When Waterfall Principles Sneak Back Into Agile Workflows

AgileFall is a term for program development where you try to be agile and lean but keep using waterfall techniques.

Traditional waterfall development is not appropriate when the problem and solution had many unknowns. This is especially true when the firm is facing disruption from new competitors. the firm may be smart, innovative and motivated but it needs to change the development methods to become more agile.

This conundrum has been analysed for a Fortune 10 company and how the agile method was brought on track with a few modifications.

The conversion from waterfall to agile methods is being st up in a product line within a division of the company.

The product line has 15 managers overseeing 60 projects. On average each project manager is overseeing 4 projects. they are creating new features to an existing product for existing customers. Teams built MVPs, got out of the office to talk to customers. 

However, the product head was still managing the project managers using the waterfall method. Teams reviewed the work once in 3 months. They had to prepare voluminous, detailed reports for these quarterly reviews. The reports were of poor quality as the teams wrote it overnight. It was clear that the product head still measured success by the reports and not by outcomes. It was the same process used to measure success using the step by step linear waterfall process.

The agile process requires a different mindset, where the focus is on outcomes rather than reports.

In this particular case, the product head agreed on a few changes to his approach.

• He understood that it was the individuals who were creating value not process and reports
• Process and reports were however essential.
• It is more important for the teams to build incremental and iterative MVPs rather than documentation and reporting.
• .Allow team to pivot to what they learnt during customer discovery rather than stick to the original plan.
• Understand that progress to outcome is not linear and different teams progress at different rates.

Instead of quarterly reviews of all teams, the product head started reviewing 4-5 teams every week. This meant that the review for each team took place at least once in a month against once in 3 months earlier.

In effect, the product head should focus on outcomes rather than paperwork. 

Agile/ lean work should be managed by a few people who can operate in a chaotic learning environment VS a process riven one.

When Waterfall Principles Sneak Back Into Agile Workflows

by Steve Blank HBR SEPTEMBER 05, 2019