Why Agile matters

Recently, I got an e-mail asking me why we should care about Agile if the overall product development process, including mechanics and electronics, is measured in years and is completely waterfall. The question took me by surprise. I’ve been working with Agile practices for the better part of two decades now and for me, it’s a given that fast feedback loops are better than slow ones.

However, after more careful reflection, I realized that the question is based on a few assumptions that, in turn, are founded on our beliefs around our ability to predict. The first assumption is concerned with our ability to optimally predict requirements for our products months, quarters or years down the line. In many industries where products contain mechanical and electronic components, the production pipeline requires long lead times. Consequently, the product requirements are formulated long before the start of production. The fallacy is, of course, that requirements change all the time due to new technologies becoming available, changing customer preferences, actions taken by competitors and so on. One rule of thumb in software says that requirements change with 1 percent per month – a very conservative estimate if you ask me.

So, how to respond to constantly changing requirements? There are fundamentally two approaches. Either you adopt agility and continuously respond to changes or you resist requirement changes, reject all that you can and grudgingly accept those that you really can’t ignore. The result of the latter approach is, of course, an inferior product as it’s based on the best insights from years ago.