The Agile manifesto is ….

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Working software over comprehensive documentation

Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

When I first read this it felt a little hippy to me, I imagined a 1970s office full of scruffy looking programmers wearing flares and stroking their badly trimmed beards. I was fully behind the concept of rapid application development, in particular in a Microsoft Dynamics CRM context. But it has taken time for me to buy into the Agile mantra.

I am however a convert and will encourage everyone involved in CRM projects to read and re-read the statements above and ponder how they apply to their world.

Agile is about trying to focus your projects on what matters. That being the outcomes of the project and not the governance. Prince 2 and other Waterfall style approaches are heavy on governance whilst Agile has a focus on results. Governance in many organisations has become a blocker to success.

Introducing an Agile approach means taking each of these statements and drilling down to understand what it means in your organisation on a day to day basis.

A simple starting point for implementing Agile might be to get this manifesto printed on some large posters and have them displayed in all of your meeting areas. You need to encourage all staff involved in projects to live and breath these guiding principles or Agile will simply not work. So having them prominently displayed would not be a bad start!