Why you should choose Agile and Scrum for your IT projects?

Introduction:

Hey! When there are multiple methodologies are available for SDLC, why Agile is unique. Before seeing it, it is wise to know and understand what Agile is basically and how it works? Agile methodology is a product/process system what a team follows with rapid short cycles for releasing the product. For more information about scrum master certification please visit StarAgile site.

How the AGILE portfolio works:

Typically as the name suggests, AGILE- a Project management process which involves splitting up one project into multiple small requirements based on ranks given as per the user needs and delivering each requirement individually in a repetitive cycle. Requirements are referred as User stories. User stories are nothing but requirement defined as short descriptions of user requirements. Prioritising it with numbers called story points. Points are based on the client’s expectation & complication of it to be executed. An iteration is the repetitive procedure of developing each section at a time. Goals are set in detail in each iteration meetings can be called as ‘spring review & Retrospective meetings’ such as priorities, budgets, expected changes, time estimation.

AGILE Process:

The Process flow goes like below.

1. Initially, the requirements are gathered by BA from Product Owners (clients) and kept in a document. Some teams will have a QA person as BA as well.
2. Team members are formed including Scrum master (Dedicated person for a team’s health), Development/QA Managers, Developers, Testers and Business Analyst. The total size of the team will be minimal.
3. The initial meeting for Sprint planning is set up for discussing & ranking the User stories in Product Backlogs. Based on the Story points, each iteration is set up as spring 0, spring 1… Spring N in Spring Backlogs.
4. Typically Each Spring will have approximately 30 days or 2- 4 weeks of time for releasing the incremental & Shippable end product.
5. Daily prescheduled meetings called scrum meetings for the whole team and client will be held by Scrum master where Customers review the work completed for the past iteration and plans for the next iteration. So everything goes in parallel.
6. At the end of the each sprint, potentially shippable product is released.

Key Highlights:

• The Agile method gives high priority on Client’s participation and satisfaction from the very beginning of the Software Development Life Cycle. It makes the Client involved in each step hence can make them happy too with the end result.
• This is a very effective method in Rapid changing environments.
• Scrum is to manage & perform sophisticated & complicated work.
• Designing balanced performance system to recognise the team performance and the individual’s contribution because of small team size.
• Offers open communication among team members & customers.
• Providing teams an advantage by spotting the defects and resolving it all round the process, instead of doing all at the end.
• Helps in budget by lowering the cost for changes since bug fixing or any changes are done all round the process.
• Minimizing the effort since it’s a stepped approach.
• Speeds up the evaluation process since each evaluation is done only for a small part out of the whole project.
• Changes to be made are easier & quicker because of the consistent evaluations as per the expected results.
• Makes the team very adjusted and Inspective throughout the process.
• Frequent check-ins and validations removes most of the bugs hence no compromise in the quality in the end product.

Comparison Chart:

Conclusion:

Currently Agile Methodology is a new trend where most of the projects are following Scrum framework since it has so many benefits over the company, client, and team as well as on individual. It is wiser to consider Agile process portfolios while considering time and budget estimation.