3 – Failing to manage the change aspect of the transformation
Has your Agile implementation failed because people are unwilling, or unable, to accept change? If you are not able to successfully manage the change aspect of the transformation, your Agile implementation is less likely to produce the desired outcome and is, therefore, unlikely to succeed. This is our sin number three.
When it comes to implementing Agile, you can put all the plans that you require in place, but in order for the change to be accepted, and ultimately adopted, you need people to act differently. In other words, you need people to change what they are doing on a day-to-day basis, so that they produce a different outcome.
4 – Failing to Scale Agile While Momentum is Present
You begin a new change project. Understandably, there are some nerves, but, there is a lot of excitement in the air about the positive change that you can create for your business. However, despite all the excitement, what ends up happening is people become focused on obstacles, the Agile implementation slows down, and
any enthusiasm that people had for the change project is quickly squandered. This is our sin number four.
It is natural for people to resist change or at best to allow change to happen slowly over an extended period of time to maintain the status quo for as long as possible. It may be that they are concerned about potential obstacles or challenges, or worried that there will be too many significant changes happening all at once.
In situations like this, it is common to want to slow the implementation down, so as to take a ‘gently, gently’ approach and, in doing so, break down all of the steps into small pieces, and roll these out slowly. Of course, people’s enthusiasm and motivation for a successful project will drop because you are not getting any of the successes, or ‘wins,’ for the change early enough for people to get excited. It is all happening very slowly.
5 – Failing to slay the sacred cows
Most businesses, regardless of size and history, have what we call ‘sacred cows.’ These are people, attitudes, equipment, systems, or other issues that people get defensive about when challenged. As a result, these are not fairly questioned or corrected and little, if anything, changes. To be considered a sacred cow, there must be some resistance associated with it. For example, if it is a minor thing, and an employee asks his colleague, “Hey! Why do we actually do this?” and the colleague replies, “Good point! Let’s stop doing it,” then it is not considered a sacred cow. There has been no resistance by anyone to stopping or changing the procedure.
Rather, sacred cows are those things that, when questioned, usually receive a response like, “Oh, we just do that around here,” or, “That’s just the way we have always done it.” You may even hear people say, “I don’t know. The guy who taught me how to do my job told me to do that, so that is what I am doing as well.” But, the thing is, if you do not challenge these phrases and ways of working, you are not transforming anything!
6 – Failing to understand the value proposition of Agile
Should you ‘do’ Agile or ‘be’ Agile? Despite what some people believe, ‘doing’ Agile is not the same as ‘being’ Agile, and understanding the differences between these two concepts is crucial. On the one hand, if you only ‘do’ Agile, then you do not necessarily understand how the fundamentals of these methods and mechanisms can help your business. Accordingly, your knowledge of how to apply them effectively can be limited. But, on the other hand, does ‘Agile’ really mean anything in itself? How can you be Agile? This is our sin number six.
The ability to do Agile is usually something that can be picked up in a two-day workshop which includes basic Scrum and Kanban training. However, if you actually want to be Agile then you must do more than just apply the practices without trying to understanding the principles behind them. You need to live and breathe Agile principles and values every day. In a sense, being Agile requires a cultural shift to an Agile mindset.