There are many project management technologies, and Agile is one of them. Before digging deeper into Agile, cause the management techniques under Agile is another sea, here is an overview of all Project Management methodologies available.
- The traditional sequential method.
- Agile methods
- Change management
- Process-based
- And the undefined PMBOK.
The traditional method is a fixed method which doesn’t allow the project planning to be flexible.
Change management is suitable for a project which doesn’t have a fixed goal and will have a lot of pivots. Can be adapted for internal products as user research and iterations are common.
Significant teams recently adapt Process-based methods. Six Sigma and Lean six sigma are some of them.
And finally, the undefined PMBOK is called the Project Management Body of Knowledge which is a set of definitions in the project management industry. Though there is no set process and is not identified as a formal method, many practitioners have started adapting to this method.
And finally, the Agile methodology which has a bunch of techniques like,
- SCRUM
- Kanban
- Extreme Programming
- Adaptive Project Framework
Why Project management? Why not skip it?
Projects face a lot of roadblocks, changes, and issues during development. This can be controlled and managed better by introducing project management techniques. By planning the project, it is easier to predict, plan, and resolve roadblocks. Collaboration is handled better and pre-planned execution to measure time and cost.
When we skip the planning phase, we miss capturing the exact requirements, risk analysis, and planning. When there is no content to estimate, and proceeding without estimation will lead to an infinite loop of development, iterations resulting in a waste of time, effort, and cost.
Why is Agile preferred?
Agile was developed after the sequential methodologies to allow projects to be flexible during development and meet the goal. The concept of planning, developing, reviewing, completing in many cycles is what makes Agile. It is preferred because of how easy it is to track the product phase, validate the developed module, and iterate if any. And the planning will include prediction and allowing space for accommodating those iterations and risks handling.
SCRUM
SCRUM is one of the Agile methodologies which is highly opted for. In a SCRUM method,
- The project is broken down into modules.
- The modules are prioritized and planned into sprints.
- Each sprint is 1 to 4 weeks in duration. Two weeks is the most common sprint duration.
- At the end of each sprint, the result is reviewed. This maintains high transparency.
- To sustain the development environment, we have daily stand-ups which are 10-15 mins duration.
- People involved
- Product owner - who represents the customer interests and makes sure the development team gets their input of what to work on
- SCRUM master - who enables the development to happen smoothly and removes any roadblocks
- Development team.
Products built at Skcript are done using the Agile methodologies. The next part of the article will focus more on a detailed project management using some tools. See ya, till then!