Pursuing Timeless Agility: the Path to Lasting Agile Transformation

by Jimmie Butler

“I see so many of the challenges my organization is facing in this book…This would be a great ‘book club’ book for your product team or program managers leading Agile transformation.” Pursuing Timeless Agility: the Path to Lasting Agile Transformation confronts the “common wisdom” of today’s “Certification Economy,” challenges the prevailing mindset around what success looks like in an Agile culture, and smartly guides management, coaches, and transformation leaders toward Timeless Agility.

Why this book is different:

Agile is a mindset that enables organizations to continuously find better ways to do, experience, learn, and adjust so that they can discover and deliver the next right thing sooner. Timeless Agility is the outcome of a mindset that transcends methodology. When you pursue Timeless Agility, ”what you do matters; why you do it matters more.”

There are many Agile teams, but very few Agile organizations. This book focuses more on the Agile leadership, culture, and organization-wide coaching that is needed to reach true agility across the enterprise. An effective Agile transformation requires transforming the right things for the right reasons, on an enterprise scale. This is why management and leadership are the keys to success in Agile transformation and organizational agility.

Leadership in the most successful organizations focus more on mindset and culture transformation than specific “Agile” practices and methodologies. They understand that what the organization does, and how, will always emanate from what it values. This is why management, leadership, and Agile coaches are the primary readers of this book.

The problem:

Agile is a vital part of any digital transformation, but industry data and experience validate that Agile is broadly misunderstood in software project and product management. What many are calling Agile is not Agile. Misguided coaching and management led to the “unintentional intentional distortion of Agile”. This resulted in the propagation of misunderstanding around Agile.

How the book flows:

The first half of this book defines the problem by contrasting what Agile really is with what many think it is. It uses data to demonstrate why the reasons many choose Agile, and how they choose to “do” Agile, have strayed from the true meaning and intent of Agile. Using a series of relatable metaphorical examples and real case studies, the book helps management / leadership, coaches, and other transformation leaders understand where their current organizational values, mindset, and practices sit within that spectrum. As one reader noted, ”Reading through the book it’s easy to identify with the problems stated and then get a new perspective on the issue – and some possible solutions, or at least a new way to think about the problem.”. It highlights how following the crowd is dangerous and ineffective.

The back half of the book guides the reader through proven approaches to getting their organization (leadership, management, and teams) on track for lasting Agile transformation; for Timeless Agility. The reader will learn how to assess their starting point for Agile transformation, how to smartly transform teams and management to properly scale the Agile mindset and culture, and then how to identify and track success measures that provide useful context and value.

What Others are Saying:

”This book should be required reading for leaders looking to implement Agile in their organizations.”

”No matter at what level you work at…that is involved in any way with software development, you need to read this book.”

”I wish this book existed years ago when I worked for a company that desperately needed a culture shift.”

”Buy one book for yourself and one for your boss!”

221 pages, Paperback

Published April 23, 2019

About the author

Jimmie Butler was born in Winchester, Virginia in the Northern Shenandoah Valley where, except for a seven-year stint in the Tampa Bay Florida area, the valley is still home.

He is a strategist and trusted advisor improving how government organizations deliver digital services and mission outcomes. Over the course of a career spanning more than thirty years, he has worked across both commercial and government environments, from early-stage startups to large enterprises.

He believes government is filled with talented people who want to deliver better results but often face organizational constraints that make that difficult. Jimmie founded StrategiX to partner with government leaders and their contractors to redesign operating models to build better government together.

Jimmie is the author of Deliver What Matters and Pursuing Timeless Agility, and writes frequently about Product-Led strategy and delivery transformation.