dcpatton

Tim Drury of Bright Green Projects recently penned a post about A Very Long (Agile) Engagement. In it he makes some excellent points about why it is in a consultant’s interest to secure very long client engagements, thus breaking the sell-deliver-signoff cycle of short consulting engagements. I encourage you to read it. One point that I found intriguing is the idea of the Agile Agents. These are client employees who are searching for new requirements based on the agile model of the business process. Then they rely on the consultants to quickly implement the new requirements which opens up the opportunity for the Agile Agents to discover more improvements to the business.

It is an interesting idea; although, I am not sure Tim has convinced us of the need for the consultants to action the backlog. Based on my own agile project experience, I believe it is based on their ability to deliver code in an agile environment. Thus, making it a win-win situation for both the client and the consultant. Perhaps Tim will have a follow-up post to detail that part.

In turning the multi-client sell-deliver-signoff cycle into a single client sell-deliver cycle, one aspect of Agile which can help turn those employees into Agile Agents is that by being on the same team and interacting daily with the consulting developers, the employees may discover new business requirements faster. For example, new ideas for features or new products can be put forward during the sprints that may never be discovered otherwise. These ideas that occur “in the moment” are often forgotten otherwise and never make it out of the team in a legacy methodology.

Have you seen any businesses who have changed employee roles to take advantage of the Agile Development Methodology? If so, I’d love to hear about it.