Observations on Balancing Discipline and Agility - Report Example

?A Systematic Comparison between Traditional and Agile Methods By Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Introduction 3 Traditional project management approaches 3 Agile project management approaches 5 Comparison of traditional and agile project management approaches 7 Conclusion 9 Bibliography 10 Introduction A project is a short-term activity to reach some specific objectives. At the present, organizations perform business operations in the form of projects, which are managed through some proper mechanist known as project management. The project management is a set of different but interconnected tasks and is an important activity of more or less every organization in view of the fact that almost every organization at the present is concerned with some kind of project management. Project management is a methodical technique to managing and scheduling project resources and tasks from inauguration to completion. However, these tasks and resources are separated into five stages, i.e. initiation, planning, executing, controlling, and completion or termination of the project. In fact, this standard format of the project management can be used for almost every kind of project, in view of the fact that its basic purpose is to systematize the different processes of project development (Kerzner, 2006; Haughey, 2009; TechTarget, 2008). Normally, the project management techniques are classified into two categories: traditional project management and agile project management. In traditional project management, project plans and cost estimates are normally developed once, in a front-loaded mode, and the remaining activities of a project involve adjusting to reality. On the other hand, in agile project management, every iteration is an opportunity to go back over the plan and adjust to reality for the next iteration (Freedman, 2010). Traditional project management approaches Traditional project management works fine for a lot of projects and environments. Actually, traditional project management makes use of the traditional tools and techniques for management and solving problems. In simple words, “the traditional project management is 'a collection of tools and techniques that can be used to perform an operation that seeks an end product, outcome, or a service”. These traditional tools and techniques can include the use of PERT chart and Gantt chart to estimate the schedule or plan the project (TutorialsPoint, 2012). The major advantage of the traditional project management methods is that they are plan driven and they follow a sequence and management approach to project development. Thus, the use of the traditional project management methods allows completing a complex project in a sequential phase wise manner where all the requirements are collected and approved at the beginning. And on the basis of these requirements software design is completed next and finally master design is executed to build high quality software. Another advantage of the traditional software development methods is they are very well-organized and purposeful planning and control methods. These methods allow us to recognize the distinct project life cycles (Rehman et al., 2010; Szalvay, 2004; Serena, 2007). Despite a lot of advantages associated with these methods, they have certain drawbacks as well. According to these methods, all the project requirements must be completed and approved before the project is initialized. On the other hand, in case of a large size and complex projects it is not possible to collect all the requirements before beginning the project. Hence, we will need to make some changes to the project requirements which will change design and as a result the entire project development will be affected (Rehman et al., 2010; Szalvay, 2004; Serena, 2007). In addition, the traditional project management methods are aimed at dealing with large size development projects, and the issues and challenges in determining and handling these endeavours to effectively carry results. Additionally, these methods were a great deal based on the principles of engineering for instance construction management. Therefore, they caused unavoidability (i.e. someone has to plan every last detail of a building or bridge before it is built), as well as sequential project development cycles, in which development is based on the design, and design is based on analysis, analysis is based on the initial requirements. Together with unavoidability, they caused a deterministic, reductionist method that was based on task breakdown, and was projected on constancy, authentic requirements, analysis and accurate design. Moreover, this inflexibility was also identified by a trend towards slavish practice “compliance” as a method of project control (CC Pace Systems, 2011). Agile project management approaches As discussed above, traditional project management does not allow us to change requirements during project development. On the other hand, project change is inevitable. Thus, to address this issue of traditional project management methodology, a new project management approach was introduced acknowledged as agile method. This project management approach is straightforward and much faster than all other traditional project management methods. Actually, agile project management methodologies are composed of iterations. In fact, small teams work in partnership with project stakeholders to identify rapid prototypes, evidence of concepts, or a wide variety of aspects to identify the problem to be solved. In this scenario, the project team identifies the requirements for the iteration, creates the prototype, builds and executes appropriate test scripts, and the users authenticate the outcomes. In addition, verification takes place much earlier in the project development life cycle than it would with traditional project management methods, permitting stakeholders to modify requirements while they are still comparatively painless to change (Serena, 2007; Rehman et al., 2010). In addition, agile project management methodologies adopt the iterative and incremental practice to enhance the output and effectiveness of the project development life cycle. Hence, the agile project management approach does not only keep away from requirement collection at the commencement of the project but also it makes possible the customer’s participation all the way through the development life cycle. In addition, the customer’s participation in the development of project activities helps the project team to create accurate and high quality product. Moreover, agile project management does not involve a lot of documentation for the reason that the team relies almost completely on informal internal communication. These methodologies offer the capability to implement the changes and continuously revise any other phase of the development process. Furthermore, the output of the agile project management appears in small incremental releases bearing in mind the changing requirements of the project. If a change has been made to the project requirements, is adjusted in the next iteration. The basic objective of agile project management is to please the customers by satisfying their requirements at any stage of the project development life cycle (Rehman et al., 2010; Boehm & Turner, 2003). Basically, the agile project management methodologies such as SCRUM, Feature-Driven Development, eXtreme Programming (XP) intend to decrease the expenditure of changes all the way through the project development life cycle. For instance, eXtreme Programming is based on the quick iterative planning and development cycles with the intention of forcing trade-offs and delivering the maximum value characteristics as soon as possible. Additionally, XP encompasses an excellent feature known as “constant and systemic testing” to make certain high quality through early defect identification and resolution (CC Pace Systems, 2011). In spite of a lot of advantages associated with agile methods, they have certain limitations as well, which prevent their extensive adoption. The basic limitation of the agile project management methodologies is that they advocates often feel it hard to get management support for adjusting what seem like dramatic changes during project development. In addition, agile project management methodologies require project managers, developers, and users alike to change the way they work and believe. For instance, the XP practices of pair programming, test-first design, constant integration, and an active customer can act like discouraging changes to put into practice. On the other hand, these project management methodologies tend to be developer-centric as well as seem to dismiss the part of management in managing and ensuring success (CC Pace Systems, 2011). Comparison of traditional and agile project management approaches As we have discussed the essential features of both the project management methodologies now we can compare the characteristics of both the methods. The first difference between these two methodologies is their adaptability towards change. Traditional project management does not allow the project teams to make changes during the execution of a project. All the requirements are gathered at the beginning of a project and on the basis of these requirements a design is built, which is strictly followed to complete a project. So any change during the project execution can affect the entire project life cycle. On the other hand, agile project methodologies are based on continuous iteration. They require project managers, developers and users to work closely so that any change happening during the execution of a project could be adjusted. In their paper, (Boehm & Turner, 2003) discuss a wide variety of features which distinguishes agile project management from traditional project management. Table1 outlines their points: Table 1Difference between Traditional and Agile Project Management, Source (Boehm & Turner, 2003) Characteristics/Applications Agile Project Management Traditional Project Management Effectiveness of addressing project goals Offer maximum value, Respond to the change quickly Unavoidability, constancy, high Assurance, does not accommodate changes during project execution Project Size Agile project management techniques are used for smaller projects. So it involves a team of a few people, few resources require. Traditional project management is used to manage large size projects. Thus, they require a team of people from various domains. Project Environment Unstable, high change; project focused, informal environment Stable; low change, formal way to project/organization Project Duration As this approach is suitable for the small projects so the duration of these projects is also smaller. Normally, these projects cover the duration of few days, weeks or months. This project management methodology is used to manage large size project so the duration of the projects is also higher. Customer Support and Relationship Agile project management requires devoted on-site customers; focused on prioritized increments Customers can be contacted whenever it is necessary depending on the conditions given on contract provisions Support for the planning and control Internalized plans, qualitative control Projects are completed through documentation. Each phase of the project management delivers a document, which is used throughout the development of the next phase and so on. So it involves documented plans, quantitative control Communication needs It requires the customers, managers and developers to work together thus it needs tacit interpersonal knowledge The entire project is based in the explicit documented knowledge Dealing with project requirements Prioritized informal, stories and test cases; undergoing unforeseeable change It is very formal process of managing a project. A project is formalized for capability, interface, quality, foreseeable evolution requirements Project development support Offers simple design; short increments, refactoring assumed reasonably priced Extensive design, longer increments, refactoring assumed costly Project Quality Assurance and Management It uses executable test cases define requirements, testing to ensure the quality In order to ensure project quality, documented test plans and procedures are adopted Project Management Culture As this project management methodology operates in an informal environment so it relieves through many degrees of freedom It is based on a formal mechanism so it uses a standard framework of policies and procedures defined at the beginning of a project Moreover, both traditional and agile project management approaches are aimed improving the process of project management and to ensure the completion of a project within the specific cost and time. However, both these approaches go behind their own terminologies for the completion of a project. In this scenario, the success of traditional project management is determined through wide-ranging design, longer increments in development. Above all, refactoring, in which the internal working of the existing system is modified without modifying the external behaviour of the system, is considered expensive in traditional project management methods. However, traditional project management is still used for large size projects such as construction projects, in which extensive documentations and careful measures are required. The majority of construction projects are managed through the traditional project management. On the other hand, agile project management is believed to be victorious in project environments involving short increments based on simple design and inexpensive refactoring. For instance, if a customer wants to develop a web site and they are not sure what actually they want from the web site. They come to a software development firm and ask them to build a web site for them. A developer builds a prototype and shows it to the customer. And customer asks the developer to make changes until the web site is developed up to the customer’s expectations. For this kind of projects, the agile project management approach works very fine. In fact, agile project management methodologies are incremental, cooperative straight forward and adoptive by nature and when properly managed lead to the simple and fast and incremental release of the software product. In contrast, traditional project management methodologies are sequential, plan-driven and not adaptive; for that reason the output of traditional methods results in a complex project management structure (Rehman et al., 2010). Conclusion The project management is a set of different but interconnected tasks and is an important activity of more or less every organization in view of the fact that almost every organization at the present is concerned with some kind of project management. Project management is a methodical technique to managing and scheduling project resources and tasks from inauguration to completion. Normally, the project management techniques are classified into two categories: traditional project management and agile project management. The major advantage of the traditional project management methods is that they are plan driven and they follow a sequence and management approach to project development. Traditional project management does not allow us to change requirements during project development. On the other hand, project change is inevitable. Thus, to address this issue of traditional project management methodology, a new project management approach was introduced acknowledged as agile method. Agile project management methodologies adopt the iterative and incremental practice to enhance the output and effectiveness of the project development life cycle. Bibliography Boehm, B. & Turner, R., 2003. Observations on Balancing Discipline and Agility. [Online] Available at: http://agile2003.agilealliance.org/files/P4Paper.pdf [Accessed 06 March 2012]. CC Pace Systems, 2011. Agile Project Management. [Online] Available at: www.ccpace.com/Resources/documents/AgileProjectManagement.pdf [Accessed 04 March 2012]. Freedman, R., 2010. Comparing traditional and agile project management estimation techniques. [Online] Available at: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/tech-manager/comparing-traditional-and-agile-project-management-estimation-techniques/4357 [Accessed 08 March 2012]. Haughey, D., 2009. The Role of the Project Manager. [Online] Available at: http://www.projectsmart.co.uk/the-role-of-the-project-manager.html [Accessed 03 march 2012]. Kerzner, H., 2006. Project management: A systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. 10th ed. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons. Rehman, I.U., ullah, S., Rauf, A. & Shahid, A.A., 2010. Scope management in agile versus traditional software development methods. In NSEC '10 Proceedings of the 2010 National Software Engineering Conference., 2010. ACM. Serena, 2007. An Introduction to Agile Software Development. [Online] Available at: http://www.serena.com/docs/repository/solutions/intro-to-agile-devel.pdf [Accessed 08 March 2012]. Szalvay, V., 2004. An Introduction to Agile Software Development. [Online] Available at: http://www.danube.com/docs/Intro_to_Agile.pdf [Accessed 04 March 2012]. TechTarget, 2008. Project Management. [Online] Available at: http://searchcio-midmarket.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,sid183_gci951200,00.html [Accessed 10 March 2012]. TutorialsPoint, 2012. Traditional Project Management. [Online] Available at: http://www.tutorialspoint.com/management_concepts/traditional_project_management.htm [Accessed 08 March 2012]. Read More