• Agile & Scrum Basics

Gert-Jan sees these 3 trends in the Agile labor market

Again, why do organizations want to work Agile?

Let’s sum it up succinctly. Knocking things out. The reasons for starting Agile include: responding faster to changing priorities; increasing team effectiveness; wanting to deliver faster and better alignment in the organization. The desired effects are: greater transparency in the organization; higher customer satisfaction and improved team morale and job happiness. The survey 15th State of Agile Report shows that 81% of respondents use Scrum or a variant, about 6% use Kanban and the remaining variants like Lean-Startup. So it is safe to say that Agile has become the norm. What impact does this have on the job market?

1. Agile in top 3 jobs of the future

Mainstream may sound negative, but of course it is actually mega good that more and more organizations are organizing themselves Agile. The flight of Agile is of course mainly taking place in Software Development sector where it started. But also in marketing, sales, HR, production/operation and even Hardware Development, Agile working is often introduced. In many of the latter sectors, Agile is often still in its infancy, so there is still a lot to discover. A lot of work to do. It is therefore not surprising that in a list of future professions the Agile roles Product Owner, Scrum Master and Agile Coach appear high on the list.

In the 2020 World Economic Forum Jobs of Tomorrow Mapping Opportunity in the New Economy report, which maps the future labor market and jobs, the Product Owner is ranked #1 (in the Product Development cluster). Followed in 3rd place by the Agile Coach, with the Scrum Master in shared 6th place.

2. Scarcity creates higher rates

Scrum Academy partner ProductOwner.nl recently researched the state of Product Owners in the Netherlands and concluded, among other things, that the scarcity of professionals is going to lead to an increase in fees. We see this happening both with Product Owners, but also see scarcity of good Agile Coaches and Scrum Masters.

At the same time, we also notice that many organizations ask for the old sheep with five legs. A minimum of 5 years of work experience as a professional is not going to work in a very tight labor market. So there have to be places where people can grow in their profession. At a number of organizations, we coach the Scrum Masters and Product Owners in that process. Group-wise and individually. We also see that coaching is offered more and more to starting professionals, so that they make the right meters faster.

Interested in coaching for your Product Owners or Scrum Masters? Contact Gert-Jan and discuss the possibilities.

3. Need for practical application of knowledge

The 15th State of Agile Report survey also highlights some of the challenges of Agile transitions. For example, 46% of respondents experience inconsistency in the application of Agile in the organization. And 42% see a lack of knowledge and practical applicability. 35% see a lack of adequate training.

We recognize this in our practice. Many teams have insufficient knowledge of Agile, but do not realize it. As a result, they unconsciously incompetently mix up all kinds of things, so that Agile does not come into its own. For example: the Scrum Master and Product Owner roles are combined. After all, a project leader or team lead always does that anyway. Or events such as the Sprint Review and the Sprint Retrospective are skipped. Result? Little transparency about what is being delivered and limited improvement of processes. Which is essential precisely at the start of Agile.

A few more figures: 43% see that the current organizational culture is at odds with the desired Agile culture and 42% see that there is resistance in the organization to change. Leadership is also under fire: 41% do not see the leaders connecting sufficiently with the teams and experience too little support from the leadership here.

So plenty of work for Scrum Masters and Agile Coaches to guide entire organizations through that change.