When I started at Bluewolf in January as an Agile Business Executive, I learned that agile design means continually improving on it your creations. I've heard that Bluewolf uses agile methodology to achieve results for companies quickly — but didn’t inititially realize that agile methodologies are an intrinsic part of our company culture.

I found myself using this agile philosophy first-hand when I built a curriculum for our Corporate Social Responsibility program. In the San Francisco office, we partnered with First Tee, a national non-profit that teaches life skills to high school students through the sport of golf. We started a program where students make three visits to our office to practice professional development and gain insight into the corporate world. I began by connecting with Kerry Fugett, who is in charge of our in-office volunteer activities. We outlined a curriculum, defining the goal of the program and what we wanted to teach the students: to show them how technology can solve business problems. I spoke to many colleagues about the curriculum we had sketched out: I consulted my colleague Angie, who has experience mentoring high school kids, Natalie from our New York office to get a different perspective, as well as Taylor White, a Program Director at First Tee, to get his take on whether the curriculum was a good fit for the youths. I incorporated feedback from each person to create a better version (in agile methodology, this is called an iteration) each time. In less than a month, we had condensed our curriculum into six hours of professional development exercises to teach the students about business, technology, and — hopefully — themselves.

By asking for feedback and ideas early and often, the curriculum improved rapidly, and we were able to kick off the program less than a month after we began building it. I didn’t notice that I was deep in the iterative processes Bluewolf is known for until the second time the students visited our office. The homework assignment I had assigned turned out to be too tough — many of the students were unable to complete it. We had to make another round of changes on the spot. As Kerry and I stepped outside to adjust a couple of the sessions for the day, she said to me with a big smile, "Iterate or die." I had heard this saying around the office before — it's a reminder to be flexible when encountering problems, as we can fix them and move on. (It also may sound familiar as it’s the title of our CEO, Eric Berridge's book.) It wasn't until this point that I realized our development process wasn't conventional; many companies that create things have rigid processes and lots of red tape. The culture here at Bluewolf allowed me to quickly create a quality curriculum. Here are some key elements that make our work environment so receptive to agile methods:

• We value responsibility.
  I had ownership of the curriculum project; it was my responsibility to make this curriculum the best it could be. It was a challenge that I was excited to take on and make my own.
• Changes are encouraged.
  I didn’t have to sit down with Kerry to discuss each detail; I made a number of changes and shared the changes with her each week.
• Collaboration is essential.
  There is recognition that different minds bring different ideas and make the curriculum better. As such, I was encouraged to share it with many fellow colleagues.
• Egos are checked at the door.
  Ideas came up at every stage that didn’t make it to the final curriculum. Everyone understood that it was okay even if their ideas were cut, as the best ideas build off previous ones.

Our company culture doesn’t just make going to work more enjoyable — it is absolutely essential to for us to deliver the best work possible. If you're interested in learning more about our philanthropic projects, or about how our company culture brings success, contact us or check out our philanthropy work.