ETM 546/646 Project Management Tools

Spring 2016

Chaitra Muralidhara
ID: 954107849

SR SUCCESSFUL SOLUTIONS THROUGH AGILE PROJECT MANAGEMENT

There are different kinds of projects being handled in todays world. Some of them are working in a
highly dynamic and active environment where the flexibility in adapting to the customers
requirements is the key to projects success. This level of flexibility is required by certain R&D
projects, software development projects, consumer electronics product development projects
where customer value and innovation of new ideas, incorporating them in the project determines
the project cycle. This is where Agile project management approach comes into picture. Agile Project
Management is well suited for the projects which require customer involvement at every stage of
the project. The process of assessing the needs, development, testing, collecting feedback from
customer and the reiterating the same steps goes on until the project meets the customers
expectations. This also stresses on the importance of maintaining the quality of delivery by fulfilling
the business purpose through these iterative changes, improvements and accommodation of
additional features. This style of project management considers transparent communication,
interaction and people more than the tools and standards of traditional project management.
When it comes to the three main facets of project management i.e. scope, time and budget, agile
method treats them in a slightly different way. Deliverables keep changing as per the change
requests and continuous delivery to achieve the desired result with creativity, technical knowledge,
innovation, experience along with customer collaboration is different from the well defined set of
deliverables and project plan of the traditional PM tool. Senior management support and ability to
make decisions in uncertainties, current customer satisfactions are the deciding factors for funding
the project. Progress throughout the schedule is measured in form of products functionality,
features and innovative attributes which makes the organization competitive in the industry. Earned
value is measured in terms of customers level of satisfaction.
The team is comprised of highly skilled resources who possess the technical knowledge, experience,
creativity along with the ability to translate user stories into functional and then technical
requirements. This requires interaction and clear communication lines with customers and other
relevant stakeholders. The PM here should encourage the team members for critical thinking and
provide them the authority to make certain decisions. Trusting the team members, providing their
own space rather than adopting project management control tools would encourage out of the box
thinking to come up with something new which has not been done till now.
The example which I would like to state here is Intels project Collaborative Cancer Cloud a
distributed precision medicine analytics platform, which is going on with OHSU, Dana-Farber Cancer
Institute and Ontario Institute for Cancer Research. Software specifications here are analysed after
frequent interactions with the doctors and professors across all these universities. This project is a
R&D project with no specific schedule. The project team consists of Project Manager as Leader
where he himself is involved in all these user stories along with the highly skilled team of 8 members
with wide knowledge on software optimization and data analytics. Their results are also not
predictive as the process of software development, assessment and testing is done repetitively and
feedback is collected from these collaborators and improvements are done accordingly.

ETM 546/646 Project Management Tools

Spring 2016

Chaitra Muralidhara
ID: 954107849

After going through the white paper I felt, firstly organizations have to divide their portfolio on the
nature of the projects handled. If the projects involve the same technology, without variation and
already been performed several times, then traditional project management approach should be
followed, like in any manufacturing company or software service company. If the project is
completely new with no experience and no well defined scope, it should follow agile approach. This
bifurcation on project portfolio will maintain a balance between regular and R&D projects( also
balance between flexibility and stability) by achieving the overall organizations goals and objectives.
This transition from traditional project management to the agile approach is not an easy one. Firstly
everyone involved in the project along with management and stakeholders should accept the fact on
uncertainty and risks involved in the project. Customers increased involvement demands more
transparent processes and communication across all levels. The team have to highly collaborative
and work with co-ordination, should also be creative and have the ability of better decision making
along with problem solving skills. The team size should be kept to the smallest possible and
monitored through the progress in product development, functionality and features. Customers also
have to dedicate their time and effort in such projects.
But all these project management approach changes to Agile are worth, when it comes to the
projects which aim at increasing customers value. This iterative process with increased flexibility,
innovativeness and customer collaboration will drive such projects to remarkable success!