Iterative, Incremental Delivery Works
The kinds of change that business projects face today are relentless. Big, disruptive events combined with political, social, environmental, & technological trends (and more) make it incredibly difficult to predict what next month might look like, let alone a year or two down the road. For projects, this means the things you were counting on one day might be different than the next, and if the change is significant enough it can generate a pile of pain, or even potential failure, for the project.
This level of change and unpredictability is tough enough for projects that have a very defined deliverable as the main goal. A project to build a bridge, for example, has already pre-planned the span, the height, the loads, etc., and now it must manage risks to the schedule, cost, and quality from supply chain difficulties, weather, labor shortages, machine breakdowns, and similar.
But What IF you’re not 100% sure what the end goal is or EVEN the path to HEAD that Way?
Projects like this show up in a bunch of different ways:
Building a new product that no one else has tried before
The thing you want from the project now might itself change
You want to get ahead of competitors that are doing something similar
The business would benefit from getting some of the deliverables soon, rather than waiting until the end
There are so many risks swirling around the project you need the ability to change direction quickly
Iterative, Incremental Delivery Manages the Uncertain
The whole idea around project frameworks devoted to iterative, incremental delivery is this:
carve off a small piece of deliverable value from the main project and focus solely on that for a few days to a few weeks
You ask the team to put all their work exclusively into that small piece of value and at the end of your time box you ask a few key questions:
Is what we’ve done so far valuable enough to the customers and business that we should start using it?
Were we smart with our time, or should we adjust a thing or two moving forward?
Are we still headed toward good value for the customers and business if we continue on this path?
The answers to those questions help you decide how to carve off the next piece of deliverable value, and then you do the whole cycle all over again.
This piece-by-piece iteration, followed by the potential delivery of what’s been done accomplishes several important things that deal with change and uncertainty around projects:
avoiding the failure to produce something useful
The frequent check-ins at the end of each cycle mean customer & business feedback should be flowing back to the team doing the work. That feedback informs the team as to whether they are delighting or disappointing their stakeholders. Negative feedback means time to adjust the direction; positive feedback indicates the team should do more of what’s working.
Avoiding the world changing beneath your feet
Long-term projects in dynamic environments can end up with deliverables that no longer make sense to fulfill their purpose. Using an iterative, incremental approach means you have the ability to adapt to changes around the business to keep the deliverables on track to deliver customer value.
Embrace, rather than resist change
Rigid project frameworks depend on making change a difficult thing to do, whereas an iterative, incremental approach creates frequent opportunities to incorporate change (aka improvements) to the original plan to make it deliver better value.
So How Do We Know Iterative, Incremental Delivery Works?
Simple: we use it ourselves every day, even when our customer is using a rigid project management regime. It’s our primary risk control measure.
Don’t get hung up on the buzzwords; we can help you cut through the noise and find out what will help your business do better on your next project. Reach out to learn more