The possibilities of Hybrid-Agile

Agile Delivery
Written By Janet McNaughtan

30th October, written by Sophie MacIntyre.

The key to making agile work for your business, is ensuring that you are able to identify what forms and processes of a more agile structure will suit your organisations requirements. Like all management, agile is adaptable and comes with a variety of different formats. For some businesses, a fully agile transformation might not suit your goals and outcomes, which is why a hybrid model approach is becoming increasingly popular.

The hybrid model is agile delivery within a traditional waterfall, programme or project management structure. When you are delivering a programme or portfolio of work there might be a minimum set of products and features you want to deliver within a planned budget and time-frame. This is when a ‘pure’ agile model may not work.

Within a hybrid model you are able to give senior leadership reassurance that they are getting their value for money. And, when they want confirmation that work is progressing and delivering effectively, you may be more capable to offer insights. This framework also works well when an organisation wants to a staggered release of funds, as it ensures that benefits and deliverables are well defined.

As variations of agile continue to grow, we understand that it can get a little confusing. So, here’s a break down of how the hybrid model could work;

  • A programme business case will outline their scope, budget, defined outcomes, benefits and estimated timeline.

  • Work is bundled into projects, with defined deliverables, benefits and costs for each one. Funds are approved, and released in said bundles.

  • Delivery is agile with each defined product. An example of which could be an online request form, this form may not have detailed requirements, instead there will be a minimum set of features that will be delivered in sprints.

  • Programmes that operate a hybrid model often have 6-week to 3-month release cycles, with each of those releases containing a number of product features.

Overall, taking a hybrid agile approach will offer the advantage of providing an overarching structure which gives the leadership team a stronger sense of assurance that it will deliver.

Janet McNaughtan