In my experience, Agile is a fine approach to a certain portion of project work, but misses a large portion of work that still needs to be managed and coordinated by a project manager. In a recent debate, I asked how Agile handles purchases and procurement of materials. Agile approaches like Scrum focus on the activities related to individual creation of items, but there is nothing about cost management, very little about stakeholder and communication management, risk management is weak other than the approach to reduce risk by developing in small increments, and other basic project management activities are barely considered.
On the topic of risk, the short development cycles often leads to increased risk of poor overall architecture since you focus only on what is known and analyzed in depth for the coming sprint as opposed to designing for future potential use of both known and predicted use (an often debated topic in the software engineering arena).
Agile is the flavor of the day, much like JAD and RAD and spiral and iterative development and breakout sessions and other new ways of doing things have appeared and disappeared over the years. The point is, good project managers are flexible and learn how to integrate what is new and fashionable to appease project sponsors and other stakeholders, and great ones keep their eye on the risks and issues and especially remain vigilant when novel, new, and untested things are used on projects to make sure they don’t derail the project. A new approach to planning and delivering the work is no more different than a new process for manufacturing windows or a new process for eliciting requirements. Risk has both an element of opportunity and threat. If it may help the project, do it but are prepared in the event things go poorly to adjust and revert to tried and tested approaches.
And get training, not just once but several times. Get a mentor, preferably one that remembers not just all the positive aspects but also the negative side and the errors made to help you either avoid or minimize the inevitable stumbles along the way to you and your team becoming proficient.
In scrum, scrum master helps team to coordinate resources inside the team or apply from outside, monitors the task execution progress like PM in transitional process and also protect team not interrupted by inserted tasks during sprint as possible as he/she can. If PM takes the scrum master role in Agile process, the working style need to be changed to encourage, respect, and trust scrum team members instead of assigning, coaching and pushing the team. The most thing is to train team proactively work together with ownership. Saving Changes...
Akhilesh SoorajTeam Leader - Process & Methods Team Leader| KNORR-BREMSE Technology Center India Private LimitPune, Maharashtra, India
I feel that Project Manager takes the role of a Product Owner in Agile (SCRUM). But if the project team is huge, then you will have to follow the scaled agile or something and the top level Product owner role will be handled by the project manager Saving Changes...
Anton OosthuizenSenior Business Analyst / Project Manager| Self EmployedPretoria, Gauteng, South Africa
The PM role does not have to change since planning, resource scheduling etc. still needs to take place, just in smaller waves. Whether the PM adopts the role of product owner would depend on the org structure i.e. if you work in an environment where you manage multiple projects it might not be feasible. But there is absolutely nothing that says the PM role must change in an agile environment, only the way they work will adapt. But then there is also nothing that says the PM role should not change. Saving Changes...
DIVINA DE LEONPM Consultant| CGI CanadaScarborough, Ontario, Canada
My own observation and opinion, companies that are just starting to transition to Agile are looking for a hybrid PMs . They want to hire Project Managers with Agile knowledge, example a PM with a Scrum Master certification and experience to help driving team efficiency, supporting the development team, removing roadblocks, evolving the product while leveraging processes which are in accordance with Agile principles and methodologies.
The project manager is still doing all the associated PM role and responsibilities but aligning them with the agile process and methodology.
But as the PM who is also a Scrum Master continues to evolve and really just focus being an expert on Agile, he would them probably completely embrace that role and leave the actual project/product management to the Product Owner.
However, to-date, there are still companies out there whose projects still requires traditional waterfall implementation so i think straight forward Waterfall PMs are still required. Saving Changes...
Phil DoyleSenior Project Manager| Orangebus (Capita)Newcastle Upon Tyne, Tyne And Wear, United Kingdom
Where as I used to be the Project Manager, in an agile project I’m now the Project Manager, Scrum Master, proxy-Product Owner (as the client has no clue). I find most organisations steer the PM to be the scrum master, but the problem is it stops the team being self organising: they turn up to the scrum and still tell me (rather than the team) what they’ve done, and stare blankly while they wait until they are given another task. My preference is for the SM to come from wiithin the development team as I stand off and focus on blockers and wider planning. Saving Changes...
I am finding that many organizations want to try Agile because it's the latest buzz word but they are tied to waterfall so they end up with a hybrid that mostly works for them. In other cases, waterfall makes sense for part of the project and agile works for other parts. That's not to say there is not a case for purely waterfall or agile--there is.
I have seen it in many organisations and I agree with you. Saving Changes...
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