Agility in Marketing - 2020

Wow, time flies and I missed the opportunity to update the 2018 post on Agile in marketing to report findings from year two, the 2019 "Annual State of Agile Marketing Report." Well, year three is out so here are a few observations on the adoption of Agile in 2020:

Adoption is slowing: the data suggests that the early adopters with 3+ years of experience are still practicing this way of working, but the adoption rate is starting to plateau. And, marketing isn't seeing adoption near the scale of other departments practicing Agile.

In 2018, 37% of marketers reported using Agile and this year's adoption is slightly higher at 41%, just over 10%. However, with the team’s that reported plans to implement Agile in 2018, we should be seeing the majority of marketing teams working in Agile by now. The two departments with higher levels of adoption are sales and IT, with 52% and 49%, respectively.

Training is key: the current report cites training as the main barrier to implementation, with almost half of the teams reporting this is the biggest barrier. While it's not a training tool, per se - if your team is interested in adopting this way to working, I highly recommend Jeff Sutherland's book, “Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time.” Jeff was one of the co-founders of Scrum and narrates multiple real-world business cases of productivity gains post adoption.

Not surprisingly, a hybrid approach is still leading the way as the flavor of Agile being adopted at 47%, with Lean, Scrum, Kanban, and Scrumban also popular frameworks referenced.

Happy (belated) birthday: Our mortgage team started with Agile in the Fall of 2017, with first work launching in January 2018. This year's report says that we're in good company with 66% of respondents practicing Agile for at least 3 years.

Also, updated - my 2018 blog used an image of Tex, who won the Westminster Master Agility title in 2015. So here is your 2020 winner, P!NK! Check her out in action!