Agile Project Management: Creating Innovative Products (Agile Software Development)

Excellent book by a renowned expert in the industry. At some point in our careers most of us have managed a multi-year, multi-million dollar project that used a strict waterfall methodology. Mine occurred about 15 years ago. We spent 1 year writing the specification (in collaboration with the customer I might add). We spent 2 years building the system and created a rigorous Acceptance Plan that demonstrated every single requirement. The customer's reaction was "You built exactly what I asked for; I hate it". Of course we got our money by clicking through the Acceptance Plan. The customer was unhappy; the users wouldn't use it. Never again!So, now there is a name and guidance on how to do iterative (Agile) SW development.Maybe this book will help others learn a better method before the pain of going over a waterfall in a barrel.

For those interested in reading both the theory and practice regarding managing a project with an Agile approach then this is the book for you. Jim has been around ling enough to have know the origins of many of the agile approaches as well as their practical application. This latest revision respectfully includes many alterations and improvements to his first release.

everything in this book is very clear and consise

Jim has written a comprehensive 100 level text for anyone considering Agile. I will be looking for a book that discusses the transformation of business leadership to support agile. Without a solid business user who can, and is will to, drive "sprints" and product valuation you will have a challenging experience with agile.

Reviewing this book now in the context of the 11 books the Project Management Institute (PMI) originally recommended reading to prepare for the PMI Agile Certified Practitioner (PMI-ACP) exam. Of that 4,500 page reading list this book touched on several of this reviewer's personal biases. In the interest of transparency the poor rating is entirely, shamelessly acknowledged to be based on that bias. If the reader doesn't share these biases, the book may be perfectly fine for a personal journey to "see Agile". Highsmith's expertise on methodology, planning, continuous improvement, extreme programming (XP) and managing teams is on full display.However, the use of the fictional narrative to illuminate concepts is tedious and ill-advised. Maya and Herman's adventures in Agile are just a weird (although infrequent) injection to this book. Other's make use of this conceit. Satisfied readers of "The Goal" who feel that fiction really illuminated critical chain theory should probably discount this criticism. The general bias on display in this review is that bad fiction doesn't add to the message.The message is also diluted by writing style. The prose is impenetrable at times. The impermeability is fortified by incessant references to other works creating a pedantic air. The second bias here is obviously a desire to have authors of reference materials get to the point in a succinct manner.So this jaundiced review must acknowledge a few facts. First many of Highsmith's techniques appear in my teaching of a PMI-ACP Certification Class, i.e. Product Vision-Vision Box. So second, the book is obviously useful, enjoyable at times, widely heralded as great, but not in the reviewer's opinion as useful as many of the 11 other books recommended for PMI-ACP preparation.

This is a book to add to your library. Its one that you should read and reference back to when you are struggling to implement change!

This book is a good introduction into agile projects. It compares agile to the traditional project management processes. The book shows where agile is superior to traditional project management and area where the traditional process is superior. Overall a good intro to APM

This is a well done text and proved very useful for preparation to take the Project Management Institute (PMI) Agile Certified Practitioner (ACP) exam, which I passed.