How an Agile Coach Can Save You Money
Finding the right people to complete a project can feel like a critical challenge that must be immediately resolved. It might sound like you’d be taking a step backward to first bring in an Agile coach before augmenting your staff. It may also look like an extra expense not line itemed in your budget. But, first appearances can be deceiving.
What we’ve discovered is that starting a project with an Agile coach not only adds value to your organization, but can also save you money. We help companies augment their teams for a living and understand the urgency that comes along with ramping up for a project…and we will still say that starting with a coach ultimately benefits your bottom line. Here’s why:
Reduces the Guessing Game
An Agile Coach brings years of experience in a variety of Agile practices to help you quickly evaluate the skill level of your current team and help you close gaps efficiently. They can look at individuals with past scrum experience or waterfall experience and help you fit the right team members together from the beginning.
Unbiased Perspective
Getting points across clearly and efficiently to a variety of personality types is always a challenge. Agile coaches are not only experienced with explaining things to a range of individual skill levels, but they’ve also worked with other companies dealing with change. They can see the goal on the horizon without getting wrapped up in company politics or employee management to keep everyone on task.
Skilled in Organizational Change
Coaches know how to coordinate the hybrid world of Waterfall management and iterative, Agile processes. They are wise to the best ways to balance people, processes and technology. Especially, when it’s necessary to switch gears quickly due to project changes or when the scope of work alters from the original plan. Having a coach to navigate the rough times keeps the project running smoothly, saving time and money along the way.
Access to a Depth of Resources
Agile Coaches bring with them a wealth of experience and resources to help your team ramp up quickly and maintain efficiency throughout the project. These tools will enable you to spend fewer hours working on the project, and we all know time means money.
Augment staff at a lower rate
By bringing in a coach early in your project, you’ll save money when it the time comes for staff augmentation. Your team will be in good shape for the project to begin and you’ll have a clear picture of what gaps need to be filled to bring in essential staff for shorter time periods and lower rates.
The level of Agile coaching that will work best for you depends on your organizational needs. From kick-start programs to coaching that deals with more technical parts of transformation, consider how working with a coach for a short time can save you money in the long run.
