The Role of an Agile Coach

Applies to: Agile

Authors: Greg Smith and Ahmed Sidky

Get this book in Print, PDF, ePub and Kindle at manning.com. Use code “MSDN37a” to save 37%.

This topic contains the following sections.

• Attributes of a Good Coach
• Training and Mentoring the Core Team
• Copyright

A few months ago, Greg was contacted by a friend with a problem. The friend had let a compliance project slip through the cracks. The compliance deadline was year-end, which was a mere five weeks away. Failure to comply could mean serious governmental repercussions. Greg’s friend asked for help in creating an Agile team and doing an Agile project in the following 5 weeks.

This would be a great time for us to tout how Agile came in and saved the day, but that would be a lie. Greg did help his friend prioritize his work and make the deadline, and they did follow some Agile principles along the way, but they didn’t put an Agile team or process in place. Why? Because it takes time to establish an Agile methodology. Teams need time to feel comfortable with Agile processes, and they need time to learn how to interact with each other. Managers need time to learn how to lead in an Agile environment. The team needs to use an Agile process for several months, and then major benefits will begin to become apparent.

Migrating to Agile means more than changing your process. It also requires a change in culture. For most companies, changing culture is the most difficult part. We believe this is true for several reasons:

• Regardless of whether it’s successful, companies get comfortable with their existing development process.

• Many people still believe that requirements change because they’re poorly managed. They can’t comprehend a process that embraces changing requirements.

• Most managers have been trained to control events. Empowering the development team to deliver and co-own the project isn’t intuitive for managers.

• In larger companies, whole groups are dedicated to regulating and overseeing projects. An Agile team has less need for these services, so some employees may feel that their jobs are threatened.

There are numerous other reasons, but we believe these are at the center of the issue.

You should address these issues in two ways. First, you must address the culture needs of each group head-on. We’ll show you how to do that in this book by laying out a game plan for obtaining support from line management, the team, the individual, and executive management.

Second, you must establish practices that foster an Agile culture. Practices such as high customer involvement, testing early, and collaborative decision making promote an Agile mentality throughout the company. You’ll see these practices as we follow the case study through the pilot project. The information in this chapter establishes the foundation that allows an Agile process to thrive (see Figure 7.1). Similar to software development, if you get a good foundation in place, everything else is easier to do. If you don’t, you’ll fight the foundation with every change you make. Let’s start by looking at the skills required for a good Agile coach.

Figure 7.1 An Agile culture is established when three major groups come together within a company. Executive management endorses the agile principles, working managers learn to coach instead of direct, and the project team understands and supports agile principles and practices.

The goal of this book is to convert you and your company into a self-reliant team that can design and maintain your own development process. But out of the gate, you’ll have limited knowledge of Agile, and you’ll be looking for good leadership and guidance from an Agile coach.

You use a coach to help you understand where you can become more Agile, how to address your constraints, and to train your team on Agile principles and practices. Let’s start by discussing how to find an Agile coach that meets your unique needs.

Attributes of a Good Coach

We’ve worked with several good coaches. Here are some of the areas to consider when you’re looking for a coach:

• Find a coach with proven results and references. A good coach has experience in several industries with several flavors of Agile. You should be able to speak to their references and validate that value was provided.

• Don’t hire a company, hire a person. People often ask us for advice in selecting Agile consulting companies. In our experience, the quality and experience of individuals within a company can vary greatly. When you need help, you can look at companies; but identify and assess the specific individual who will potentially be working with you.

• Avoid a cookie-cutter approach. Some individuals may tell you that one flavor of Agile works for everyone. Some companies only support migration to Scrum. In our opinion, Scrum may work for you, but a consultant should evaluate your circumstances before committing to an approach. A good coach will help you evaluate your circumstances before committing to an approach.

• What about certification?. A certificate does not validate a coach’s skills, but it shows their dedication to their occupation. For the most part, certification is lacking in the Agile community today, but ScrumMaster certification and other credentials are available. Recently, the University of Washington opened an Agile certificate program.

• Is chemistry important?. When you interview a potential coach, you’ll get a feel for whether you click with them and whether their approach to migration makes sense to you. Regardless of credentials, you should be wary of selecting someone you aren’t comfortable with.

• Soft skills are critical for a coach. You should select a coach who can motivate and inspire all the personality types on your team. They should have good interaction skills.

• Find someone you already know and trust. Acme Media was lucky enough to have a connection to a good Agile coach before the company began its search. If you don’t know anyone personally, you may have friends at other companies who have moved to Agile, and they may be able to provide recommendations.

Johanna Rothman, a well-respected Agile coach and consultant, recommends that a coaching engagement should always have a deadline so the team doesn’t become reliant on the coach. This is a great recommendation, and we agree with it. We often see the coach and core-team leader working together initially; the coach becomes less involved as the team matures.

Now, let’s discuss how an Agile coach will help you.

Training and Mentoring the Core Team

Your company will need some level of training to begin your move to Agile. You may have enough experience in-house to lead your migration, but it’s helpful to obtain a third party to coach your team and provide an outside perspective. By using a third party, you also demonstrate that management is neutral and open to new ideas.

Training should happen within a few days of the kickoff with the core team. Determining the level of training is tricky. You want to provide enough information so the team understands the Agile principles and their value. But you don’t want to train to the point that you hand them a methodology—especially somebody else’s. The team should combine Agile principles with their knowledge of your business to create a methodology that is effective for your company.

You and your coach must use your own judgment to decide how deeply to train your core team. The assessment in will help here, allowing your coach to understand the existing level of Agile knowledge, practices, and culture within your company. Here is our suggested outline for training:

• Explain to the team where Agile came from, what makes it works, places where it’s working, and why it hasn’t faded away. This training should be focused around the Agile principles and understanding how Agile improves the process. It will allow them to envision how to create and test a more Agile lifecycle. It will also show them how Agile practices tie to principles.

• Give the team a few days to absorb the principles, and then train them on the phases of Agile.

• Use the case study in this book, along with your coach’s knowledge, to quantify what Agile looks like in practice.

After training is complete, the team will work with your coach and begin the design process by documenting the existing processes.

Note

Do You Really Need Training and Coaching?

Many people believe they can do their own training on Agile, using books or in-house knowledge. We’ve worked in environments where the team had good Agile knowledge, but in most instances we recommend going with some level of Agile coaching.

When Greg worked for the Seattle Times, his team started a migration to Agile with two team members who had worked on an Agile migration at another company. These team members provided mentoring and guidance to other team members, but they still decided to bring Jim Highsmith in for basic Agile training and to provide coaching as they created their custom process. This worked well because the team respected Jim, and the team tapped into his breadth of Agile knowledge when considering practices and techniques.

A coach can be expensive, and you’ll want to use your coaching hours effectively. In our experience, we’ve provided coaching during initial training and then returned one or two weeks later to answer team questions and do more detailed training related to Agile practices. We’ve also provided a lot of coaching via telephone and email, which holds down travel-related charges.

Next, you need to prepare your line management team. Let’s look at how things change for managers in an Agile environment.

Previous article: Create Your Own Flavor to Become Agile within Your Constraints

Continue on to the next article: Agile Management

Copyright

©2009 by Manning Publications Co. All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without prior written permission of the publisher.