Book review: Agile Project Management: A Mandate for the 21st Century

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Agile Project Management book cover“[T]he time has come when we need to admit we (the program/project manager, business customer, product architect/designer, other stakeholders) do not know the solutions to the problems… and indeed, that “we” – our methods, our habits, our leadership styles, our assumptions – are part of the problem,” writes Karen R. J. White in her book, Agile Project Management: A Mandate for the 21st Century.

This book isn’t designed to be an in-depth primer into agile. Instead, White aims to “connect the dots” between agile practices, project management and the business imperatives that mean we all need to be thinking about how to manage projects in an uncertain world.

I thought I’d end up reading a book in which agile could do no wrong, but White is measured in her approach and clearly sets out where projects will benefit from an agile approach and where they won’t. “Agile techniques supplement the traditional techniques the organisation already uses,” she writes.

The big concern I have with agile project management is making it work in an environment where the team does not all sit together.  After all, agile teams work closely together and have daily stand up meetings. She writes:

Collocation of all project team members, including the project manager, contributes to this sense of unity and further fosters sharing and collaboration, but the reality is that many teams no longer share a continent, much less office space.

White touches on managing distributed teams in an agile environment by briefly saying it is possible with the use of technology to create virtual rooms for discussion and collaboration. “To date there are few examples of companies successfully employing agile project management with a distributed-team model,” she concludes.

The difficulties of managing remote workers aside, this is a handy book for convincing people to give agile a go. There is a good section overcoming cultural change issues and management resistance.

I would have liked to see some more on bringing the rest of the organisation along with you when you decide to make the leap. There is a page on how traditional budget planning doesn’t suit agile, but not a lot on how to make agile either work with corporate bureaucracy or get them changed.

There are are also some useful templates dotted about, like the change management action plan. It’s short, too, at just over 100 pages, but there is still space for an interesting chapter on measuring in an agile project environment. White makes the point that tools like earned value are not as useful for this type of project as accurate costs and a full schedule are not available at the outset of the project.

The final chapter looks at the evolving role agile methods have to play in managing the projects of the future. With more complex organisations and partnerships with suppliers, greater levels of uncertainty and global teams, agile could help companies face future challenges. If only they can get it to work effectively.

This is my first book review done completely on an iPad. The review was written on an iPad, and the book was read on an iPad too.

If you liked this, you might enjoy:

  1. 5 Team structures for Agile teams Catherine Powell, principal at Abakas, a Boston based firm, spoke about agile team structures at Øredev, the software development conference in Sweden at the end...
  2. The 8 dangers of implementing Agile As if adopting Agile wasn’t scary enough, Keith Richards from KRC talked about the 8 dangers of Agile at the APM conference last month. And...
  3. PMI Launches Agile Certification Agile techniques are increasingly important to project managers and the organizations they serve, and PMI hasn’t been blind to this fact. There was enough publicity...

Tagged as: Agile, Karen White

10/01/2011

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  • http://twitter.com/ronaldjanki Ronald Janki

    Hi Elizabeth,

    I really like the point that the overall system itself can sometimes be part of the problem and the organization needs to rethink and implement new methodologies, processes and guiding principles to increase the chances of achieving success in a dynamic fast,-moving environment.

    I also like the thinking that traditional approaches could be merged with Agile principles, if this would have more likelihood of achieving the organizational goal. I also like the point that the measurement of success is an integral part of the journey, and present methodologies of measurement have to be changed as success is measured differently in an Agile environment.

    Best

    Ronald

    • Elizabeth

      Ronald, measuring success is key. We think we know what it is that we want, but until we actually ask the right questions we don’t realise that different people have different ideas of what success looks like. Project leadership is all about making sure people share a common vision, and all projects should be aligned to corporate goals. It’s a massive effort though, to change the way an organisation does business and implement this kind of change. Still, I think we can adopt certain bits of the Agile mindset even if the whole company doesn’t take to Agile.

  • http://twitter.com/Agile_PM Karen RJ White, PMP

    Hi there – I find this dialogue about my text very interesting and insightful! And I extend my thanks to Elizabeth for the review! I am currently writing another text addressing agility and proect management within the world of community-based non-profits, where response to immediate situations can often derail plans. If interested in dialogue, please send me email at krwhite@appliedagility.com, where my blog page is underdevelopment.
    Karen

    • Elizabeth

      Hi Karen, thanks for commenting! Your new book sounds interesting, especially given the current economic climate and the ‘Big Society’ approach we’ve got over here. Community-driven initiatives may not have a formal project management approach, but I can see how an agile approach would work well.

  • http://twitter.com/Agile_PM Karen RJ White, PMP

    There most definitely is “work” to be done to educate an organization on why an agile PM approach is appropriate for some projects and not for others. You can expect some PM’s to resent the perceived “less bureaucracy” associated with an agile approach. A training and awareness campaign associating the practice of project management practices – traditional or agile – to risk mitigation would be my recommended approach. As I state in the book, I firmly believe the only reason for project management is to ensure completion of a particular objective, be it the installation and adoption of new technology or the timely construction of a building. The methods by which that project management is practiced should be reflective of the risk associated with not achieving that objective.

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