We precocious introduced you to the Agile Marketing Navigator, a flexible model for navigating agile selling for marketers, by marketers successful the article A caller mode to navigate agile marketing. The navigator has 4 large components: Collaborative Planning Workshop, Launch Cycle, Key Practices and Roles. Within these categories, determination are respective sub-pieces for implementation.
In caller articles we covered the archetypal 3 components. Now we’re going to dive into our last halt connected your agile selling journey—Roles.
Six agile selling roles
The navigator identifies six agile selling roles, whereas Scrum has lone 3 named roles. We’re not trying to overcomplicate roles, but we’ve expanded our explanation of agile roles to spell beyond conscionable the team. The roles that enactment the squad indispensable besides beryllium versed successful agile selling and cognize their responsibilities. In my acquisition with Scrum, we often hide astir everyone extracurricular the squad — and those radical deliberation that agile is lone for the team.
Over the adjacent respective weeks, we’ll heavy dive into each of these roles and wherefore they are significant. Of people a model lone scrapes the aboveground of these roles and isn’t intended to beryllium a broad occupation description. That’s wherever your enactment and its uniqueness acceptable into the mix; but what our model does supply is simply a baseline of what’s expected from these roles successful agile marketing.
Role #1: The Team
Today we’re going to dive into our archetypal role, the squad itself. If you’ve worked connected an agile squad successful the past, the relation of a squad subordinate doesn’t alteration overmuch contempt the model used. However, we’ll refresh you connected what makes up a bully agile squad versus 1 that whitethorn not beryllium acceptable up for success.
Who should (and shouldn’t) beryllium connected an agile selling team?
When getting started with agile marketing, a bully squad enactment is going to beryllium cardinal to your success. I’ve seen a batch of variations of what radical telephone an agile “team” truthful let’s statesman with who should and shouldn’t beryllium connected your team.
Should:
- People who are getting their hands soiled and are “doers” of the enactment — specified arsenic contented writers, SEO specialists, graphic designers, bundle developers, analytics, etc.
Shouldn’t:
- People who are managing the enactment of others, but not really doing it themselves. We person different relation for them called “Practice Leads” which volition get into successful the coming weeks.
It’s truly communal for everyone to privation to beryllium connected the agile team, however, successful bid to summation the autonomy and ownership that are halfway tenets of agile marketing, the squad needs to beryllium made up of radical who are really getting the enactment done and who tin collaborate with each different without idiosyncratic telling them however to bash it.
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Cross-functional teams vs. functional teams
In agile marketing, a cross-functional squad is the perfect setup. This means that you person a premix of roles that tin get a portion of enactment delivered from end-to-end without having to spell to different team.
If you’re gathering web landing pages, you’ll astir apt request a designer, a writer and a developer to implicit the work. The magic lies successful having those roles moving together, day-in and day-out, and knowing the full portion of enactment from commencement to finish. That means being capable to rapidly present lawsuit value.
A functional team, specified arsenic a squad of designers, whitethorn summation immoderate benefits from agility, but determination are limitations. While immoderate companies don’t person afloat buy-in and request to commencement this way, they volition find themselves incapable to present worth independently. A graphic plan squad whitethorn go truly businesslike and collaborative, but without the different roles, their enactment sits similar inventory connected a shelf.
Self-organizing marketers
Becoming self-organizing marketers is the extremity with agile marketing. This means that the squad serves much arsenic consultants to stakeholders, having an progressive accidental successful ideation astir the selling that needs to happen.
To go self-organizing, leaders indispensable spot the squad and let them to fail. This tin beryllium truly hard successful a traditionally-run culture, but erstwhile the squad is freed and feels psychologically harmless to springiness their opinions, much originative selling happens.
T-shaped marketers
On an agile team, we look to make T-shaped marketers, meaning you person your halfway specialty but tin assistance successful a fewer different areas. While your occupation whitethorn beryllium a graphic designer, if you tin edit transcript to determination the enactment along, past you’re helping the team, not conscionable staying successful your lane. An agile marketer knows and understands everything that has to hap to get enactment done, not conscionable a azygous portion of the puzzle.
Working connected an agile squad is rewarding and empowering. You get to person a overmuch larger portion successful the wide lawsuit experience. Next week we’ll excavation into the relation of Marketing Owner (which is really a portion of the team).
Opinions expressed successful this nonfiction are those of the impermanent writer and not needfully MarTech. Staff authors are listed here.
About The Author
Stacey knows what it’s similar to beryllium a marketer, aft all, she’s 1 of the fewer agile coaches and trainers that got her commencement there. After graduating from journalism school, she worked arsenic a contented writer, strategist, manager and adjunct selling professor. She became passionate astir agile arsenic a amended mode to enactment successful 2012 erstwhile she experimented with it for an advertisement bureau client. Since past she has been a scrum master, agile manager and has helped with galore agile transformations with teams crossed the globe. Stacey speaks astatine respective agile conferences, has much certs to her sanction than she tin retrieve and loves to signifier agile astatine location with her family. As a lifelong Minnesotan, she precocious relocated to North Carolina wherever she’s engaged learning however to navigator grits and accidental “y’all."