If you’re new to project management or just want to know about agile methodology, the answers to these 10 frequently asked questions will cover the basics you need to know. And if you’re a project management veteran, these frequently asked agile questions are a good refresher.
What is agile?
Agile is a project management methodology that uses short development cycles called sprints to focus on continuous improvement in the development of a product, service or other result.
How long as agile been around?
Although Incremental software development methods go as far back as 1957, agile was first discussed in depth in the 1970s by William Royce who published a paper on the development of large software systems.
Later in 2001, the Agile Manifesto, a “formal proclamation of four key values and 12 principles to guide an iterative and people-centric approach to software development,” was published. Several software developers gathered together to discuss lightweight development methods based on their combined experience. These are the 12 key principles that still guide agile project management today.
1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.
3. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference for the shorter timescale.
4. Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.
5. Build projects around motivated individuals, give them the environment and support they need and trust them to get the job done.
6. The most efficient and effective method of conveying information with and within a development team is face-to-face conversation.
7. Working software is the primary measure of progress.
8. Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
9. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
10. Simplicity—the art of maximizing the amount of work not done—is essential.
11. The best architectures, requirements and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
12. At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.
Who uses the agile methodology?
Although designed originally for the software industry, many industries have now adopted the use of agile in their development of products and services because of the highly collaborative and more efficient nature of the methodology. Agile is also used in industries like marketing and advertising, construction, education and finance.
Why is agile necessary?
Agile was originally developed for the software industry to streamline and improve the development process in order to more rapidly identify and adjust for issues and defects. As an alternative to the traditional waterfall approach, agile provided a way for developers and teams to ultimately deliver a better product, faster through the short iterative and interactive sessions/sprints. With customer expectations on the rise, keeping ahead of the competition requires finding project leaders who can use best approach methods for project execution.
How is agile used?
The more traditional cumbersome methodologies like waterfall typically require entire project groups to meet and discuss full project goals throughout each phase. Agile, however, uses smaller more focused groups that meet more frequently to discuss very specific goals, making it easier to make rapid changes as required. This allows teams to be more agile, more effective and increases the chances of meeting customer goals successfully, especially as a customer’s needs might also change. Agile arms teams with a mechanism to rapidly repeat a contained process, isolate problems and achieve specific goals quickly, rather than waiting until the end of a lengthy project phase to find out customer requirements and goals have been missed.
What are the advantages of agile?
Agile has become extremely popular, widely adopted and a highly effective project methodology that offers project teams, sponsors, project leaders and customers many benefits including the following
• Agile allows for more rapid deployment of solutions
• Reduced waste through minimization of resources
• Increased flexibility and adaptability to change
• Increased success through more focused efforts
• Faster turnaround times
• Faster detection of issues and defects
• An optimized development process
• A lighter weight framework
• Optimal project control
• Increased focus on specific customer needs
• Increased frequency of collaboration and feedback
What are the disadvantages of agile?
As with any other methodology, agile is not well-suited for every project, sufficient due diligence is always recommended to identify the best methodology for each unique situation.
• Throughout the development process, agile favors the developers, project teams and customer goals, but not necessarily the end user’s experience.
• Due to its less formal and more flexible processes, agile may not always be easily absorbed within larger more traditional organizations.
Can agile be combined with other methodologies?
Opportunity exists to combine agile with other methodologies such as Waterfall to create a hybrid solution. This aids in making it even more adaptable within various industries or to suit the more unique nature of a project, product, or service. Again, due diligence is required to determine the suitability and capacity of the different methods and processes available.
What are popular agile methods used?
Within agile here are some frequently used methods, with scrum (by far the most common), kanban, and lean being the most popular. Other Agile methodologies include Dynamic System Development Model (DSDM), Extreme Programming (XP), Crystal and Crystal Clear, Adaptive Software Development (ASD), Agile Unified Process (AUP), Feature-driven Development (FDD), Scrumban (Scrum + Kanban), and RAD (Rapid Application Development).
What’s the future of agile?
In a business environment where competition is continually increasing and time to market is also shrinking, agile offers numerous benefits and limited drawbacks. Its application in multiple industries makes it an attractive methodology, and with all the benefits offered by agile project management, this methodology is here to stay.
Do you need further information about Scrum and Agile methodology? Please Click here.
Do you want to start learning about key concepts in Scrum thanks to a free online course, getting a free basic certification (SFC™) and also being provided with 10 PMI® approved PDUs (professional development units)? Please Click here.
Are you interested in knowing our whole Scrum and Agile training program – on line, physical classroom and the innovative virtual classroom? Please Click here.
PME Staff
Project Management Europa S.r.l. is Authorized Training Partner of VMEdu and SCRUMstudy
Scrumstudy, SFC, SDC, SMC, SPOC, AEC, SBOK are registered trade marks of VMedu Inc.
All the contents of this blog, unless explicitly stated otherwise, come from the wealth of knowledge, skills and experience of our team.
PME provides goal-oriented, cost-effective consultant services to support change management throughout the organization, promoting the implementation of a hybrid methodology – with traditional planning and agile delivery. For further information, please download the brochure or contact us.
If you’re new to project management or just want to know about agile methodology, the answers to these 10 frequently asked questions will cover the basics you need to know. And if you’re a project management veteran, these frequently asked agile questions are a good refresher.
What is agile?
Agile is a project management methodology that uses short development cycles called sprints to focus on continuous improvement in the development of a product, service or other result.
How long as agile been around?
Although Incremental software development methods go as far back as 1957, agile was first discussed in depth in the 1970s by William Royce who published a paper on the development of large software systems.
Later in 2001, the Agile Manifesto, a “formal proclamation of four key values and 12 principles to guide an iterative and people-centric approach to software development,” was published. Several software developers gathered together to discuss lightweight development methods based on their combined experience. These are the 12 key principles that still guide agile project management today.
1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.
3. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference for the shorter timescale.
4. Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.
5. Build projects around motivated individuals, give them the environment and support they need and trust them to get the job done.
6. The most efficient and effective method of conveying information with and within a development team is face-to-face conversation.
7. Working software is the primary measure of progress.
8. Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
9. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
10. Simplicity—the art of maximizing the amount of work not done—is essential.
11. The best architectures, requirements and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
12. At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.
Who uses the agile methodology?
Although designed originally for the software industry, many industries have now adopted the use of agile in their development of products and services because of the highly collaborative and more efficient nature of the methodology. Agile is also used in industries like marketing and advertising, construction, education and finance.
Why is agile necessary?
Agile was originally developed for the software industry to streamline and improve the development process in order to more rapidly identify and adjust for issues and defects. As an alternative to the traditional waterfall approach, agile provided a way for developers and teams to ultimately deliver a better product, faster through the short iterative and interactive sessions/sprints. With customer expectations on the rise, keeping ahead of the competition requires finding project leaders who can use best approach methods for project execution.
How is agile used?
The more traditional cumbersome methodologies like waterfall typically require entire project groups to meet and discuss full project goals throughout each phase. Agile, however, uses smaller more focused groups that meet more frequently to discuss very specific goals, making it easier to make rapid changes as required. This allows teams to be more agile, more effective and increases the chances of meeting customer goals successfully, especially as a customer’s needs might also change. Agile arms teams with a mechanism to rapidly repeat a contained process, isolate problems and achieve specific goals quickly, rather than waiting until the end of a lengthy project phase to find out customer requirements and goals have been missed.
What are the advantages of agile?
Agile has become extremely popular, widely adopted and a highly effective project methodology that offers project teams, sponsors, project leaders and customers many benefits including the following
• Agile allows for more rapid deployment of solutions
• Reduced waste through minimization of resources
• Increased flexibility and adaptability to change
• Increased success through more focused efforts
• Faster turnaround times
• Faster detection of issues and defects
• An optimized development process
• A lighter weight framework
• Optimal project control
• Increased focus on specific customer needs
• Increased frequency of collaboration and feedback
What are the disadvantages of agile?
As with any other methodology, agile is not well-suited for every project, sufficient due diligence is always recommended to identify the best methodology for each unique situation.
• Throughout the development process, agile favors the developers, project teams and customer goals, but not necessarily the end user’s experience.
• Due to its less formal and more flexible processes, agile may not always be easily absorbed within larger more traditional organizations.
Can agile be combined with other methodologies?
Opportunity exists to combine agile with other methodologies such as Waterfall to create a hybrid solution. This aids in making it even more adaptable within various industries or to suit the more unique nature of a project, product, or service. Again, due diligence is required to determine the suitability and capacity of the different methods and processes available.
What are popular agile methods used?
Within agile here are some frequently used methods, with scrum (by far the most common), kanban, and lean being the most popular. Other Agile methodologies include Dynamic System Development Model (DSDM), Extreme Programming (XP), Crystal and Crystal Clear, Adaptive Software Development (ASD), Agile Unified Process (AUP), Feature-driven Development (FDD), Scrumban (Scrum + Kanban), and RAD (Rapid Application Development).
What’s the future of agile?
In a business environment where competition is continually increasing and time to market is also shrinking, agile offers numerous benefits and limited drawbacks. Its application in multiple industries makes it an attractive methodology, and with all the benefits offered by agile project management, this methodology is here to stay.
Do you need further information about Scrum and Agile methodology? Please Click here.
Do you want to start learning about key concepts in Scrum thanks to a free online course, getting a free basic certification (SFC™) and also being provided with 10 PMI® approved PDUs (professional development units)? Please Click here.
Are you interested in knowing our whole Scrum and Agile training program – on line, physical classroom and the innovative virtual classroom? Please Click here.
PME Staff
Project Management Europa S.r.l. is Authorized Training Partner of VMEdu and SCRUMstudy
Scrumstudy, SFC, SDC, SMC, SPOC, AEC, SBOK are registered trade marks of VMedu Inc.
All the contents of this blog, unless explicitly stated otherwise, come from the wealth of knowledge, skills and experience of our team.
PME provides goal-oriented, cost-effective consultant services to support change management throughout the organization, promoting the implementation of a hybrid methodology – with traditional planning and agile delivery. For further information, please download the brochure or contact us.
