In a networking event on effective agile transformation, a question
came up from a few learners in terms of the practices of project governance in capital
project selection was agile or traditional development practice. The same
question manifested differently in a PMI-ACP class I was facilitating where a learner
expressed the challenges with not doing some proactive requirements gathering
exercise around the extent of data exchange methods from the application
service provider as part of the Agile approach to favor customer collaboration
over contract negotiation. The learner reasoned that the later negotiations to
add these requirements only hurt the organization with increased costs, reduced
speed to market, and decreased customer satisfaction and organizational
profitability.
There seems to be a common pattern that I think is evolving where
practitioners of agile are forgetting the importance of Agile Manifesto. While
Agile Manifesto was prohibiting extensive upfront requirements gathering for
software product development keeping working software as a measure of progress,
the Agile manifesto never eliminated documentation requirements. In fact, the
stage-gate approaches promoted by Dr. Robert Cooper from the Product
Development Institute (Cohn, 2010) takes product development from discover to post-launch
review through the stage gates of idea development, business case development,
development, testing, validation, and launch introduces multiple stage gates.
Each stage gate becomes a major milestone serving as a go/no-go decision-making
point.
A formal product selection criterion, also advanced by Project
Management Institute’s Program and Portfolio Management Processes, for the
organization to evaluate the key performance indicators to measure the return
on investment (ROI) and use financial measures likes Internal Rate of Return (IRR),
Net Present Value (NPV), & payback period to evaluate the profit potential,
operating expenses, resource requirements is not prohibited by Agile Manifesto.
Some product development where specialized expertise is outsourced to be
competitive in the market, dependencies on external vendors that handle testing
or audit procedures, use of distributed agile teams, or adherence to high
quality management practices like CMMI may mandate that the standard operating
procedure (SOP) is clearly outlined so that the teams productively work towards
product development and are not burning unnecessary cycle times with delays and
external dependencies. Not considering these things in advance by using Agile Manifesto as the shield to avoid “Contract Negotiation” or “Comprehensive
Documentation” is not the failure of Agile.
Mike Cohn (2010), a pioneering contributor to the Agile Manifesto,
recommends that any document or artifact required to achieve compliance be part
of the product backlog and use of agile project management tool and practices for
products in the regulated industries demanding compliance requirements. In a
white paper submitted by Primavera, Oracle (2011) recommends the combination of
Agile and Enterprise Project Portfolio Management (PPM) systems mitigates the
risk in pharmaceutical and financial services industry (p. 3) increasing visibility
of projects, resources, schedules and business value for the entire
organization (p. 6).
It is therefore evident that our own understanding of Agile framework’s core
principles may have to evolve when we apply agile in different industries. But,
putting down project governance, product selection, and product portfolio
management techniques as ineffective practices promoted by Agile is choosing to
ignore the best practices. It is no wonder that topics of scaling agile are
evolving leading to the latest description of Scaled Agile Framework (2013) for
implementing scaled lean and hybrid agile framework in enterprises.
References
Cohn, M. (2010). Succeeding with
Agile: Software development with Scrum. Boston, MA: Addison Wesley
Description of the Scaled Agile Framework (2013). Retrieved October 26, 2013, from http://scaledagileframework.com/purpose/
Oracle (2011). The Yin and Yang of Enterprise Project Portfolio Management and Agile Software Development: Combining Creativity and Governance. Retrieved October 27, 2013, from http://www.oracle.com/us/products/applications/primavera/primavera-eppm-agile-wp-453028.pdf
