Olena Grygorchuk - Refactor your understandings about Agile development

1. Refactor your understanding about
Agile development
Oct 18, 2018

2. Agenda
• SDLC, why it does matter
• Why Waterfall method fails and what benefits it has
• Agile approach, how to apply it
• Agile adoption and transformation
• Hybrid model or “structured” Agile

3. Olena Grygorchuk
• Experienced mentor, QA, Team/QA Lead, SM, Proxy PO,
Agile coach
• 4+ IT PM in various business domains: B2B, e-commerce,
media and entertainment
• PMO expert and mentor at N-iX company
• Strategic PM, getting deep insight into client`s business
domain
• N-iX company values
 Data-Driven Decision Making
 Advocating Agile Approach
 Freedom to Innovate

4. What is the best methodology?
• There are stacks of different project management methodologies you could apply, knowing which is the
right methodology to use can be tricky
• There is no ‘right’ methodology. There is no one-size-fits-all one methodology that is the methodology
that should always be used for every project
• The best methodology is what makes sense and is most suitable for the project, team and client!
• There are two main approach directions agile and non-agile

5. Waterfall structure
• sequential and heavily requirements-focused
• customer and team need to have a crystal clear idea of what the project demands before proceeding it
• there is no scope for correction once the project is underway
• each stage in this process is self-contained

6. Some common problems and why often
Waterfall fails
• Expensive project deliverables and re-works
• Delayed Projects. Lots of “Accidental” Complexity
• Missed market opportunities, difficult to respond “Quickly” to market change
• Being unable to deliver meaningful value to clients
• Poor collaboration, communication
• “Code then Fix” approach to delivery
• Long feedback loops between product delivery and expected customer value
• No predictability (e.g. quality, schedules, risk, costs, value, etc.)
• Strong focus on process and tools, over delivering “actual” business and customer value

7. Waterfall: Advantages and Disadvantages
A
• Easy of use and understand
• Structure: Since you can't go back, you have to be "perfect" in each stage
• Documentation: makes it easy for new resources to move in and work on the project when needed
D
• Higher risk: if an error is found or need to change something => start the project from the beginning
Increases the risk of project failure
• Front-heavy: The entire Waterfall approach depends heavily on your understanding and analyzing
requirements correctly
• Lack of flexibility
Best for
• Short, simple projects
• Projects with clear and fixed requirements
• Projects with changing resources that depend on in-depth documentation

8. What is Agile?
• Agile is not a methodology: It’s a mindset. Several methodologies are based on the Agile manifesto;
two of the most widely known are Scrum and SAFe.
• Emerged as a response to the failure of Waterfall method

9. Agile Delivery Values and Methods
Agile was formally launched in 2001 when 17 technologists drafted the Agile Manifesto:
• Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
• Working software over comprehensive documentation
• Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
• Responding to change over following a plan
There are various Agile Delivery Methods e.g.
• XP
• Scrum
• Kanban
• SAFe
• Lean Software Development

10. Agile delivery
• iterative processes to deliver small increments of value

11. Just having short iterations is not enough
• We need both: An iterative process and incremental delivery of value

12. Agile: Advantages and Disadvantages
A
• Flexibility and freedom: gives your resources much more freedom to experiment
• Lower risk: regular feedback from stakeholders, reduces the risk of project failure since the
stakeholders are involved at every step
D
• No fixed plan: responding to changes as they occur. This lack of any fixed plan makes resource
management and scheduling harder
• High level of Team maturity is necessary
• Collaboration-heavy: The lack of a fixed plan means all involved departments - including stakeholders
and sponsors - will have to work closely to deliver results. The feedback-focused approach also means
that stakeholders have to be willing (and available!) to offer feedback quickly
Best for
• When clients don't have a fixed end in mind but have a general idea of a product
• When the project needs to accommodate quick change
• If collaboration and communication are the key strengths (and planning isn't) 

13. Agile adoption vs Agile transformation
Agile Adoption
• is “a change in process to one that is consistent with the Agile Values and Principles”
• The focus during Agile Adoption is on process change. You can view Agile Adoption as moving from one
process, such as waterfall to an Agile process
Agile Transformation
• Agile Transformation may be defined as “the process of transforming an organization’s culture and
nature to one of agility”. Transformation is about a fundamental change in the way people think and
feel. Some people distinguish this from adoption by calling adoption “doing agile” and transformation
“being agile”
Agile behaviour is a must
• 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 on the next
team
• All team members have to accept the idea that delivering less, high-quality features is better than to
produce a large number of items that don’t work well
• Servant Leadership

14. Benefits I gained on my project using Agile
mindset
• Planning - humans are naturally bad at planning and estimating
• Higher productivity by improving the planning proceeds
• Customer engagement and trust establishing
• Flexibility - adapt when some requirements change. If you work in the software development industry, I
am sure you know how much they can change!
• Quality - integration of testing throughout the development cycle
• Better Environment and motivation- the team can make decisions and explore options on their own. This
provides you more motivated and focused teams

15. Agile Project Management Statistics for 2018
• 71% of organizations report using Agile approaches sometimes, often, or always. (Source: Project
Management Institute)
• Microsoft Project is the most popular project management software, whereas Atlassian Jira is the most
popular Agile-specific tool. (Source: Capterra)
• 27.4% of organizations rely on Agile, 56.6% - rely on “a combination of methodologies.”
(Source: LiquidPlanner)

16. Hybrid model – my project case study
Combination of the Waterfall and Agile methodologies – we can call it "Structured Agile"
• By gathering and analyzing requirements initially. At the same time, it takes the flexibility of Agile
approach with an emphasis on rapid iterations
• By combining attributes of Waterfall and Agile approaches
• By dividing the project into two parts—one that’s waterfall and another that’s Agile. This would work
well when you use waterfall to establish the infrastructure for deploying a new solution, then turn to
Agile for the configurations

17. Hybrid: Advantages and Disadvantages
A
• Increased flexibility
• More structured: By borrowing the initial planning phase from Waterfall, the Hybrid method addresses
one of the biggest complaints about the Agile approach - lack of structure
D
• Requires compromise: Since you're essentially reconciling two polar opposite approaches, both sides will
need to compromise on requirements and flexibility
Best for
• for projects that have middling requirements when compared to Agile and Waterfall, i.e. they require
structure as well as flexibility
• mostly, this would be medium-sized projects with moderately high complexity but fixed budgets

18. SUM UP
You should pick your methodology based on the needs of your project and your team. Two tips are relevant
here:
• Evaluate the Project Take a look at your requirements, your project goals and objectives. Analyze
contract type, project budget, timeline, size, complexity and stakeholder expectations
• Evaluate Your Team: experience, training, self-organization capabilities, location (remote, on-site, etc.)
The best methodology is one that’s continually and organically improving,
adapting and through strong collaboration increases the value of the output.
My contacts:
Olena Grygorchuk
+380976108414
ogrygorchuk@n-ix.com

19. THANK YOU!
ANY QUESTIONS?
Olena Grygorchuk