Top Reasons Companies Choose Agile For
The well-known principles of the Manifesto for Agile software development define the following terms: individuals and interactions over processes and tools; working software over comprehensive documentation; customer collaboration over contract negotiation; responding to change over following a plan.
Agile’s values are known widely. This method has enabled teams at both large companies and small startups to produce high-quality software – on time and within budget. If your company is planning to apply agile software development practices, your entire team will have to adopt them to maintain a clear advantage and deliver the best products to customers. The adoption of the Agile methodology in the software companies is very important in today’s dynamic environment. On the market there are many available development practices and project management practices, but the agile approach promises a fast and efficient way for product delivery with less obstructions and impediments on the way.
In the agile approach – the software is developed in time-boxed units, which are usually from 1 to 4 weeks; they are called iterations. Each iteration is a complete software project, including requirements, design, coding, testing and documentation. It requires that product managers should elaborate and define complete set of use cases, which the product could possibly cover. The marketing department should change its approach from one-time product marketing to strategic and collaborative marketing. And also – the development team should thrive to become real problem-solvers, not just ordinary non-creative coders.
The actual development will start when all initial requirements will be approved. When the development begins, it will last until all requirements have been coded according to spec, then the quality assurance team takes over. In the meantime, changes in the market environment may appear that can cause customer needs changing as well. But your specs are defined months earlier and much of the development budget has been spent, so maneuvering to meet the new client demands is painful, if not impossible.
The most important role in the ‘agile’ organization is the product manager. He will be the leader of change in your organization, making it possible the agile approach. The product manager should manage the backlog, communicate with stakeholders, inform the other groups in the organization, so that they fully understand the importance of being agile and using Agile processes. The product manager will have the key role, since he will motivate the team members to be more agile, from inception to the project closure. He should always know what is in – for the company’s members, and of course, for the customer. When you adopt the agile approach – you will be able to focus on what’s needed now and in the near future, ensuring that you’re delivering what’s actually valuable to your clients and customers, not just forecasting what will be needed in the far future. And being agile – will ensure that you are using proven processes that can be adapted to implement, follow, and report the main objectives.
In the agile software development – the client of the software product is always informed about the progress of the project and he decides (together with the team) what should be done in the next sprint. This permanent interaction between the development team and the client, will ensure that the client will get all the required functionalities.
The scrum master is a role person in the agile development, that is in charge with organization and leading of all Scrum events (daily Scrum meetings). He should explain its principles, show its process, engage with the team, connect with stakeholders, and, most importantly, to be an example by living the Agile values and presenting the Scrum behaviors. The Scrum Master should always be helpful, honest, and transparent, and to put the benefits of his team ahead of his own benefits. The Scrum Master must also resolve issues that obstruct the way of the team’s progress. An advanced task of the Scrum Master is to use Scrum to improve the creativity, learning, and abilities of the entire team.
Today, the agile software development practices are very highly ranked in the programming community; so much that leading developers cordially prefer it. Developers, testers, and all software engineers must learn to work together during the project, sharing responsibility for quality, stability, and performance instead of just putting the responsibility to the next team. All team members have to accept the idea that delivering less, high-quality features is better than to produce large number of items that don’t work well. If your business has adopted some agile methodology – you will more easily attract and retain a quality team of software engineers. Also, the agile should not be enforced only in the departments of the engineering and the IT.
