14 In Goals

My Life in ‘Agile’ | New Accountability Series

I just started a new job a few weeks ago and it gave me an idea for a new post series, all about goal setting and accountability. You see, last year when I was looking for a job, I took a bunch of online courses to improve my skills, and one of those courses was about Agile. It’s a really interesting managing development concept that we use at my new job.

What is Agile?

Agile is a way of managing IT projects principally. I like the concept because it usually means to empower team work, being active, being open to discussing issues and involves reflections.

The first thing I like about Agile is the idea of daily stand up meetings. Stand up to help its brevity and attention and daily to keep on top of the work everyone is doing.

The second thing I like about it is that it usually involves building incremental changes to release. This means you have two-week sprints to focus on a specific goal, moving step by step (sprint by sprint) towards a bigger goal. Having a fixed timescale means being able to achieve smaller goals and reflect on how it went. Are there changes needed? Can we do anything better? What have we learnt from this process?

It’s basically a lifestyle change.

What does that have to do with anything?

I swear I’m getting somewhere! Because I now have a permanent job (and a semi-permanent visa) it means I can finally think about the future, settle into a routine and get back to the goals I left behind last year.

I made a list of the big projects I’ve been meaning to achieve:

  • Finish the play I started writing in January
  • Finish those 2 big Scottish tourism brochures I’ve been working on
  • Get back to work on my novel
  • Apply for a PhD
  • Keep blogging once or twice a week (Tuesdays and/or Fridays)

And then I thought no wonder I feel I’m never achieving anything, I have so many big goals that it feels overwhelming. It feels like even if I sit down and write 5 pages for my novel, I’ve not actually accomplished my goal.

With being reintroduced to Agile at my new job, I thought it could be a great way to set myself smaller goals (toward my bigger goals). Obviously I can’t do stand up meetings by myself, but I thought a fortnightly blog series would hold the accountability part of this managing process.

I will post on Mondays every two weeks about my small goals for my next two-week sprint and also reflect on how my last two-week sprint has gone.

What are my goals for this first sprint?

In the next two weeks I’ll be a little busy. We’re off to Copenhagen, the film festival is on and it will be my birthday. But I thought I would set myself a few small goals to start with.

My goals are:

  • Write down a plot outline for my play
  • Write two blog posts a week
  • Read one book
  • Read 1 article for my PhD application

Small ones to start – we’ll see how it goes and will reflect on it in two weeks!

What do you think of Agile? Would you like to join me in this series?xx

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