Chapter 11. Aligning the pilot team with the project
- Delivered a feature that the customer never used
- Created a detailed specification for a feature and then failed to pursue the feature
- Discovered a problem deep into a project, and had a team member tell you they knew about the issue all along
You can avoid these issues by aligning your project team at the start of your projects and envisioning the final product.
Alignment does this by uniting the team around a common vision. You involve the entire team in the planning process. If a team member perceives an issue, you learn about it immediately. Developers don’t wait until coding starts to voice their issues; they can communicate issues immediately as the team reviews the features at the beginning of the planning cycle.
Collaborative planning is one of the cornerstones of an agile development process. We’ve seen many companies move to an agile process mainly for the benefits that come from improved project planning. You’ll see that value in this chapter as Acme Media performs chartering exercises to better understand the project value and goals.