Is Agile Actually Agile For Non-IT Teams?

Agile values and principles were mentioned in the Agile Manifesto, since 2001. From that time, Agile has become the standard and widespread process in software development. According to survey, one third of all software projects uses Agile methodology for their Organizations.

Agile Methodology is being used by the software development teams on a regular basis. Innumerable Organizations included Agile methodology to improve their versatility and delivery speed. Every department in an Organization have successfully scaled Agile. Agile has already gained prominence in marketing, education, and even auto manufacturing.

This methodology is better for a person who has a technical background. If you are a non-IT team member who wants to adopt the Agile methodology, then you may look for change and this is good as “Change is Nature’s Policy”. The reason for ‘change’ varies from person to person. Adapting to the Agile mindset differs for team members. For a “tech-savvy”, it is easy to imbibe the concepts quickly. Gripping the Agile values can help your Organization improve.

To encourage non-IT teams to integrate Agile with their processes, you first need to demonstrate the importance of Agile. Not only that, you need to convince them to develop an Agile mindset. Agile is being constantly innovated, keeping the aspects of software in mind. It renders a superior method of collaborative process management, which is applicable across many Organizations.

Agile – What?

Before delving deeper, you should explain the basics of Agile to non- ITans. Agile has in practice since 2001. The purpose to develop an Agile is a –step-by-step approach to software delivery. Instead of a piecemeal approach to form a single final product, Agile promotes iterative development process. Here, the user requirements are divided into “user stories”. User stories are the smaller segments of user functionalities. These functionalities are then given priorities and delivered in short cycles, which are known as iterations.

Priorities are given by “planning poker” activity. In this activity, priority cards are distributed among the team members and accordingly, priorities are decided. Iterations are called as Sprints. In each and every module, a Sprint cycle is formed. Agile process requires communication between the experts, who are working together as well as between the developers,testers and users who can give feedback on sprint.

he flexibility and simplicity of Agile are the main advantages in the software and other industries. So, if you are working in the industry like marketing company, the sales department or if you are the responsible person to manage programs in government firms, Agile methodologies can make your techno life easier. You can use the following Agile Practices which are described in the agile frameworks in particular:

• Create a list of priority work items which is called backlog in the scrum. Creating a list of items will help you and your team decide which items to work on first. 
• Write short descriptions about the work to do, in a few sentences which are called user stories. User stories are often written on index cards or sticky notes and arranged on walls to assist planning and discussion. This will allow you and your team members to agree on how to complete the work. 
• Prepare your charts on the walls, which  includes columns such as to-do tasks, in progress, stopped and completed tasks. This way, the team and the stakeholders can track the progress as well and can have a global view of the tasks to be performed.

• Set a short period which is usually of 2 to 3 weeks or more, to do the basic task (user stories) and make sure it is done in the allotted time. 
• Arrange daily standup meetings of 5-10 minutes where the team members can check the progress, discuss problems and find suitable solutions. Daily stand-up meetings allow the team members to stay up-to-date. 
• Organise retroactive meetings when there is a need to discuss over sprint to know what went wrong and how to avoid it in future.

Clearly, the above methodologies can help you improve the collaboration among your team members. Tech teams apply and use this frameworks to do their tasks. But as a non-IT team, always try to mend the things and adapt according to the need, for your business and offices.