Agile Project Management

499 Pages·2020·17.465 MB·English

by  Mark C. Layton, Dean J. Kynaston, Steven J. Ostermiller

Agile Project
Management

Agile Project
Management
3rd Edition
by Mark C. Layton, Steven J Ostermiller,
and Dean J. Kynaston
Agile Project Management For Dummies®, 3rd Edition
Published by: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774, www.wiley.com
Copyright © 2020 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published simultaneously in Canada
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Library of Congress Control Number: 2020942690
ISBN 978-1-119-67699-7 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-119-67706-2 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-119-67705-5 (ebk)
Manufactured in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents at a Glance
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Part 1: Understanding Agility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
CHAPTER 1: Modernizing Project Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
CHAPTER 2: Applying the Agile Manifesto and Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
CHAPTER 3: Why Being Agile Works Better . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
CHAPTER 4: Agility Is about Being Customer Focused . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .69
Part 2: Being Agile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
CHAPTER 5: Agile Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
CHAPTER 6: Agile Environments in Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
CHAPTER 7: Agile Behaviors in Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
CHAPTER 8: The Permanent Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
Part 3: Agile Planning and Execution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
CHAPTER 9: Defining the Product Vision and Product Roadmap . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
CHAPTER 10: Planning Releases and Sprints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
CHAPTER 11: Working throughout the Day . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
CHAPTER 12: Showcasing Work, Inspecting, and Adapting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Part 4: Agility Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251
CHAPTER 13: Managing a Portfolio: Pursuing Value over Requirements . . . . . . . . . . 253
CHAPTER 14: Managing Scope and Procurement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 269
CHAPTER 15: Managing Time and Cost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
CHAPTER 16: Managing Team Dynamics and Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
CHAPTER 17: Managing Quality and Risk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 331
Part 5: Ensuring Success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355
CHAPTER 18: Building a Foundation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357
CHAPTER 19: De-Scaling across Teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373
CHAPTER 20: Being a Change Agent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 395
Part 6: The Part of Tens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 421
CHAPTER 21: Ten Key Benefits of Agile Product Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423
CHAPTER 22: Ten Key Factors for Agile Product Development Success . . . . . . . . . . . 431
CHAPTER 23: Ten Signs That You’re Not Agile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437
CHAPTER 24: Ten Valuable Resources for Agile Professionals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 449
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 455

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
About This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Foolish Assumptions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Icons Used in This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Beyond the Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Where to Go from Here . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
PART 1: UNDERSTANDING AGILITY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
CHAPTER 1: Modernizing Project Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Project Management Needed a Makeover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
The origins of modern project management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
The problem with the status quo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Introducing Agile Project Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
How agile projects work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Agile Project Management Is Becoming Agile
Product Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Differences between managing a project versus
developing a product . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Why agile product development works better . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
CHAPTER 2: Applying the Agile Manifesto and Principles . . . . . . . 21
Understanding the Agile Manifesto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Outlining the Four Values of the Agile Manifesto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Value 1: Individuals and interactions over processes
and tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Value 2: Working software over comprehensive
documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Value 3: Customer collaboration over contract negotiation . . . . . . 28
Value 4: Responding to change over following a plan . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Defining the 12 Agile Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Agile principles of customer satisfaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Agile principles of quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Agile principles of teamwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Agile principles of product development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Adding the Platinum Principles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Resisting formality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Thinking and acting as a team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Visualizing rather than writing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Changes as a Result of Agile Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
The Agile Litmus Test . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Table of Contents vii
CHAPTER 3: Why Being Agile Works Better . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Evaluating Agile Benefits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
How Agile Approaches Beat Historical Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Greater flexibility and stability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Reduced nonproductive tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Higher quality, delivered faster . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Improved team performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Tighter control . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Faster and less costly failure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Why People Like Being Agile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Executives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Product development and customers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Development teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
CHAPTER 4: Agility Is about Being Customer Focused . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Knowing Your Customers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Common methods for identifying your customer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
Figuring Out the Problem Your Customer Needs to Solve . . . . . . . . . . 79
Using the scientific method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Failing early is a form of success . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Defining customer-focused business goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Story mapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Liberating structures — simple rules to unleash a culture
of innovation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Understanding Root Cause Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Pareto rule . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Five why’s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Ishikawa (fishbone) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
PART 2: BEING AGILE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
CHAPTER 5: Agile Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Diving under the Umbrella of Agile Approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Reviewing the Big Three: Lean, Scrum, and
Extreme Programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
An overview of lean . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
An overview of scrum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
An overview of extreme programming . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Putting It All Together . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .107
CHAPTER 6: Agile Environments in Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Creating the Physical Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
Collocating the team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
Setting up a dedicated area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
Removing distractions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
viii Agile Project Management For Dummies