What is a no-go zone for agile consultants, and why?
Value Glide agile consultants will not take on work that we cannot deliver.
Our industry has a lot of agile consultants who overcommit and under deliver, which has led to a trough of disillusionment (Gartner Hype Cycle) in the past. People who are looking to serve hours and get paid rather than focus on delivering the most valuable, critical outcomes for clients.
If we aren’t able to deliver the outcomes our clients need, we will let them know upfront and bow out for someone else to take over.
Taking on work without a clear understanding of the context.
If an agile consultant proceeds to implement agile without having a clear understanding of the business context, the challenges faced, and the objectives and outcomes that most matter to the organization, that would be a red flag.
Discovery is an important element of every agile consulting engagement and it is critical that an agile consultant has a firm grasp on the problem, and a clear understanding of what the organization are attempting to achieve.
You can’t design an experiment or develop a hypothesis without a firm grasp of the problem.
A one-size-fits-all approach.
An agile consultant may favour a specific agile framework such as SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) or LeSS (Large Scale Scrum) because they have a lot of success with that framework, but that doesn’t mean that the framework is the solution to every problem.
If all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.
A fixed mindset with an unwillingness to consider all the options available to a client, including which agile framework best fits their application, is another red flag.
Value Glide work with several agile frameworks, including Scrum and Kanban in addition to SAFe, but our focus lies in understanding what would be the best fit for our client. On rare occasions, it turns out that we aren’t best suited to help them and we acknowledge that with a recommendation to our potential client that someone else, or a different framework, is a better fit for their application.
Beware of agile consultants who insist that their way is the only way. Agile, at it’s very core, is about discovering and cocreating the best solution rather than attempting to force square pegs into round holes.
Agile dogma.
Another red flag is an agile consultant who is all about the textbook.
They tell people what they aren’t doing correctly and insist that there is only one way to achieve an outcome. They are purists through and through and anything that deviates from the agile dogma is heresy.
Agile is the starting point. It is based on values and principles, rather than rigid rules and robust steps to be followed. The whole point of the ideology, in combination with lightweight agile frameworks, is to empower teams and organizations to discover what works best in their unique application and context.
Sure, there are great ways to kick off an agile consulting engagement but you are immediately following empirical process control (empiricism) in that you are developing a hypothesis, designing an experiment to validate or invalidate that hypothesis, and using the data you gather to inform how you adapt and evolve.
If there was a proven formula to success, everyone would do it.
A great agile consultant will meet the client where they are, define where they are attempting to go next, and help them forge a path from here to there.
It isn’t about creating an environment that is 100% agile, from top to bottom, before you can commence. It’s a process of discovery and a willingness to continuously improve based on what you have learned and what the data or evidence is suggesting.
Agility will come, it is in the doing, in the messy work of moving forward, that we discover the best solutions for ourselves, our organization, and our clients.
So, avoid agile dogma like the plague.
These are the 3 no-go zones for agile consultants, in my opinion, and I would recommend that you consider alternative options if your current agile consultant embraces any of these approaches.
About Value Glide
Value Glide are a SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework) consultancy, coaching practice, and training specialist who work with organizations to align business objectives with customer needs and wants.
As deeply experienced agile coaches and practitioners, our team are invested in continuous learning through each client engagement and use the data and evidence we gather from each implementation to inform our training, coaching, and consulting services.
In a nutshell, empirical process control or empiricism.
If you are thinking of adopting agile within your organization and have identified SAFe as a great agile framework to adopt, implement and improve your business agility, visit our SAFe Quickstart ART Launch program page or view our SAFe Consulting Services page.
If you have identified a need for an agile coach and SAFe coach to help your organization adopt and implement SAFe, visit our SAFe Coaching Services page.
If you want to know more about SAFe and how to lead SAFe, visit our SAFE Training page for a host of options, from Leading SAFe to a SAFe Release Train Engineer course.
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