Confession: I love Agile marketing.
Another confession: I am not currently practicing Agile marketing.
Yes, that’s odd. Here’s the deal:
I was first introduced to Agile project management in 2009. I was working at a software company and was involved in a project to rewrite a client/server application to for the web. I was a junior marketing associate providing graphics support for some of the UI elements.
It was my first exposure to anything other than waterfall project management. I was instantly intrigued by the Agile methodology. In particular, we were using Scrum.
That project was so well organized and executed, that when I went back to work on regular marketing projects, I was frustrated.
The marketing team was managing by spreadsheets. We had no project management tool or methodology to speak of, but we were also a team of just 3 people. Since everything was contained within our group and we spoke literally hourly, nothing slipped through the cracks.
Still, though, I had seen the light and wanted to get back to it.
Fast forward seven years. I had changed companies and found myself on a 17-person marketing team. There were sub teams – content, events, design, operations. It was a start-up and the pace of work was crazy-rapid. We were using Asana as a PM tool, and it helped organize and communicate about work in progress, but it was not designed to help us plan, estimate or iterate.
A new hire came on board and suggested that Agile practices could help the team be more efficient. I helped him champion the cause.
It started slowly. Agile is a mix of funny words and it feels awkward at first. It took a while to hit our stride.
Within about 6 months, though we were successfully operating in Agile and it was F-A-B-U-L-O-U-S! We planned and estimated. We executed and closed out. We retro-ed. (Is that a word?)
Today I am on a team of 10 and we are not using Agile, but I can see it on the horizon. Right now, we default to waterfall. We currently have two sub-teams, but we are still able to meet as a group weekly. We use Clubhouse as a PM tool, but only for execution management.
My gut is telling me that once we have three sub teams and add 2-3 more people, we will hit that critical number.
At 13 people, full team tactical meetings will be counter-productive. Rather, sub-team meetings will be the norm.
Timing will become more crucial with the increased volume of work, so sprints will be used to schedule content creation in advance of design, with design feeding operations.
Estimates will need to be created so that projects pass from sub-team to sub-team on schedule.
In short, I feel that 12-13 people is the critical mass for when Agile marketing becomes a necessity. I’m not saying you can’t do it before then, but that’s when I feel it goes from ‘nice to have’ to ‘gotta have.’
I’m anticipating that day with joy.
What do you think the tipping point is?
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