What differentiates Agile project management from traditional Waterfall methods?
What differentiates Agile project management from traditional Waterfall methods?
Agile Project Management
Iterative & Incremental: Had it been implemented in large chunks, project deliverables would be overdue or below par, but due to agility, the project is delivered in sprints, which allows for improvements and adaptations.
Flexible & Adaptive: It means the requirement model can be changed and adjusted with respect to the dynamics of the project life cycle.
Focus on Collaboration: Cross Functional Team and stakeholders are involved in regular communications and interactions with each other.
Customer Feedback: Facilitates frequent customer feedback after every release in order to verify if the product meets the market demands.
Self-Organizing Teams: It is important for teams to be able to make their own decisions and change the priorities conveniently.
Continuous Delivery: Presents a tangible product at the end of the development cycle, which cycles usually being in the range of 1-4 weeks long.
Focus on Individuals & Interactions: Employs people and conversation over frameworks and equipment.
Traditional (Waterfall) Project Management
Linear & Sequential: It follows the classical waterfall model where one phase (design, development, testing) is conducted before the other.
Fixed Scope: Project requirements are already stated at the beginning of the project and alterations are usually not welcome once the project is initiated.
Focus on Documentation: Stresses proper organization of work documentation and detailed forecasting at the beginning of the job.
Limited Flexibility: Any modification with the project is not easy and expensive to execute.
Delayed Customer Involvement: Customer feedback is mostly collected after the end of a project and when the final product is complete.
Defined Roles: Committees are established and each operates within a hierarchy to achieve the specific phase of the project.