How Agile Can Help You Build Resiliency

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Mentioning the word “Agile” these days feels like talking about sugar. It's a massive controversy, with debates and fights over its core values and effectiveness, and the number of opinions is greater than the number of actual users.

I love a good controversy and speaking about Agile, so let me be one of these people and share my perspective on that topic. You'll often see me mentioning the famous phrase "inspect and adapt," which I kind of live by, and no one still proved me wrong about its efficacy.

Agile Methodology is widely used in software development and project management to deliver high-quality products within tight deadlines. However, I believe the principles of Agile can also be applied in day-to-day life to make us more productive, efficient, and adaptable.

Using the Scrum framework, which is a widespread implementation of Agile Methodology, teams can break down large projects into smaller, manageable tasks and work in short, focused sprints to deliver incremental improvements.

Using the Agile approach in their personal lives, people can break down complex tasks into smaller, manageable parts, allowing them to focus on one thing at a time and progress toward their goals.

Sounds quite similar, right?

This framework is built around the idea of iterative and incremental development, with a focus on flexibility, collaboration, and responsiveness to change. These are common personality struggles, inevitably turning into team issues whenever a team is established. It's how people work. Bursts of motivation and energy enable the beginning of a massive project, and then fatigue and confusion slow it down or stop its progress.

Like most of us, I am a person of habit. Like less of us, I am obsessed with planning and time distribution. I am not scared to admit most of my interest in precise planning and execution came after I learned more about the Agile approach in Software. But adapting it to my lifestyle and decision-making turned out to be the game-changer.

Let me give you the most straightforward example:

Each morning my alarm rings at 6:01 AM. My goal is to arrive at the gym before 9 AM. Delivering incremental improvements in 2-Sprints time, two people and a dog established a well-managed routine.

6:35 AM: packed and ready for the dog walk

7:40 AM: arriving back at our building

7:41 AM: the automatic coffee maker starts. It needs about 5 minutes to prepare the coffee, which is the calculated mistake time of our morning walk.

7:50 - 8:30 AM: the chunk of time needed for morning coffee, lunch preps, and getting up to speed for the day.

It took us time to establish the right 'parameters' for our morning routine, but once we landed on the perfect setting, we were where need to be in the desired time frame. Staying flexible and willing to adapt the plan when required helped us narrow down the perfect time distribution in a relatively short (but effort-heavy) period.

But how about resiliency?

Agile can help individuals build resiliency by providing a framework for dealing with uncertainty, adapting to change, and staying focused on their goals. By adopting the mindset of continuous improvement without downtime, they can learn to be more open to change and better equipped to adjust their plans when unexpected events occur. This can help build resilience and reduce stress and anxiety in the face of uncertainty.

Resilience means ups and downs. If people tune themselves to accept challenges and setbacks as opportunities for growth and improvement rather than failures, they become more adept at handling adversity.

Tools that help me stay on track, reiterate, and evaluate the success of my agile missions:

• Clock and calendar: this may sound funny, but have you tried logging all your daily tasks and priorities on a calendar? If you have a day with a couple of work activities and meetings, a dentist, and a gym session, where would you put the grocery haul? Missing visibility and clarity over time would probably lead to an emergency takeaway.

• Notes app: I use my built-in notes app, but any note app is a precious asset in your pocket. Never count on remembering your idea or shopping list. We all know what happens next.

• Confluence: Yes, all day, every day. Confluence helps me keep track of either work or personal activities (and I am currently writing this article under the LinkedIn Newsletter Page Tree), and it plays the role of a second brain when the primary one is overwhelmed.

• Any data-gathering device or analytics: I use various metrics to monitor and evaluate the success of my current approach. That's a very personal preference and experience, but finding the best way to monitor and track changes will improve your overall willingness to change when you find a glitch in the Matrix.

Building the Agile mindset is not one-size-fits-all or a magic pill. But it's solid proof to yourself that change is what drives life forward.

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Not sure where to begin?

See live Agile courses near your area or get inspired by watching this webinar about Going Beyond the Team Agile Mindset.

This article is part of The Daily Walk newsletter series.

[Summer_Hogan]

This is really great information @Teodora _Old Street Solutions_Tempo_! Thank you for writing this. I have done many things like you to implement agile into my personal life. It works very well, especially as you said when you incorporate tools to help you! And I'm with you on the Notes app! I would be lost without my plethora of organized notes! I seem to have one for everything! 

[Teodora _Old Street Solutions_Tempo_]

Thank you @Summer_Hogan! I can't believe people survive without scheduling and writing everything 'on paper.' I'll probably be drowned in madness :D