Agile outside of Information Technology: Literature review and police policy project experiment

Défense de mémoire de Denis Julien

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It is rare for a project to progress without surprises or changes. An Agile approach aims not only to accept these challenges, but also to respond to them and quickly make the required adaptations so that the project remains in line with the beneficiary’s needs. This approach is often associated with software development, but it can in fact be applied to any type of project: manufacturing bathtubs and cars, teaching music, sales team performance,... Various conditions create a favorable climate for the realization of an Ag-

ile project: tolerance for variable efficiency, context of permanent change, a relatively high level of complexity, willingness to collaborate, open-mindedness and managerial support.

We experimented with the implementation of an Agile approach within a police zone in Belgium, and more specifically within the framework of the zonal security plan follow-up. This plan determines the priorities of the police zone in terms of security phenomena and internal operations manage- ment.

We proposed and tested a model in which we adapted Scrum to the context of the organization in order to build teams in charge of putting into action the objectives determined in the plan. Rather than following the traditional waterfall approach via a series of analyses and plans that ultimately establish the actions that should be carried out by the field staff, our model places these field actors at the center. They are responsible not only for thinking about how best to achieve the desired outcome, but also for helping to implement them.

Although this experiment was interrupted for reasons unrelated to the Agile approach, we can draw some observations to improve the replication of a similar approach, such as the attention to be paid to the environmental elements in order to maintain timeboxing.

 

Keywords: Agile, Scrum, Police, Plan, Policing, Non-software, Non-IT, Project  management

Contact : Isabelle Daelman - isabelle.daelman@unamur.be
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