How to work with different project management methods/tools in one org? Applying "Agile" in ops type work

Question

In my role I need to manage two types of projects

1. standard development projects (software/coding)
2. operations related projects (IT/Vendors/Marketing - no coding involved)

In the first one, we slowly trying to adopt Agile using Pivotal Tracker

But on the second one, because this is more ops related and majority of the stakeholders are non-techs, some have adopted Asana at their own initiatives.

My question does it make any sense at all to move ops type work to Pivotal when the work involved are in "sprints" - just to dos with due dates. My own thoughts that I need help on are

• The work that works in Asana wont be compatible with Pivotal style
• Getting non-techs understand Pivotal is a huge barrier
• On the other hand, trying to manage these projects in different tools makes its hard to track progress and resources.

Any thoughts?

Answer 1

Consider using Kanban flavor of agile for your Ops management. Kanban works well when units of work move through a repeated sequence of steps.

Kanban may also be useful during development; however, can be more challenging for development teams to adopt since uncertainty has more significant influence on task duration when a task is being figured out for the first time. In the Wikipedia article on Kanban you'll notice the sample Kanban board shows that the development process step is managed using Scrum.

The power of Kanban is that it can help you to identify process bottlenecks and to allocate the right number of people to each step in your organization's product development process.

Answer 2

You should be able to sync Asana and Pivotal Tracker with Zapier: https://zapier.com/zapbook/asana/pivotal-tracker/

However, choosing the tool should really reflect the process you have in place.

It appears you are managing your development in sprints, therefore a sprint planning tool like Pivotal Tracker makes sense.

IT Support is usually based on Service Level Agreement's which determine due dates. Asana, ZenDesk, or a Ticketing Based System makes sense, as you can manage the lifecycle of a ticket through completion. IT Tickets don't require planning. They require scheduling.