Page - 227 - in The Future of Software Quality Assurance

The Why, How and What ofAgile Transformations 227 andprevailingvaluesandnorms.Makesure, therefore, that the transformationto agile ismuchbroader than just theprocessside. 7 Conclusion Agile goes beyond a wish for novelty. Agile working is often started because the market and the environment require more speed and agility than can currently be delivered. Something therefore has to change. Generally, a number of pilots or initial projects are cautiously started. Once confidence has been established, the strategic choice is quickly made to switch completely to agile. This doesn’t just happeninsmallercompanies. Increasingly,largeorganisationsarealsoswitchingto agileasstandard.Anumberofmultinationals,banks,manufacturingcompaniesand telecom giants are currently carrying out transformations in which agile working will becomean importantbasis for the future. Whatdoesworkwell inpracticeis tostructurethetransitiontoagileasaseparate change process. The first step in such a transformation consists of strategy and planning. Questions are answered such as: Why do we want/need to change, what will theorganisationlooklikeinthefuture,whataregoodobjectives,whatproblems have we solved? And naturallyalso: What is the business case for this change, and what does the planning look like? Such questions sometimes do not seem very ‘agile’ at first glance, but practice has shown that an agile transformation begins byfirst properlyadapting to thecurrent situation. Implementing an agile transformation is not an easy task. What usually starts with a single agile team soon results in all fixed values being called into question. Despite the good intentions, organisations regularly find themselves mired in an agile transformation. At the same time they often have no choice but to attempt it, since themarketdemandsfar-reachingagilityandspeed.Doingnothingis therefore not an option. Lessons learned and mistakes from the past can help make agile transformationsrunbetter and faster. An agile transformation is best carriedout via a step-by-step rhythmof iterative changes, i.e. agile isbest introducedagilely!