Join us for this live webinar — Mixed Methodologies Pt II: Building successful outcomes — on Thursday, June 11 at 10 a.m. Pacific, 1 p.m. Eastern. Register here for free.

When it comes to dev methodologies, it’s not uncommon to have teams religiously indoctrinated in either Agile or Waterfall. The adherence can be almost blinding, and according to Nick McCleery, Agile Project Manager at Workfront, it’s easy to get lost in the standardization of the methodology.

“Companies can simply do Agile rather than be Agile,” he says, “and that can mean forgetting about what your organization is trying to do.”

Of course, the same applies to Waterfall, and by maintaining a strict attachment to a singular methodology approach, teams are losing sight of the benefits of both. When methodologies are merged, not only can teams get a better understanding of each approach, the organization reaps huge benefits beyond what either methodology can offer alone.

According to McCleery, the two main benefits of merging Agile and Waterfall are improved predictability (what Waterfall brings to Agile) and an improved ability to respond to customers needs, whether those customers are internal or external (what Agile brings to Waterfall).

But there can be issues in implementing a hybrid approach. “It can be disaster when a company thinks that the PMO’s office is going to be able to start telling the agile teams what they’re going to do and how they’re going to do it — or try to take the agility out of agile.”

That can be tempting, because of course, improved predictability and prioritization make exec teams very happy, but it’s paramount to respect the inherent benefits of Agile and its ability to deliver incremental value.

On the other hand, those who have come from the Agile side of the divide are tempted to set their own agenda separate from the broader company goals — or those of the CIO, CTO, or CFO.

“The agile teams need to understand what the goals of the organization are,” says McCleery, “and that they don’t have the option to prioritize their work however they want.”

So while the benefits are significant, the road to getting there needs some TLC.

In this essential webinar, we’ll cover exactly how best to approach building a hybrid methodology — what works, what doesn’t, and what to avoid at all costs. We’ll look at how to incorporate other methodologies such as Kanban, Scrum, sprints, and burn-down charts as well as integrating the public cloud and big data technologies. Don’t miss it.

What you’ll learn:

  • What works when mixing traditional app dev techniques
  • The Automate Agile principles while deploying new or existing apps
  • How cloud and big data can complicate the Agile scenario
  • How to avoid the pitfalls of bad development strategies

Join us on June 11th for this free VB webinar.

Speakers:

David Linthicum – Senior Vice President; Cloud Technology Partners

Rich Morrow – Principal Engineer; quicloud

Nick McCleery – Agile project manager; Workfront

Moderator:

Wendy Schuchart, VB Insight analyst

This webinar is made possible with the support of Workfront.