Agile Development

July 6, 2018 By alexjcooper

Ask the Stage-Gate Expert – Dr. Cooper Answers Your Top Questions

Are speed to market, fast-changing customer needs, and insufficient resources a challenge in your organization? If so, an Agile Stage Gate approach could help. This approach works for physical products and is faster and more flexible than traditional stage-gate. Plus, it can fit within your current set up – no need to buy or overhaul anything. However, implementation is not a slam-dunk, and many of you have asked us what to do. So we turned to Dr. Robert Cooper, the world’s leading authority on Agile Stage Gate, for answers. Here are two of the most common questions we have received — watch this page for more to come. And please feel free to email your questions for Dr. Cooper to alex@roundtable.com; we’ll send you his reply.

Question #1: Are there still gates in an Agile-Stage-Gate system? What is their role?

Dr. Cooper: Yes, gates play a vital role in Agile-Stage-Gate. They are not only a quality check-point, they are a resource commitment decision. They allow senior management to periodically review the project, kill weak projects and reallocate resources to better initiatives. Most importantly, they ensure enough resources are committed to complete approved projects in an accelerated fashion. Gates still have essentially the same Go/Kill criteria as in the traditional gating model – financial criteria such as NPV or scorecards to rate the attractiveness of projects – since investment decisions must still be made. However, the deliverables for each gate are usually leaner, less granular and more flexible than in the classic gating model. Deliverables are also more tangible, such as product designs or rapid prototypes, rather than long reports or slide presentations

Finally, gates allow senior management to track the progress and on-time performance of the project: when to deliver the product on the longer-term horizon scale remains defined and a key part of Agile-Stage-Gate.

Question #2: How can an Agile-Stage-Gate strategy help manage complexity? (Projects that are uncertain, ill-defined and ambiguous with many tenuous assumptions)

Dr. Cooper: Most firms’ new product processes emphasize extensive front-end homework to define the product and justify the project before development gets underway. Robust up-front homework and VoC work early in the project are key to new product success (Cooper, 2013), but not all projects are clearly definable. Some highly uncertain projects – those in new markets and using new technologies – will be near impossible to nail down. No amount of VoC work, technical assessment or market analysis will validate all the assumptions prior to the Development stage. Understanding what the customer values and what will work technically only comes about through experimentation.

The rapid sprint-iterations in Agile-Stage-Gate encourage experimentation and testing – build something, test it with the customer and in the lab, and then revise. In this way, key assumptions are validated and major uncertainties dealt with, but in real time and as the project moves along. Understanding product requirements and envisioning a technical solution does not occur before Development. Instead Agile-Stage-Gate is done as part of the Development and Testing stages of the project – learning on the fly. The new Agile-Stage-Gate hybrid model handles highly complex, ambiguous, ill-defined projects well, and in fact, sees its greatest benefits there.

December 17, 2017 By alexjcooper

Ask the Agile Stage-Gate Expert: What is the role of process manager?

The third big question posed to Dr. Robert Cooper in our ‘Ask the Agile Stage-Gate Expert’ series is about roles of team members in Agile (versus traditional) stage-gate. Here is what he says:

Dr. Cooper: There is a fair amount of controversy and some disagreement among manufacturers regarding the ‘roles’ of people in the new Agile-Stage-Gate system. Some of the confusion comes from the fact that most manufacturers end up using a ‘blended’ system – most of their projects still use the traditional or classic gating process, and a smaller proportion – say 20% of projects (often the riskier or more ambiguous projects) – use Agile-Stage-Gate. Thus they argue that the roles should stay the same as today, because one cannot have two sets of roles in development — a real mess. Of course, in the software world, this is not an issue, as all the code-writing projects in a software firm typically would be done using Agile, not a blended process.

Bottom line, recognizing there are differences of opinion among firms, for manufacturers:

— the process manager’s job stays much the same as today, except now s/he is overseeing two different types of projects – traditionally-gated projects and Agile-Stage-Gate projects. So it’s a bit more complex. But they still coach the teams, facilitate the gate meetings, keep the database, produce portfolio charts, provide training, etc.

— the project leader – most manufacturers have kept this role (but some have opted for the ‘product owner’ role instead. Product owner = a member of management, not on the project team, who meets with the team regularly and provides direction; in this system, there is no team leader per se on the project team!)

— scrum master – a new role, on the product team, a “servant” of the team. Ensures that the team works well, and follows the Agile practices (daily scrums, sprint planning, demos, retros, etc.). Some scrum masters serve 2 teams out of necessity.

–– project team – for manufacturers, still a cross functional team (Technical, Marketing, Operations, Sales), but in theory 100% dedicated to the one project. Quite different than Agile in the software world, where the ‘team’ is a room full of ‘techies’ or software writers. Most manufacturers break this ‘100% dedicated’ rule for good reason, it’s not practical for them – some assign certain days to the Agile project, for example. While it is not always possible to dedicate a full time team, it is important to have a defined approach of some kind versus leaving it to chance. Resource management is a tough issue and the ‘elephant in the room’ for many companies trying to do Agile-Stage-Gate. Getting the right resources can make or break your efforts.

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For further insight: Dr. Cooper’s latest book, featuring Agile-Stage-Gate, Adaptive & Accelerated New-Product Development, may be ordered here. He also offers both public and inhouse workshops. For more information, call 781-891-8080 or email info@roundtable.com.

September 29, 2016 By alexjcooper

Dr. Robert Cooper on Agile-Stage-Gate Methods

Recently published research by Dr. Robert Cooper in Research-Technology Management and the Journal of Product Innovation Management documents how leading organizations are blending Agile techniques within their Stage Gate systems for all kinds of products, not just software. This emerging approach allows organizations to gain the speed and rapid customer feedback of Agile methods along with the control systems and longer-term planning capabilities offered by Stage Gate systems.

Dr. Cooper offers public and inhouse workshops on how leading organizations are combining Agile methods with their stage-gate systems and achieving superb results. This is a great opportunity to get expert guidance on how to update your innovation process for faster development and greater customer satisfaction. For more information, call Alex Cooper at 781-891-8080 or email alex@roundtable.com.