It’s not as hard as you might think to get leadership teams (and others) engaged in the effort to adopt a more Agile way of doing things, even if you’re not a master diplomat or influencer. In fact, in most organizations, the mechanisms are in place already – they just need to be utilized more intentionally as data-driven Agile advocacy.
Whatever your method for piquing the curiosity of others and jiggling the status quo around a bit, here’s the path to successfully gaining momentum, interest, and buy-in outside your own organizational solar system:
- Find your advocates.
- Start small.
- Collect data.
- Demonstrate early wins.
Optional: Ply them with designer donuts.
Few things are more convincing to a leadership team than solid, positive results based in reliable data. Ask yourself what mechanisms and tools you have at your disposal to demonstrate to others in their native language that it’s hard not to get good results while working under the influence of Agile.
You can leverage existing mechanisms such as RAG status read-outs (Red/Amber/Green), leadership syncs, monthly PRB’s (Project or Product Review Board), or a bi-weekly Sprint Reviews to demonstrate with confidence the improvements in delivery, predictability, and quality.
You can also take advantage of the tools and techniques that are more familiar to the uninitiated (Gantt charts, resource plans, budgeting, forecasting tools) to help them visualize how things have changed since adopting a more Agile approach.
Then ask yourself what you need from them so that once you’ve got their attention, you can let them know exactly what they can do to help. How can you make it crystal clear, extremely comfortable, and very easy for them to take a first baby step? Soon they will be bought in, and then you have another advocate.
Contact our team for help gaining momentum with agility at your organization.
