http://www.cio.com/article/3021336/leadership-management/how-to-improve-productivity-with-agile.html
In the article “How to Improve
Productivity with Agile”, Bruce Harpham mentions agile approach as the future
of software development and other industries. He claims that agile approach,
which provides better communication, can improve the effectivity and
productivity of IT staffs in completing their work. According to Bruce, the new
method enables face to face communication between development team members,
which results in a more efficient and more effective work flow. As the result,
the failure rate decreases and the practice becomes popular within many major
companies.
The author then provides an example where
agile approach yields a better result than offshoring. In his example of Arntz,
the company has experienced significant increase in term of productivity after
changing to agile approach. With the new emphasis on face to face
communication, the firm can reduce the time cost for communication and boost
the project speed.
In addition, Bruce says that global
development teams will have trouble applying agile approach due to the
difference in individuals’ cultures. To deal with the difficulty, those teams
need to split their projects into smaller pieces to manage. After that using
feedback and adjusting the process will be the key for success.
In conclusion, the author claims
that agile approach is the trend for software development; therefore, all organizations
should utilize it. In order to effectively apply the new method, each firms
must identify the challenges, generate new ideas, as well as use agile method
to experiment those ideas.
This article is very interesting
since it relates to our class discussion of history and value of agile software
development. The article proves that agile approach is an outstanding method
that we need to consider when conducting a software development project.
Moreover, Bruce points out some challenges we may face against when trying to
experiment the new technique. Using the knowledge gained in class as well as
the new information from the article, we, MIS students, can better analyze this
new trend.
This information is very useful for
us as MIS professionals. It is important that MIS student know the new
techniques and trends to apply them in the near future. Our technology world is
changing every single day. We must keep our knowledge up to date to be
productive and efficient as workplace
