ABSTRACT Your team is supposed to use an agile approach, such as Scrum. But you have a years-long backlog, your standups are individual status reports, and you’re still multitasking. You and your team members wish you had the chance to do great work, but this feels a lot like an “agile” death march. There’s a reason you feel that way. You’re using fake agility—a waterfall lifecycle masquerading as an agile approach. Worse, fake agility is the norm in our industry. No one has to work that way. Instead, you can assess your culture, project, and product risks to select a different approach. That will allow you to choose how to collaborate so you can iterate over features and when to deliver value. When you do, you are more likely to discover actual agility and an easier way to work. LEARNING OBJECTIVES Have a clear understanding of the different lifecycles and when to use each. Be able to assess your project, product, and portfolio risks. Know how to customize a lifecycle based on the unique culture and requirements of the team. How to create shorter feedback loops in any lifecycle for product success. MEET JOHANNA “People know me as the “Pragmatic Manager.” I offer frank advice—often with a little humor—for your tough problems. I help leaders and managers see and do reasonable things that work. Equipped with that knowledge, you can decide how to adapt your product development, always focusing on the business outcomes you need. My philosophy is that people want to do a good job. They don't always know what they are supposed to do, nor how to do it.”

1. “Agile” Not Working forYou?
SeeYour Reality and Incorporate Agility
Johanna Rothman
jr@jrothman.com
www.jrothman.com
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman

2. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Everyone’s gone “Agile,” right?
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3. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
So Many Problems
• Long and extensive backlogs and
roadmaps
• Teams become feature factories with
little product strategy
• Little to no experimentation
• Lots of late changes
• No joy. No ease.The grind of work.
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4. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Culture is the Root Cause
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• Resource ef
fi
ciency thinking:
Individual actions or deliverables
• Flow ef
fi
ciency thinking:
Create environment for everyone to
succeed in teams
• Rewards can drive your organizational
structure

5. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
When managers reward resource ef
fi
ciency, true
agility cannot survive
However, you have many options
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6. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Waterfall or agile is not a useful question
(leads to fake agility)
Instead, how can we manage our risks and
incorporate agility?
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7. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Part 1: Clarify Risks
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8. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Risks Drive Choices for Feedback Loop Duration
• Three major kinds of risks
• Project risks
• Product risks
• Portfolio/organization risks
• When we manage risks, we can
reduce the duration of feedback loops
and decide faster
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9. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Project Risks Affect Lifecycle Choice
• The project pyramid explains:
• Drives your project (one aspect)
• Constraints (not more than two)
• Floats (the other three)
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10. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Product Risks Affect Lifecycle Choice
• Product risks clarify how much
innovation you need and when
• Very few product ideas survive
customer contact
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11. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Portfolio Risks Affect Lifecycle Choice
• How often does your organization
need to re-decide on the project
portfolio?
• Market in
fl
ux
• Startup
• Insuf
fi
cient stability for long decision
durations
• The more portfolio risks, the shorter
the feedback loops need to be
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12. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
How to Choose a Lifecycle (Not “Agile”)
• Higher organizational or product risks:
incremental, combination, or agile approach
• Project risks:
• Date → incremental or agile approach
• Low defects → incremental or agile approach
• More features → iterative or agile approach
• General guidelines
• Know what to do and short timeframe? →
serial or incremental
• Longer timeframe? Anything other than serial
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13. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Agile Approach Is Not a Lifecycle
• A culture change
• Not a mindset or speci
fi
c practices
• Agile approaches require:
• A collaborative cross-functional team
• Limits its ranked WIP
• Releases often for feedback
• Learns from what they did
• Consider “Agility” instead of “Agile”
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14. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Agile Teams Work Through the Architecture to
Deliver
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15. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
More risks? Reduce feedback loop
duration
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16. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Poll forYour Collaboration to Enable Agility
• In the chat, please use a number for your answer:
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17. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Part 2: Clarify Lifecycles
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18. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Serial Lifecycles
• Waterfall
• Stage-Gate
• Phases
• Characteristics:
• Plan a lot up front
• SMOE (Simple Matter of Execution)
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19. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Reality for Too Many “Agile” Teams
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Requirements Hell
Freezes are Slush
Reality:
Unplanned Feedback Loops

20. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Iterative Lifecycles
• Re
fi
ne prototypes:
• Boehm’s Spiral Model
• Evolutionary
Prototyping
• Even SAFe, unless the
teams release from the
fi
rst timebox
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21. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Internal vs External Feedback
• Iterative approaches can work under
these conditions:
• Obtain feedback from outside the
team
• Obtain feedback from a customer
• The longer it takes for customer-
based feedback, the more likely the
project “Kiss of Death”
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22. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Incremental Lifecycles
• Design to Schedule
focuses on release
candidates
• Staged Delivery
assumes the team will
release
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23. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Late Feedback in Incremental Lifecycles
• Design to schedule has risks because
everything is a release candidate
• In Staged Delivery, release what you
have
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24. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Consider Combining Approaches
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Date-driven:
Iterative
fi
rst, then Incremental
Feature-driven:
Iterative
fi
rst,
then choose when to release

25. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Component Teams Challenge Agility
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26. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Agile Approaches
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Iterations are timeboxes.
That’s how the team limits its WIP.
The shorter the iteration,
the faster everyone learns.
A Kanban system does not need timeboxes.
The team limits its WIP by design.
I like to right-size the work
so the team delivers on a cadence.

27. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Poll forYour WIP Limits to Enable Agility
• In the chat, please use a number for your answer:
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28. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Part 3: How to Increase Agility
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29. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Team Tips to Increase Agility
• Focus on the
fl
ow of work, not what
individual people do (
fl
ow ef
fi
ciency
thinking)
• Reduce or timebox up-front work to
reduce later unplanned feedback loops
• Start with and maintain a cross-
functional team that collaborates for
the entire project
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30. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Flow Metrics Support More Agility
• Cycle time to see how long things
take
• Aging to see where work gets stuck
and for how long
• WIP: How much work is in progress
• Throughput: How often does the team
release something?
• Why your collaboration and ability to
limit WIP matter
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Little’s Law:

31. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Culture/Project Tips to Increase Agility
• Use your project and product risks to
understand how often you need
feedback, internally and externally
• Plan for shorter projects to reduce
unplanned feedback loops
• Deliver & Demo something at least
once a month
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32. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Less Planning + More Delivering =
Real Agility
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33. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
FindYour Way to Ful
fi
llYour Customers’ Needs
• “Agile” is not the point
• Satisfy the customer
• Manage risks to release
• To obtain revenue
• Use risks to choose your “best”
approach
• Incorporate agility to bring joy and
ease to your work
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34. © 2024 Johanna Rothman
https://mastodon.sdf.org/@johannarothman
Let’s Stay in Touch
• Pragmatic Manager:
• www.jrothman.com/
pragmaticmanager
• Please link with me on LinkedIn
• Project Lifecycles: https://
www.jrothman.com/lifecyclebook
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