What is Agile? Stories, Iterations and Dealing with Constant Change

1 Agile refers to a bunch of project management methods that are well suited to managing projects in an environment where everything is changing. Agile methods came from software development but can be used for managing all sorts of projects.

2 Using an Agile method, a project team organizes all its work into "stories". A "story" is a short description of one thing that needs to be done on the project.

3 The list of stories are prioritized in discussion between the project team and the client.

4 The team, in discussion with the client select a number of the stories to work on over a short period of time (from about a week, to about a month). This is called an iteration. Each story in an iteration is assigned to a team member. This team member estimates how long the story will take.

5 The aim at the end of each iteration is to have something working to show the client. The client then has a chance to give feedback, to add new stories to the list of stories still to do, or re-prioritize the stories that are already there.

6 The team go through the stories that they've finished and compare how long they estimated they would take with how long they actually took. They use this as guide to future estimation.

7 The client and the project team go through the newly-prioritize list of stories and decide on the next iteration.

Read More:

Agile on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agile_software_development

"Extreme Programming" by Kent Beck

"Agile Software Development with SCRUM" by Ken Schwaber and Mike Beedle

"Scrum and XP from the Trenches" by Henrik Kniberg