From the course: Project Management Tips

What is an agile project?

From the course: Project Management Tips

What is an agile project?

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- The traditional approach to project management is often called the waterfall method. We plan everything out at the beginning, and then one step flows into the next in perfect sequence. It sounds logical, but it can actually become rigid, bureaucratic, and hierarchical. And many environments are just too dynamic and unpredictable for that to work. That's why Agile project management has become so popular, especially when it comes to software development. Agile is a faster, more collaborative, less bureaucratic approach to managing a project. The approach is summarized in a one page document called the "Agile Manifesto" that you can find by doing a search on the Internet. It includes these four main values. Individuals and interactions over processes and tools, working software over comprehensive documentation, customer collaboration over contract negotiation, and responding to change over following a plan. Agile focuses less on the up-front, long-range planning, and more on communication and short-term planning. And there's a strong emphasis on making sure that the project is delivering value to the customer, even if that means making changes in midstream. In other words, Agile focuses on delivering something that works quickly, rather than obsessing about creating something that's perfect.

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