How do you determine if Agile is right for your team?

Agile has become a national trend for project managers. But agile is not new; it has been around for more than 20 years. As social media circles say, agile is gaining momentum and popularity over the years. But is Agile really the panacea that can solve every project’s woes, as the rumor has it? Of course not! But agile is a better way to manage projects. Agile offers some unique advantages to project leaders and their teams.

We compared the Agile approach to the traditional waterfall approach earlier. Agile, a project management approach to software development, has gained momentum over the past few years. It solves the uncertainty of product demand and development. The waterfall approach, in contrast, attempts to organize the phases of the project life cycle — initiation, planning, execution, and closure — in a strict structural order.

What is Agile?

It is difficult to define exactly what agile is. Different people may give different answers. Agile is a broad category that includes systems such as Scrum, XP Extreme, Lean and Kanban Software Development, and Crystal Clear. Agile turns project planning into an iterative process that spans the entire project life cycle. The term fail-fast embodies the desire for iteration, the gathering of customer feedback by first delivering an imperfect product to the customer. Customer feedback is critical. Traditional project management methods require that project requirements be collected and identified before the project begins. Agile is more practical and efficient, requiring the product owner and key stakeholders to participate in the build and test of the product development process. This can save a lot of time. Why do we need to spend three months gathering requirements and four months developing a product, only to discover at the end that the product is not what the customer really wants? Why can’t we develop a part of it, show it to the customer, integrate feedback into product development, and then repeat the process and build what the customer wants in less time? That, in a nutshell, is the goal of Agile.

What are the best conditions for using Agile?

When we are unsure what the requirements of the product are, it is best to use agile methods. Involving the product owner and the Scrum team from the beginning of collecting user stories allowed us to use our time more efficiently. A user story is a brief description of the features and features that the product owner wants to develop. Then, based on these software features, the Product owner and the Scrum team create a Backlog called the Product Backlog. After the Product Backlog is established, the Scrum team creates the Sprint Backlog. Product features required by customers will be arranged in different sprints. Therefore, sprints are features in the next release, and the goal is to develop and deploy a small portion of the product functionality at a time.

The product owner and Scrum team will hold daily station meetings to review development progress. This approach helps resolve uncertainty in a product or requirement. So the whole product development process is: develop some features, test them, collect feedback and continue development until the product owner is happy with the final product.

When is Agile not the best choice?

Agile is not always the best approach, such as when requirements are generally determined. A waterfall approach is best used when a project has a proven track record as a baseline. Data center construction is a good example. Requirements and tasks are developed in a clear sequence without much planning. Therefore, following the “partial development, feedback, continue development” process described above is obviously impractical.

So, when do you go agile?

Now we have a clear definition of agile, what it applies to, and when it is best to use traditional development methods. Let’s take a look at when it’s best to use Agile. There may be many specific cases, but only a few major cases are listed below:

• Product demand is uncertain

In this case, agile can get the project off the ground faster and involve the product owner in the development process. With an agile approach, we don’t have to spend six months documenting product requirements without knowing if the customer will be satisfied. When developing new product features, the product owner can use his or her feedback as part of the development process to present features as quickly as possible to ensure faster product delivery.

• Agile is the best choice for software development projects

Because the software development process itself allows some functionality in the entire system to be developed, tested, and delivered first. This means that certain features will be delivered earlier than others. Sprint allows development teams to test and deploy these features individually to ensure development efficiency.

• Collaborative teams can benefit from Agile methods (Daily station)

The key to Agile is the daily stand-up meeting. During the meeting, the team can discuss current development progress, problems encountered, and feedback from the product owner. It would be nice if someone were responsible for holding these meetings and updating the results to agile Kanban. Because collaborating team members can access and update the storyboard at any time, this helps team collaboration run smoothly.

This can be done through the iteration storyboard of Worktile, where the iteration leader can drag the requirements kanban to change the status of the requirements during the daily station meeting to update the progress of the requirements.

• Actively involved product owners

Real-time feedback from the product owner is key to agile success. This not only replaces tedious requirements documentation, but also ensures that the needs of the product owner are clearly communicated. Product owner involvement and constant feedback to the development team enables the team to get the product right faster. Product owners should attend daily station meetings and express their expectations, likes and dislikes, and grievances. This ensures that the development team builds the product the product owner wants.

• Team work and collaboration — Proactive team player

Social responsibility is a key driver of agile methods. Agile wants to create a team environment that allows for some degree of self-management. Agile coaches want to create teams that are positive and show initiative. If team members are not catching up or actively participating, the Agile coach expects other team members to help, encourage, and motivate each other. The Agile coach will lead by example and set a collaborative tone of mutual encouragement and accountability within the team.

• Willingness to learn from failure

Learn from failure more quickly. Prototyping and feedback are important tools for agility. Traditional development approaches try to describe all requirements before a project is launched, which can waste a lot of time, especially when developing new products. So once you have an idea you should develop it immediately, even if the current product is not what the product owner wants. The goal is to reorient the product and continue development through constant feedback.

• Management supports the Agile framework and has a culture of team empowerment

Agile can bring about a change in culture and expectations in an organization because it encourages team empowerment and puts the team in charge of making decisions and taking risks. In contrast, in a traditional development team, the project manager is expected to provide clear direction, while in agile development, the Agile coach encourages the development team to come up with the solution that best suits the product development and product owner. Instead of controlling the team’s every move, management must give the team the necessary freedom to only provide guidance and direction that will allow the team to grow quickly.

It’s exciting to embrace agility. Because it gives the project leader a project management method to solve all kinds of problems in the project schedule. However, as with any other approach, there are limitations and tasks for which agile is not suited. All in all, Agile gives project managers more options and the possibility to better manage their projects.

Project management tools enable project managers to do their jobs better, and the right project management tools enable us to complete the work within budget, on time, and with quality. Worktile has a huge role to play here. As a project management tool, it gives you the means to plan, monitor, and report in real time.