Postponing Deliverables
Some time ago on the Agile Leadership forum a poster mentioned that one of the attributes of agile software development was the ability to postpone the delivery of features to the next release cycle. This was conjectured as a benefit to the customer.
I just got to the chapter in Performance-Based Earned Value, Paul Solomon and Ralph Young, John Wiley & Sons were they discuss the issues that result from Deferred Functionality, which is a nice term for Deviation from Plan.
- If all the requirements planned for a phase (or iteration) are not completed, then the Earned Value for these deferred requirements cannot be earned as part of the build (deliverable)
- The functions in the phase (iteration) and/or build (release) that are deferred will require additional time and resources to complete. The earned value associated with deferred requirements, that was not earned in the phase or build in which they were baselined, will instead be earned in the phase an/or build to which it is deferred.
- Although requirements may be deferred to a subsequent build, the earned value must continue to show behind-schedule condition. The deferred effort should not be replanned beyond the current reporting period.
So What Does This Mean for Agile and for Other Performance Measurements?
- For traditional projects, if we defer features, then we "off baseline" and need to show that in the earned value reporting. This is rarely the case. The creation of Release 1.A from Release 1 because we can't make Release 1 on time is very common in large COTS product development. In fact it is common to see Release 1, Release 1.A, Release 1.A.1 all have the same completion date. Evolving from 1 to 1.A to 1.A.1 is a symptom of a project in trouble.
- For agile projects if the features identified in the planning session don't make out of the iteration, you're running behind
In all cases
If you plan to something, budget for that something and then defer the work to a later period - you're under performing, are behind schedule and possibly over budget
