Tag Archives: Project Strategy

I have just read an interesting article by Bob McGannon on selecting the right IT projects for Agile development. Bob is a Founder and Principal of MINDAVATION, a company providing project management training, consulting, keynotes & coaching services throughout North America, Europe, the Middle East and Australia.

Here is a précis of Bob’s guide to creating an appropriate filter for determining which projects would benefit from the use of Agile processes.

• An eager sponsor willing to conduct frequent reviews and evaluations of the evolving product.
• Ambitious, knowledgeable and available business representatives – The Agile process is purposefully collaborative.
• Minimal time to verify product viability: its power comes from its ability to produce quickly, adjust consistently to new knowledge and business change but only if the learning can be understood, interpreted and absorbed quickly.
• Minimal business exposure if the product produced is broken; it would be high risk to put a piece of functionality into a production environment if an error in that product would have a substantial impact on the business.
• A willingness to consider a very different approach; the ability to invest in a different work and management approach is necessary for the project stakeholders.
• The ‘DNA’ to deal with a bit of ambiguity. Priorities are consistently reassessed and work sequences changed.

The full article can be found at http://www.mindavation.com.au/articles/may10_intellections3.html

Bob’s approach is closely aligned to the ideas discussed in Mosaic’s White Paper on Project Strategy; see: http://www.mosaicprojects.com.au/WhitePapers/WP1038_Strategy.pdf; one approach to every problem seldome dilivers optimum outcomes.