In the cutting-edge competition, the mantra to make the project succeed is- ‘Building the right project with the right set of features and getting it to the market at the right time.’
Going the traditional way where when the project when outsourced to a company can only be reviewed by the client when it is completely built and the lack of visibility during the development uplift the risk of getting the project developed that’s not up-to-the-par. The minimum control over the project, inability to introduce the changes in between, compromise with project quality, and the risk of project failure makes the conventional approach inefficient.
Thanks to the agile manifesto that has turned the table upside down with a slew of benefits. Over the last decade, the agile methodology has become bread and butter for the software development space. Increasingly, the businesses are moving into the agile orbits to warmly embrace the range of advantages it brings along and the elasticity it offers to maintain a pace with the dynamic market and the users’ needs.
It’s just an overview of what you will get as a result of agile software development. Intrigued to know more? Let’s discuss why the agile methodology is becoming integral to software development:
- Accelerate time-to-market
The agile software development is done in parts as sprints where the whole project is divided into a set of sprints which are sent to the client every week or fortnightly to get their feedback and again iterated to meet the client’s expectations. In this sense, the beta testing of the software becomes possible and the project will never lose the track due to the continuous review and approval provided by the client. Therefore, the software can be released in the market at the right time or even before the deadline.
- Ensure quality
The project sprints are easily manageable for the client and the development team because, in the parts, it ensures that both the parties are on the same page. The sprints sent to the client at regular intervals is finalized only after it’s tested, reviewed, and approved by the client. The process of release-reiterate-repeat enables the development team to build the software that syncs with the client’s software requirements.
Also, it eliminates the chances of software development having numerous bugs, lacks important features, clumsy layout, or poor design, which results in the development of software that fits best the software purpose, and meet quality standards.
- High Flexibility
The software development is not a matter of a few days while sometimes it takes a couple of weeks or months. In the digital world, the technology is changing very fast and keeping the future project stay up-to-date with the latest technology is all-important to make it a perfect fit for future use.
With agile development, the clients are allowed to change the features’ priority, add new features, or remove the planned features to adapt the changes and evolve the product as it’s developed. The opportunity of reprioritization and new requirements addition or deletion never led the software to become outdated.
- Unmatched transparency
Gone are the days when little-to-no involvement of the client makes the project suffer. With agile development, the client is enabled to track and monitor the on-going project progress daily on the project management system (PMS), in addition to regular meetings with the development team and project manager.
They can also access the number of hours spent on the parts of the project and if any delay or extra hours are taken by the team for sprint completion, then they can question the same. This level of visibility into the project development keep the development in the control of the client and ensure the expectations are fulfilled.
- Zero down the risk
The software delivered to clients directly at the end with no interventions in between generally comes as a surprise with a lot of bugs, flaws, and mismatched expectations. This is not the case with agile methodology.
The regular meetings, seamless communication, high collaboration, and sprints’ review, retrospection, and reiteration enable the detection and fixing of the bugs at the early stage. It’s better to resolve the issues in the development stage rather than fixing all of them once the software is built.
Besides, it limits the risk with the ability to introduce changes in the course of software development as the market, customers, and trend changes. The crucial decisions sometimes become a life savior for future software.
- Deliverables are certain
In the planning phase, the development team breaks down the project timeline by deciding the number of features, design, backend, third-party integrations, and others to keep in different sprints. The estimation of the number of sprints helps in estimating the time in which the software will be developed.
It guarantees that in a fixed schedule the sprint and project will be delivered to the client. However, when more features are added and feature priority is changed, then additional iterations are sure, which stretches the project deadline. The agile development ensures on-time and on-budget development.
- Cost-efficient option
In the agile development, the software development company raises the invoice for every sprint or the complete project only after it’s approved by the client. In the invoice, the detail of the number of hours utilized for the development of the distinct set of features, front-end, back-end, designing, and integrations is displayed. Also, the additional changes required by the client are also mentioned.
With the detailed invoice, the client will end up paying only for the number of hours the resources have worked on the project and the material required. It sounds cost-effective as opposed to agreeing to pay an estimated sum for the project development, which sometimes perplexes you with hidden fees as well.
- Align with success
Innovation is a key to keep the project ahead of the competition, which comes with agility. The agile approach allows the client to incorporate the changes as required with reduced time, efforts, and cost, which in turn, maximize productivity, keep the software user-oriented and realize business value.
The continuous improvements and adjustments to the software development is a way to propel the project in the right direction and raise a toast to success. Keep doing.
