5 Ways Agile Needs Managers

Bart has been in ecommerce for over 20 years, and can't imagine a better job to have. He is interested in all things agile, or anything new to learn.

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Topics: Agile, Requirements Management, Strategy, Talent Management, ProjectsAtWork

Organizations that see Agile as a way to remove a layer of management are either missing the point or at risk of missing a huge opportunity. Specifically, the role of a software development manager takes on a different and often more important role in an Agile framework.

Many executive leaders see something in an organizational Agile transformation that isn’t really there: a way to cut costs. They hear about the promise of self-organizing and self-managing teams, and they see an opportunity to eliminate people, roles and, perhaps, even entire layers of management. It seems to make sense to turn the existing product managers into product owners, the project managers into Scrum Masters, and possibly eliminate software development managers entirely. While it is true that many of the existing team members can be shifted into new roles, it’s generally wrong-headed to consider eliminating people from the teams, and a straight mapping like the above is almost certainly doomed.

It’s important to realize that the roles aren’t completely gone, but the responsibilities of the roles have changed. The position that seems to change the most is that of the traditional software development manager. Virtually all of the Agile literature completely leaves this role out of the picture, as many of the traditional tasks and responsibilities of the role are now done by the team. It would seem …

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