Effective communication is a crucial element of any successful project development team but it is especially critical for Agile ones. If you’re considering using Agile development for a project, one of the most important things to understand about Agile is how crucial communication is to the success of Agile teams.
Before we dive into different communication strategies let’s cover why communication is such an important part of successful Agile development.
Why Communication Is So Important for Agile Teams
All of the 12 core principles of Agile rely on effective communication in some way but there are three in particular that depend on effective communication.
Principle 4: Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project
You might have heard of these daily meetings referred to as “daily scrums”, aptly named by the Scrum framework or “daily standups” as they are referred to by the Extreme Programming Framework.
Daily meetings with your coworkers might sound like a way to fast track ruining the working relationships of you and your team but when done right can actually do the opposite and be the key to smoother, more streamlined development and minimizing misunderstandings and miscommunications.
Daily meetings in Agile are not meant to be long and drawn out and instead ideally last 15 minutes or less where people give short updates about what they’re working on, discuss any issues they’ve run into, and make sure everyone is on the same page [2].
During these meetings, team members not only need to be able to clearly and concisely summarize their current status and what they’ve been working on, but also be able to discuss any issues and work collaboratively with the rest of the team to address them [2].
Principle 11: The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams
Not all Agile teams are completely self-organizing and by definition every self-organizing team works differently. It is a very broad term and encompasses a wide variety of team organization and management styles, but one thing they all have in common is a fundamental need for clear, open communication in order to be successful [3] [5].
Self-organizing teams are all about shifting the responsibility of planning and scheduling the work that needs to be done, as well as shifting the role of the project manager to help facilitate that process rather than dictate what needs to be done when.
Even for experienced self-organizing teams, effective communication is essential as team members need to keep each other up to date with what they’re doing on the project, what needs to be done, and engage in planning and scheduling each aspect of the project [3].
Without clear, frequent communication a self-organizing team is bound to quickly deteriorate into chaos and confusion.
Principle 12: at regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly
If you’ve been looking at Agile you’ve probably come across the word retrospective. The retrospective was created by the Scrum framework but other frameworks have similar review meetings to serve the same core purpose but at different times in the development process.
For the sake of simplicity, I’ll be using the term retrospective to refer to the review meetings used by the many different Agile frameworks.
Retrospectives are an important aspect of Agile methodologies meant to improve team collaboration and improve the development process. It generally involves the team meeting after a set development period, such as a sprint, and discussing what went well, what didn’t, and what can be done to improve and streamline the development process [4].
However, without proper communication retrospectives can not just be a waste of time but can actually end up harming the team’s cohesion and efficiency.
A primary goal of retrospectives is to give team members an opportunity to bring up and discuss issues or obstacles they have run into or noticed during the development process. For this to happen team has to have a dynamic where members feel comfortable participating and speaking up about issues and are able to collaboratively work toward a solution.
Fostering that environment is an important part of your role as an Agile project manager and without it the positive benefits of retrospectives will likely be minimal.
Another possible impact of not having effective team communication is that instead of discussing and addressing challenges collaboratively it can instead end up being a platform for assigning blame and pointing fingers [5].
This is another place where you as an Agile project manager can help steer the focus of the retrospective towards problem solving instead of assigning blame. Ideally these kinds of issues would be addressed and solved by the team but if that isn’t working it might be time for you to take a more active role and address the issue with the team member in a one-on-one setting [1] [4].
Keys to Successful Agile Communication
Agile certainly puts an emphasis on communication and without it Agile teams cannot function effectively, but good Agile communication involves applying the exact same principles needed for good communication in general.
With that being said there are still some key aspects you as an aspiring Agile project manager can keep in mind to help you and your team work and communicate effectively.
Have a purpose for communicating and make sure to communicate that purpose. For those new to Agile daily standups, retrospectives, and the general emphasis on close collaboration can feel stifling and like they are being asked to engage in them for no other reason than its what an Agile team does.
Every communication should have a clear purpose that everyone on the team understands and if it isn’t adding a tangible benefit for the team, you and your team can discuss whether you really need to continue it [5].
Clearly communicate expectations. This is especially important to remember when making the switch from traditional project management to Agile. When using an Agile methodology, the roles and responsibilities of both you as the project manager and your team are different than they are in traditional project management.
The team members are expected to take more active roles and participate in things like project planning which they may not be used to doing and you the project manager instead step back and work as more of a guide and facilitator.
In order for that shift to be made successfully, and for the team to continue working smoothly, expectations need to be clearly communicated. This doesn’t just mean expectations for when or what work gets done, although it may often include that, but also clear expectations for things like participation in meetings and general communication guidelines [5].
Be honest and transparent. Agile works most effectively when everyone involved is upfront and honest with their communications. Team members should feel able and encouraged to speak honestly, especially when it comes to bringing up concerns or problems they have encountered [5].
Summary
The importance of effective communication in Agile project management cannot really be overstated. A core tenant of Agile is frequent communication and collaboration, including reviews and revisions to improve the team’s development process.
Good communication is critical to this process and without it Agile teams can start to fall apart. The keys to good Agile communication are to communicate for a specific purpose, clearly state expectations for things like communication, and work to be honest and transparent.
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