Summary Agile transformation strategies or project management have emerged as important components in the modern business world. Agile techniques were traditionally designed for the tech world and were mostly applied in IT projects and companies. However, these techniques have the potential to transform an organization’s culture and project management processes, which has warranted their application in the non-tech world and non-IT projects. Agile mindset is primarily a collaborative technique for managing work, which is applicable to a wide range of project types and industries. Nike is an example of a company that could benefit from using an agile mindset in its project management processes in research and development teams.

The company can apply an agile mindset in R&D project management through beginning with a focus on providing the most important features first during project management while assuming that any necessary changes would be brought by customer demand or market changes. Once the most important features have been identified, they should be categorized and arranged in a manner that they will be adopted by the entire lifecycle workflow. During this process, the company’s workforce should be provided with ongoing training on knowledge and skills relating to agile thinking. This helps to ensure that the team does not relapse to its former ways during the project management process, but continuously uses the agile approach. The other critical feature of applying the agile mindset in Nike R&D project management strategies is continuous integration. This type of integration ensures that the different teams in the company’s R&D department work collaboratively on an ongoing basis rather than on selected processes in project management. The integration also creates cross-departmental collaboration as teams share a unified vision and work together continuously as the project evolves since they are structured vertically rather than horizontally.

Agile Transformation Plan

Agile transformation strategies have become essential in the modern business environment since they incorporate long-term plans for transforming an organization’s culture. These strategies are increasingly adopted as part of project management processes as they relate to people, processes, and tools in an organization. Agile project management techniques have traditionally been applied to IT projects because the use of these techniques in software development transform a project with...

However, agile project management techniques can be applied to non-IT projects since they are no longer sought by IT companies only. This paper discusses the application of agile transformation strategies at Nike’s research and development teams and project management processes.
Overview of Agile Transformation Strategies

Agile transformation strategies or project management techniques have dominated the tech world and traditionally applied to IT companies. According to Vandersluis (2014), the application of these techniques in the tech world is attributable to their potential in transforming projects with minimal chances of success into successful ones that deliver timely results. However, agile thinking was initially not designed...…together on a continuous basis. Through this process, the company not only adopts a flexible approach to project management in research and development, but also prevents one or more elements of the project from becoming silos (Vanderlust, 2014). This implies that when the research and development teams are carrying out their work, each element is pulled together as it evolves rather than in the late parts of the project management process. As a result, the project management process involves collaboration between the R&D teams on an on-going basis. Creativity is encouraged among the various teams as members are allowed to comment and make their input in real-time and as the project evolves. Cross-departmental collaboration among the teams converts them into a collaborative ecosystem through unifying their vision and activities (Malahosky, 2017).

In conclusion, agile strategies or project management techniques have become potential and prevalent in the modern business environment. This is due to their ability to transform an organization’s culture and promote success in project management processes. Nike’s research and development teams could benefit from adopting an agile mindset in project management efforts or activities. This would require beginning with a focus on providing the most important features first during project management while assuming that any necessary changes would be brought by customer demand or market changes. The other steps in adopting an agile mindset in project management for Nike’s R&D teams include organizing these features for adoption in workflow processes, workforce training, and…