Published on August 3rd, 2019 | by Guest

Everything You Need to Know About Agile Project Management

Agile Project Management (APM) is a well-known concept of the software industry. It refers to an iterative approach to planning as well as guiding project processes. The primary advantage of Agile Management is its very ability to quickly respond to issues as they arise during the life-cycle of the project.

APM also permits you to provide small chunks of deliverables in a more efficient manner. It is, in fact, an excellent choice for the teams that work in specific fields of business analysis, product development, and other similar collaborative areas.

Primarily designed for the software industry, APM is now used by several other industries as well when developing their products and services. The reason for this shift is the highly collaborative and more efficient nature of the Agile methodology.

How Agile Project Management Works?

Agile project management involves breaking down large projects into small pieces. These pieces are completed in various work sessions that run right from the design phase to testing and quality assurance. These sessions are known as sprints, which is basically the term for iteration in a popular Agile development method known as Scrum.

The detailed working of APM can be explained in the below steps-

Agile teams work on building rapid feedback, continuous adaptation, and quality assurance best practices into their iterations.
The APM teams adopt various practices such as continuous integration and deployment using advanced technology that automates the process to speed up the release and use of products.
APM reduces the complexity of the projects by breaking down the long cycle of building requirements for the whole project, followed by building the entire product in quick succession along with testing them to find flaws if any.

Agile project management with Scrum

In the case of project management tasks, the project manager is usually burdened with multiple responsibilities of balancing project scope, quality, cost, risk, personnel, and adapting as requirements change. Agile project management help in dividing these responsibilities among three separate agile roles:

Product Owner

Product owner typically does the task of handling project goals, adapting to changing project requirements along with setting priorities for various product features. If you are an aspiring Agile professional, this is one of the most important roles of APM that needs thorough preparation using specific product owner interview questions frequently asked during the interviews.

ScrumMaster

ScrumMaster’ role in APM is to guide the whole team to prioritize the tasks, work efficiently and remove any impediments which come during handling their tasks.

Team Members

The third role of APM is that of team members who are assigned the duty of directly handling most of the task assignment, the progress of the project, daily detail management as well as quality control for the product.

Principles that guide APM

Among the key principles that guide agile project management today includes

Constantly changing environments that are embraced at various stages of the process to provide customers with a competitive advantage
The agility that can be enhanced through a continuous focus on proper design and technical excellence
Sustainable development that can be accomplished by adopting agile processes whereby all the stakeholders are able to maintain the required pace of the projects
Self-sufficient as well as self-organizing teams that are required to develop the best designs and architectures to meet project requirements.
Customer satisfaction can be achieved through rapid and continuous delivery.

Agile is a perfect fit for organizations looking to transform how they manage projects and operate as a whole. Adopting APM can help ensure both the company-wide process as well as methodological alignment along with many other benefits such as-

Increased productivity
Better quality deliverables
Better chances of project success through more focused efforts
Higher flexibility
More transparency
Faster turnaround times
Early detection of flaws and other issues
Reduced risk of missed objectives
Higher customer satisfaction and stakeholder engagement
Increased frequency of feedback and better collaboration

Why should you adopt agile project management?

Agile project management is an important link in the overall Agile methodology. APM allows the project managers to continuously evaluate time and cost as primary constraints in any project.

In an increasingly competitive market, agile project management offers several benefits to project managers as well as the organizations adopting the methodology.

As organisations make a conscious shift towards the digital workplace, the need for flexible, speedy, and productive solutions is an all-time high. APM and other Agile methodologies serve this purpose well and this is the reason why multiple industries across the world are adopting and embracing Agile.

Tags: agile, agile project management, IT, management, project management, tools