2. Flexibility
Agile brings more flexibility in process compare to
traditional waterfall methodology. Accepting a
change from business is comparatively easy and
lest costlier in agile. Business has authority to
bring changes in product backlog (Scrum) due to
changed market scenarios or priorities.
As a detail project plan is prepared in beginning in
waterfall, any change request (CR) needs to be
analyzed and its impact need to be assess.
Approval is required if team can proceed with the
Change request. The CR impacts the project plan
and timelines.
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3. Collaboration
In Agile customer is very much part of the
development process. Business is aware of what
team is working on; what issues/challenges they
are facing. There is better collaboration between
customer and development team which helps in
reducing the gaps/impediments.
Traditional waterfall is more like contract based
approach. Requirements are finalized and approved
during analysis phase and team develop or
implements as per the approved requirements
only. There is less collaboration between customer
and team as implementation is done phase wise.
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4. Visibility/Transparency
In Agile processes; customer regularly attends
certain meetings so he is aware of developments
happening at team side. Team regularly interacts
with customer (Daily Stand up in Scrum). There is
greater visibility in terms of how well team is
progressing towards their iteration commitment.
Customer is able to see the working copy of the
software thru Sprint review (Scrum).
In traditional waterfall; milestones are tracked as
per the shared and baseline project plan. Working
copy of the software is produced/released quite
late in stage; thus getting business feedback is
very late in process.
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5. Time to market/Business Value
One of the great benefit of agile processes is
frequent releases or delivery of business value.
This helps customer to get timely ROI. Customer
has a chance to provide feedback based on the
quality of the initial releases. Business can
prioritize the features/requirements they would
like to release first.
In traditional waterfall; release happens only at the
end of the project. Milestone as per the phase like
requirements document, design document etc. are
shared with business. Its difficult to judge the
progress of the project based on working software.
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6. Inspect and Adapt
Agile processes are based in inspect and adapt
approach. Team learns from their completed
iterations/sprints and prepare an action plan to
incorporate in upcoming iterations. This gives a
chance to team to improve further. In case a team
has one bad iteration; they can retrospect and
improve in coming sprints based on that learning.
In traditional waterfall; team capture project
learning at the end of the project which serves as a
knowledge repository that can be used in other
projects.
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