Getting to Know the Salesforce Agile Accelerator

Agile, in simple terms, is a principle of being open-minded and dynamically evolving with the changing needs of the world. Now, how to accelerate the agile process using Salesforce? Agile Accelerator is the answer.

***Before I go ahead, let us see how the whole world is now following Agile. For example, each country’s response to Covid-19 required emergency responses and almost overnight changes with the way things were done, setting up containment zones, medical containment, and treatment zones, and mass evacuation of the students and citizens stuck abroad. All these are dynamic inclusions of protecting humanity!! Interesting topic but will cover it in detail in another blog separately***

Customers worldwide are developing and managing their software products and applications on Agile, which has led to a tremendous demand for project management tools, like JIRA. It has become increasingly efficient, improving accessibility and economically viable for most companies to build and maintain their software on the cloud. It gives them an edge of 24/7 accessibility, transferring maintenance-related challenges to a highly competent service provider.

Salesforce has won over a large share of clients in this space, ensuring efficiency, accessibility, dynamic licensing, platform availability for complex products/projects, and a maintenance perspective.

Salesforce Agile Accelerator

In its nascent stages, it was a platform called ‘Grand Unification System (GUS)’ built by the Salesforce team to help manage their product backlogs, sprints, user stories, defects, etc. It is tailored for agile development and scrum and typically reserved for social networking. This product helped Salesforce as a company to be what it is: A major market reckoner in Cloud Services.

The Agile Accelerator is a managed application available via AppExchange, an evolved version of the GUS with the expertise of providing a single source of truth! With Agile Accelerator, we have a single application for the entire project management. It also provides easy collaboration with the help of Chatter — a real-time app that helps users to connect, engage, and share information within the organization.

Advantages:

• Ability to integrate backlogs with standard Salesforce objects like Accounts/Cases etc. is super-efficient and easy.
• Provide tracking options for backlog or sprints in Kanban view on both mobile and desktop.
• Ensures a single sign-on to track backlog as well for the application, obsoleting SSO applications.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams, share updates, and work to get done anywhere, any device, without leaving Salesforce.

A snapshot view of the application

With various tabs for various project needs like creating and maintaining profiles, collaboration with Chatter, Reporting, Requirements view with Unified wall, and product tags, creating and managing teams, planning sprints, builds and releases and themes:

Feature Comparison: When compared with the present market leader, JIRA, on key features, Salesforce has a definite edge on parameters like Reliability, Availability, Performance, Trainings (both online and offline), ease of implementation, scalability, ROI, and Pricing.

And, with most customers giving a 10/10 rating to renew services with Salesforce Agile Accelerator, will it be safe to assume this might be the end of other major project management tools?

We have to wait and watch.