Topic Teasers Vol. 187: Distance, Culture and Time Zones...Oh, My!

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  Agile   Communications Management   Leadership   Teams  

I am happy that my employer is with a company that is expanding overseas at a time when many organizations are doing layoffs or folding altogether. But traditional/waterfall practices have been how we arrange our projects, and I am concerned with the fact that we will be bringing IT features to our production products. I think usually they are more agile teams who work with IT, right? With the language, culture, pressures of a new branch, and time zones to consider…how can I possibly set up a way to manage our international projects?

A. There are ways to allow waterfall and agile to work together. Each team can use their most appropriate process, and then there are ways to coordinate across teams and countries to have all teams in sync and time things appropriately. It requires an open mind to a new way to manage projects, but there are suggestions in place that have been tested and found to work.

B. The whole reason there is an Agile Alliance and an agile process is that some projects cannot work using a more traditional/waterfall approach. And if you try to mix the two together, there is no chance of a project being successful. Suggest to upper management that the offshore extension of the new location must now be required to use …

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