Agile is a Federal Acquisition flow down. In the Department of Defense, Agile Acquisitions are Guided by a series of Booklets
For each of the Agile Manifesto topics, applying them in the Federal Acquisition domain means
The Heart of Agile Projects in any Business of Any Technical Domain ...
- Collaborate with all participants
- Deliver value on periodic boundaries
- Reflect on progress, processes, and activities in a Close Loop manner
- Improve through corrective and preventive actions
These four processes, applied repeatedly on fine-grained boundaries, are the foundation of not only Agile Project Management but all good project management Principles, Processes, and Practices in any domain.
These are the foundation for answering the question:
How long are you willing to wait before you find out you are late?
Project Success Factors?- No matter the Project Management Process ?
- Clearly defined goals - Mission, Vision, and Capabilities?
- Competent project manager - Skilled project leader?
- Top Management Support - Top or divisional manager
- Competent project team members - Selection of skilled staff
- Proper resource allocation - Money, personnel, logistics, etc.?
- Adequate communication channels - Objectives, status, changes, organizational coordination, client needs
- Control Mechanisms - Planning, scheduling, and budgeting
- Feedback capabilities - Review project status, suggestions, and corrections through feedback
- Responsiveness to client - The user consulted and kept up to date?
- Client consultation - Soliciting input from stakeholders
- Technical tasks - Technology works well
- Client Acceptance - Clients confirm the usefulness of outcomes?
- Troubleshooting - Look for problems and correct or prevent
? Ranking of System Implementation Success Factors,” James J. Jiang, Gary Klein, and Joseph Balloum, Project Management Journal, December 1996, pp. 49?53
More Agile Project Critical Success Factors
- Train each team member - Before adopting the Agile method, each team member must be trained according to the Agile method and the supporting Risk and Performance Management. Training includes Agile method practices followed by each role on the project.
- Gain executive management buy-in - ?Upper management buy?in required before accruing benefits of the Agile method in the organization.
- Install a process for team collaboration.
Are Agile and Plan?Driven Methods Opposites?
- Integrating Agile and Traditional frameworks provide a comprehensive spectrum of tools and options that increase the Probability of Project Success.
- Both use Physical Percent Complete as the measure of progress to plan using the Product Roadmap and Release for Agile projects and the Integrated Master Plan for Traditional projects.
- Both start with a Capabilities?Based plan for what Done looks like
- Both use closed-loop corrective and preventive actions ? to Keep the Project Green.
Principles of Agile Compared to Traditional Project Management?
Advantages of Traditional Project Management
- The easiest model to manage, each phase has specific deliverables and a review process.
- Works well for smaller-size projects where requirements are stable and understandable.
- Faster delivery of the project.
- Process and results well documented.
- Easily adaptable for shifting teams.
- The project management method is beneficial for managing dependencies.
- Clear visibility to cost and schedule reporting form - Federal IPMDAR
compliance.
Advantages of Agile Project Management
- Focused client process continuously involved during every stage.
- Agile teams are self?organized to provide better results from the development projects.
- The agile method ensures that the development quality is maintained through frequent deliverables.
- Process-based on incremental progress, with client and team knowing what is complete and what is not, reducing risk in the development process, with tangible evidence of working product on short periodic intervals
Disadvantage of Traditional Project Management
- It is a less effective method if requirements aren’t clear at the beginning.
- Very difficult to move back to make changes in the previous phases.
- The testing process starts once development is over, with a higher chance of defects found later in development that is expensive to fix.
Disadvantage of Agile Project Management
- Requires an expert to make important decisions in the meeting.
- The cost of implementing the Agile method is a little more compared to other development methodologies.
- The project can easily go off track if the project manager is not clear about what outcome he/she wants.
The primary thing Agile does, is force the delivery of working products, services, or outcomes on fine grained boundaries ? every two to four weeks?
Project Management as a Governance Process in Traditional and Agile Environments
- The purpose of project oversight, commonly called governance, is to make sure a project does not go astray.
- Effective project governance identifies a project that will exceed its budget, leading to conversations about whether the project should be canceled.?
- Governance identifies a product drifting too far from its original goals, a project deviating from an architectural standard, or any similar high-level considerations important to the organization.
Reconciling Governance with Agile Project Management ?
- Realize that Project Governance and Project Management are not the same things.
- Separate Governance from Project Management.
- Separating them achieves the ability for high?level checkpoints providing necessary oversight while allowing the Agile team freedom to manage itself and the project in an Agile manner.
- In the Agile environment, Agile Governance is minimally sufficient Governance.?
? “Incorporating Governance or Oversight into an Agile Project,” Mike Cohn, www.mountaingoat.com?
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