Agile Development methodology

Agile methodology enables any adjustments in project activities in response to conditions that crop up during the process in project management. One such methodology is SCRUM. Although Scrum is “inspect and adapt” framework used in software development and not a project management methodology, as such , it has uses for many types of projects and hence is thought by many to be an agile project management tool.

Why Agile?

With Agile, we can always assess the direction in which the project is going through during the duration of the lifecycle of the project. This can be done through what is known as Sprints or Iterations. At the end of each sprint the team must present a shippable product increment.

Agile methodology is considered to be iterative and incremental. This is achieved by focusing on the repetitive work cycles as well as the functional product.

By contrast, In waterfall method, teams have only one opportunity to get the aspects of project right.

However in Agile, every aspect of development is re-examined through the lifecycle of the project.  When a team stops and re-evaluates the direction of a project every two weeks, there’s always time to steer it in another direction

Due to this approach of “inspect and adapt” , the cost of project and time taken to complete reduces drastically. But due to constant analysis done by the team a phenomenon called “analysis paralysis” can likely occur and hinder the progress of the team

Using the Agile development method, companies are now able to build the right product.

Rather than being obliged to market a piece of software which hasn’t been written yet, agile allows teams to constantly replan their release to enhance its value throughout development, allowing them to be as competitive as possible in the marketplace.

What is Scrum?

Scrum is the most common way of introducing Agility as it is simple and flexible. Considering SCRUMs popularity , many organisations though they claim that they are using SCRUM , in reality they are not even close to the definition of SCRUM

Scrum highlights empirical feedback, self-management of team, and determined to construct well tested product within short iterations. Trying to adapt SCRUM as it is defined may find conflict in the existing non Agile organisations.

The three roles in Scrum are Product Owner, Team, and Scrum Master. These three roles responsibilities are divided based on the traditional manager role.

Five meetings in Scrum are :

1. Backlog Refinement
2. Sprint Planning
3. Daily Scrum
4. Sprint Review Meeting
5. Sprint Retrospective Meeting