Professional relationships are changing dramatically, and with them, the way companies and their employees are managed.
Organizations are flat, work is done by project, leadership has changed, and people work remotely from the most unexpected places.
That is why the challenges of the modern world, together with the introduction of digital technologies, have driven the development of new methodologies used to manage the way we work more effectively, keep employees more motivated and achieve better results in companies.
Used for project development, Agile methodologies are part of this process of change and of new ways of working and relating to each other professionally:
They were introduced in 2001, and in a short time they have been applied to different professional environments, with excellent results in many cases.
Today, Agile methodologies have broadened their scope to reach every area of business organizations, from the human resources office to the marketing or accounting department.
This has led to better planning of business productivity, starting from the ground up with the initial screening of candidates, who are expected to bring more than training and experience.
In fact, so-called soft skills are increasingly valued for middle managers and leadership positions.
This article is about Agile methodologies, their origin, their benefits and how implementing them in the business ecosystem has increased productivity and organizational effectiveness in a context shaped by talent acquisition and adapting to change.
· What are Agile methodologies?
Agile methodologies are an organizational philosophy aimed at improving and optimizing the processes that take place in a company through a set of approaches designed to optimize the quality and efficiency with which products are created.
This premise includes hiring staff with a competent work profile, changes to company structures or hierarchies, and working by objectives or projects.
The Agile discipline has technological roots; in fact, it was born in 2001 in the context of software design.
That was when a group of programmers met in Utah (United States) to reach a consensus on each company’s best practices and create the Agile Manifesto.
From that moment on, the linear work model was transformed into a more dynamic model that has brought many benefits to organizations. That is precisely why it has gradually spread to other sectors and business models.
· Values of Agile methodologies
Agile methodologies are based on the following principles:
· Their business vision focuses on people, their interactions and actions, so individuals take priority over tools or processes
· Communication and collaboration with the customer become more important than contract negotiation
· Processes are neither static nor tied to a rigid plan; instead, they can quickly adapt to whatever changes are needed
· Benefits of Agile methodologies
Agile methodologies offer a wide range of benefits, including:
· Improved productivity. The Agile methodology proposes step-by-step, incremental productivity, where objectives are set in advance and build on one another as they are achieved. It also focuses on allocating resources better and managing processes more dynamically.
· Higher product quality. This is achieved because processes are controlled individually and in stages, which makes it possible to optimize them fully and improve their performance.
· Greater control over protocols: methodologies and ways of working are shared so they can be studied in detail. The results of this study are also shared, so problems can be analyzed and solutions found more dynamically.
· A smaller margin of error in processes. With Agile methodologies, risk management is much simpler. Because processes are broken down into shorter stages, errors can be detected much earlier and corrected quickly.
· Greater commitment. Hiring competent staff and assigning responsibilities based on evidence lead to greater employee commitment to the stage of the process they are in charge of.
· Greater final satisfaction. All these benefits lead to a better final product. The aim is for it to meet the needs of all stakeholders, including customers, employees and the company.
· Types of Agile methodologies
The types of Agile methodologies used in the workplace are:
► Lean:
This approach is based on continuous improvement.
Also known as the lean method, it was founded on the Kaizen philosophy, and its goal is to deliver a quality product using as few resources as possible.
It also achieves a high level of commitment by decentralizing responsibilities and decision-making. This methodology was driven by Toyota executive Taiichi Ohno.
► Kanban:
This methodology is based on flexibility and simple communication within teams.
Like the Lean method, its goal is continuous improvement, with all staff taking part to deliver work on time.
This approach was popularized by American David Anderson, although it actually originated in Japan.
► Scrum:
Also of Japanese origin, this approach is based on delivering work regularly so the customer gets an early impression of the final product.
Tasks are distributed among all staff and reviewed regularly, which reduces the likelihood of errors.
In fact, the role of Scrum Manager has become popular among organizations that apply this methodology.
· How to apply Agile methodologies in a company
Companies can use several Agile methodologies at the same time, since they can be applied across the organization and involve several departments.
In the end, the point is for the different groups to be aligned and integrated into a business philosophy that reflects those famous words: mission, vision and values.
In any case, people play a central role in Agile methodologies, which is why their philosophy has taken hold in modern human resources offices.
Below, we review some of the Agile strategies used in HR.
· Creating multidisciplinary teams where all employees act in a coordinated way and communicate smoothly about a specific task
· Breaking processes down into continuously monitored stages. This shortens response time by making errors more likely to be detected
· Setting short, continuous delivery deadlines for early testing of the product
· Holding daily meetings to discuss the objectives achieved, the goals still to be met, and to identify situations that stand in the way of reaching them. In this space, employees have the opportunity to learn the status of every stage of the process and can make suggestions for reaching the goals. New ideas are always welcome.
· Training the supervisors of each process so they act as coaches rather than bosses. Business coaching methodologies, which are highly effective in individual cases, have a lot to say and do in this area.
· Encouraging collaboration between employees through a system of commitment generated at each stage of the process.
· Promoting ongoing education and training at every level of the company. This is a necessity imposed by the VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous) environment in which organizations operate today.
· Working on a strong company brand that attracts people with the right work profile. This is where the new leaders have a lot to say: communicators, empathetic people, good listeners and those who can recover from crises in an agile and successful way. Approachable business leaders who lead by example and work in flat, global structures.
· Conclusions
The linear, hierarchy-based business model is now a thing of the past, and Agile methodologies are emerging as a very attractive alternative for business management.
Many of the companies and startups being founded today are organized around Agile methodologies, and this structure gives them a better chance of adapting more efficiently to the constant changes in modern society.
That is why this philosophy has become a way of working, thinking and acting.
It increases the effectiveness and efficiency of the processes carried out within organizations, both small and large, and this translates into a healthy bottom line for the company as well as for its suppliers and customers.
These new ways of organizing work fit well with other workplace trends: in the benefits of remote work for companies you can see how they complement each other, and if you are looking for tools to manage your projects with the Agile methodology, you will find several options in the 6 best project management systems.
This approach has also given rise to Agile marketing, which applies frameworks such as Scrum to marketing teams.