Who Are Agile In Audit Ltd?
History
In 2015, Barclays Internal Audit (BIA) sought assistance from agile coaches to help them with adopting agility and Scrum. The initial approach was based on kanban. This had a significant effect and later metrics indicated that audit duration was decreasing by significant margins.
Training on Scrum then began with the Professional Scrum Foundations course for senior auditors within BIA. This initial work led to the creation of the BIA Agile Team (BAT) that consisted of three external coaches and three internal coach candidates: Sam Randall, Nadeem Haque and Alexandra Rodrigues.
The work of the BAT over the following 12 months helped revolutionise the way in which Barclays Internal Audit worked. They went from a traditional model to 100% agile, earning the ‘Industry Pioneers’ award along the way.
On that journey, the application of agility helped cut audit times by significant percentage margins. The effect was so pronounced that the external coaches on the BAT were asked to propose techniques from other industries and this led to the introduction of stable team planning.
Stable team planning is very different from the way in which auditors generally plan and staff audit teams and it met with significant pushback. However, continued work on viability led to the creation of the Audit Planning Simulator that proved what was possible. The technique is now being applied to audits and promises further significant savings in audit lead times. It is an example of the approach we have taken to introduce new techniques to the world of auditing.
Because of the immensely positive experience working with auditors, and also to leverage what was learned during this initial transformation, Agile In Audit Ltd was setup as a bespoke agile organisation to serve the audit community. They have tried, and proven, many agile techniques in an audit context. They’ve learned what works and what does not work. Between them, they have a unique set of knowledge and experience that can help audit teams to benefit from agility quickly and efficiently.
Director’s Experience
Derek Davidson has 20 years of experience working in agile environments. He is a Certified Scrum Trainer with the Scrum Alliance and a Professional Scrum Trainer with scrum.org.
Derek also spent 17 years in the Royal Air Force, initially as an RAF Police Special Investigator and latterly as a commissioned officer, specialising in executive roles. The former provides Derek with excellent investigative and analytical skills. The latter provides a firm foundation in leadership.
This experience makes Derek well suited to devising agile transformation strategies, mentoring agile coaches and scrum masters, helping senior management teams with agility and agile leadership and teaching scrum and agility.
Derek’s agile qualifications include:
- Professional Scrum Trainer
- Professional Scrum Master Level III
- Professional Scrum Product Owner Level II
- Professional Scrum Master Level II
- Professional Scrum Master Level I
- Professional Scrum with Kanban Level I
- Professional Scrum Product Owner Level I
- Professional Scrum Developer Level I
- Scaled Professional Scrum
- ICAgile Certified Professional – Agile Coaching
- Certified Scrum Professional
- Certified ScrumMaster
- Certified Scrum Product Owner
You can find more details on Derek’s work experience, as well as testimonials and recommendations, on his LinkedIn profile