Home » What is the agile project management life cycle | Benefits and Phases

What is the agile project management life cycle | Benefits and Phases

by MarketMillion

Organizations must implement the right strategies and initiatives to deliver excellence in today’s competitive global business environment. A systematic approach to business operations is required to stay ahead of the competition. Project management is the modern business buzzword for implementing any new initiatives in support of that.

What comes to mind first when you think of project management? A project is a series of activities undertaken to complete tasks to achieve the desired business goals. Project management focuses on managing and planning all aspects of project delivery.

The concept of Agile was first developed in 2001 as a software development methodology, but it is now widely used for project management. Stated agile values and principles guide the project management lifecycle. Agile does not employ multiple project management phases. End-users and cross-functional teams collaborate to deliver business solutions in the form of projects flexibly and nimbly, using successive incremental projects.

This article will teach about project management, Agile life cycle management, Agile ALM benefits, and Agile ALM phases to help you deliver a well-executed and successful project. Web design company Nashville effectively working on agile project management life cycle for successful software development.

What is Agile life cycle management?

Agile life cycle management (also known as Agile application life cycle management) refers to values that guide software development. Teams use the principles to make decisions throughout all phases of a project, allowing them to meet deadlines and deliver high-quality products.

Agile project management life cycle is a relatively new method that emphasizes flexibility and reassessment throughout product development. Agile project management allows businesses to produce their products more quickly.

Agile project management methodologies embrace the following values:

  • Individuals and interactions should take precedence over tools and processes.
  • Working products take precedence over extensive documentation.
  • Customer collaboration exceeds contract negotiation.
  • Responding to change by following a plan.

In today’s environment, where companies embrace mission-critical initiatives such as KYC, digital transformation, & M&A, business expansion, and so on, effective project management has become mission-critical for all organizations.

Agile project management life cycle splits a project into small goals, known as sprints, and uses frequent assessments to reshape the steps and the end goal. 

What are the advantages of the Agile Project Management life cycle?

The Agile project management life cycle provides users with numerous advantages in terms of efficiency and effectiveness. The most significant advantage it offers to agile project management is quickly changing the project’s direction to meet changing project demands. Agile project management principles give team members complete autonomy and prioritize customer demands over other considerations.

Because changes are evolutionary and incremental rather than revolutionary, agile can effectively support some cultural change, which is crucial to the success of most transformation projects.

Agile approaches empower those involved, foster accountability, promote idea diversity, allow for the early release of benefits, and encourage continuous improvement. Agile management allows decision ‘gremlins’ to be tested and rejected early on: the tight feedback loops provide benefits in agile that are not as evident in the waterfall.

Agile project management life cycle is beneficial in the following ways:

  • Improves customer satisfaction
  • Increases productivity
  • Encourages teamwork, 
  • Save money 
  • Boosts team morale.

Many people compare Agile’s benefits to other ALMs, such as a waterfall. A Waterfall ALM team follows a more linear process that lacks flexibility, making it difficult to develop innovative products. Agile ALM is much more fluid because it encourages teams to draw on principles rather than strictly following a plan. Few constraints allow developers to progress through stages in whatever way is best for the current project. 

Agile project management is similar to the Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule (20% of the effort yields 80% of the result, while the remaining 80% of the action yields only 20% of the effect) and vice.

Five Phases of the Agile Project Management lifecycle

The Agile project management (APM) life cycle is a cohesive and iterative method of effective project management throughout the project’s entire lifecycle. It successfully integrates traditional aspects of project management with modern requirements within the project’s scope.

Five Phases of the Agile Project Management lifecycle

As defined by Jim Highsmith in 2004, the five phases of the APM framework correspond directly to the five phases of project management described in the PMI Project Management Book of Knowledge (PMBOK).

Let us look at how project management stages are related and provide a brief overview of each phase.

  1. Envision

The first phase of the APM Framework corresponds to the Initiation phase of the PMBOK. A product is conceptualized during this phase, and all project stakeholders are identified. This phase also includes determining potential project objectives and identifying customer needs.

Envision

In the Initiation phase, key project management steps are involved.

  • Conduct a research study to identify the primary problem that the project will address and whether the project will be able to provide a solution to that problem.
  • Make a business case and a high-level project definition.
  • Create a project initiation or Project Charter document that outlines the project’s vision, objectives, and goals.
  • Determine the project’s high-level scope and define the product or service it will deliver.
  • Determine the key project stakeholders.
  • When approved, form a project team and set up a project office.
  • Speculate/project planning 

The Project Planning phase is the most important and requires complete attention because it lays out the project’s roadmap. It entails defining the work and determining how to complete it. It is especially true for large or complex projects typically carried out using traditional methodologies. Projects that use Agile methods of execution go through a planning phase, but the plans may define at a high level, with the detailed implementation left to the team to plan in short iterations or sprints.

Speculateproject planning

Two key activities typically define the speculation phase:

  • Breaking down the project into high-level milestones and determining the expected project timeline
  • They are developing an initial understanding of the project’s critical tasks. Priority is given to one task over another during this phase, and team members decide how to continue the quality of the final project deliverable.
  • Execution

The execution phase entailed carrying out the activities outlined in the project plan, where the project began to take shape and becomes a reality!

execution phase

The stage at which planning is translated into action. Resources and other specific people are assigned to the tasks outlined in the project plan. The project work is completed in the required sequence to meet all of the work in the most efficient manner possible.

The project manager organizes team members, establishes workflow, and constantly monitors progress to ensure work is completed according to plan while maintaining effective collaboration between the project team and various stakeholders.

The following are the critical project management steps involved in the Execution phase:

  • Assign and determine the project member team. Resources and assign the team and other resources to the project tasks and get started on time.
  • Give the team the necessary instructions on how to complete tasks.
  • Keep track of the team’s progress.
  • Maintain regular communication with stakeholders to ensure that project deliverables are acceptable.
  • Monitoring & Control

This phase also entails continuously monitoring the project environment for any risks or issues that are likely to impact project performance and taking the necessary steps to prevent or mitigate them as proactively as possible to minimize the influence on any project goals.

Monitoring & Control

The project manager reports on the project’s performance and ensures that it proceeds as planned. It allows you to keep track of any deviations from the project’s budget, timeline, and quality objectives.

The following are the critical project management steps involved in the Monitoring and Control phase:

  • Keeping track of the progress of various project tasks
  • Estimate the project’s budget, timeline, and quality performance.
  • Examine deliverables and track efforts to see if they meet the acceptance criteria.
  • Conduct user reviews, collect feedback, and take any necessary corrective actions.
  • Report and track all changes to the project scope (whether from team members or stakeholders) and their impact on project goals.
  • Monitor overall project performance, including any changes to the project plan, and ensure that all project team members and the stakeholders are on the same page about the project’s status and expected outcomes.
  • Closure

Project Closure is the last stage of the project management life cycle, indicating the completion of the project and delivery of all project deliverables.

 project management life cycle

Project closure entails completing a project’s final delivery and approval by stakeholders. 

The project manager holds a “post-project review” meeting, also known as a retrospective, to review the lessons learned and the challenges encountered during the project. It provides an opportunity to understand lessons learned to improve productivity in the future.

The following are the critical project management steps involved in the closing phase:

  • Conduct a “Project Ending” Review or Retrospective to analyze project performance and formal analysis of successes and failures.
  • Document project completion and distribute reports to key stakeholders.
  • Account for spent/unused budget and free up remaining resources for future projects.

Conclusion

This article provides an overview of the Project Lifecycle, including its key phases and benefits. Projects are challenging endeavors in all industries, and understanding the Project Management Lifecycle is an essential first step in completing tasks. Businesses are constantly optimizing costs and investments to maximize the return on investment (RoI). Running projects successfully to deliver the intended business value is a critical – if not the most important – aspect of that effort.

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