Project Delivery
WATERFALL / PRINCE 2 PROJECT MANAGEMENT
The ‘waterfall’ project approach is explained extensively in the PRINCE2 (Projects IN Controlled Environments) methodology. PRINCE was originally developed in 1989 for UK Government projects and was very widely adopted in many industry areas, extensively so in I.T.
The traditionally phased approach to implementing change; analysing and documenting requirements, finalising the design, building, testing, implementation and then going into maintenance mode produces a cascade shape when viewed at a high level. This has therefore also come to be known as the ‘waterfall’ model of project delivery and is known to most people managing change, especially those in the I.T. domain.
As a highly experienced practitioner of PRINCE 2, I am well versed in the strengths and weaknesses of the waterfall approach and On Time On Budget is well-placed to support your project teams in their project delivery, whether managing the project directly, providing Quality Assurance oversight or consultancy on specific issues across the project lifecycle. I am particularly strong in the areas of building and managing high-performing teams, project communications and managing stakeholders from customers up to Board level, so call me if you would like to discuss opportunities for me to support your project delivery.
Agile / scrum project management
The waterfall model is one in which each phase of a product’s life cycle takes place in sequence, so that progress flows steadily downwards through these phases. The approach was inherited by enterprise software developers from other industries where, once a phase of production is complete, it was incredibly costly or impractical to go back and make changes (analogous to laying the foundations of a building). Using this approach, one has to ensure that the requirements are really well understood, documented in detail/signed-off and hope they don’t change during your project!
As a radical change in approach was required for an increasingly fast-moving world, where requirements change rapidly due to the increasing speed of technical developments and other external factors. In 1995 Jeff Sutherland and Ken Schwaber jointly presented The SCRUM Development Process – the origins of SCRUM. This was more fully developed in 2001 when Sutherland, Schwaber, and fifteen colleagues got together in Snowbird, Utah, and drafted the Agile Manifesto, which became a call to action for software developers around the globe to pursue a radically different way of creating software. Since then, Sutherland, Schwaber, and an ever-growing community of Scrum practitioners have gone on to generate tens of thousands of high-performing teams in companies all around the world.
Other important contributions to Scrum practices were made by Mike Cohn with the development of ‘User Stories’ as a tool for describing client-oriented goals of work, along with the development of ‘Story Points’ as a way of measuring the quantity of work and the ‘Velocity’ (productivity) of Scrum teams.
Scrum is now a very mature methodology and its use continues to grow – it is changing the world of work as we know it and much for the better! I am proud to be part of this movement that is bringing agility to people, teams and organisations around the world and not only for software development either – Agile techniques can be used for managing all manner of business change.
Scrum is not a process or a technique for building products, rather it is a framework within which you can employ various processes and techniques, founded on empirical process control theory or empiricism – knowledge comes from experience and making decisions based on what is known.
Therefore Scrum employs an iterative, incremental approach to optimise predictability and control risk – we learn through experience, we learn early, we adapt and change approach quickly taking into account the changing needs of a fast-moving commercial and technical environment. This way of working is aligned closely with the principles of Lean Management, is strongly focused on continuous improvement and the early delivery of value. This is achieved by delivering usable products in increments via a series of work cycles/iterations (“Sprints”).
The Scrum framework consists of a number of key Scrum events (sometimes known as ceremonies) on a regular basis usually taking 2-4 weeks to complete the cycle, known as a Sprint. The customer (or ‘Product Owner’) is intrinsically involved in these and steers the work in real-time – this can be really empowering for business users who are used to getting what they are given only months after being consulted on their requirements/needs. This engagement leads to the delivery of high-quality, usable products and delivers value early on in the process/project.
Agile Services On Time On Budget can provide:
Professional Certified Scrum Master who has learned through experience and networking with others the challenges involved implementing Scrum and making it work effectively. I can support your team in realising the benefits of Scrum and Kanban working methods.
If you are looking to implement Scrum and agile working methods in your organisation, I can support you, manage the process, pitch the benefits to senior management and employees and provide awareness training, up to Director/Board level.
Many companies struggle to implement ‘pure’ Scrum due to organisational and/or cultural constraints, thus some implementations adapt to become hybrid Waterfall / Scrum projects, sometimes rather clumsily called “Water-Scrum-Fall” projects or Scrum-Lite. Having implemented this approach in a corporate environment, I can advise on the best way to optimise your organisations’ use of agile methods whilst maintaining a more ‘traditional’ overall project delivery methodology if needed.
Conduct Scrum agility checks – how agile are you, really? What could you be doing better, to get the most from the team(s)?