Do Agile Software Development Principles Conflict with Software Product Management?

KLAMPENBORG, Denmark - Oct. 21, 2013 - PRLog -- Agile software development has, over the last 15 years, been established as a popular development approach. In a time when speed of change is of utmost importance, agile approaches are often the most appropriate roads to success. They do not only change the way development is performed, but they also impact on other parties involved in development projects, in particular the software product manager.

Software companies are faced with the question how can software product management and agile development work together in an optimal way. Who is responsible for requirements? Is the software product manager automatically the designated “product owner” (Scrum)? Or is “product owner” a new and separate role? Does he/she replace the software product manager?

"This whitepaper answers most of those questions software CEOs are faced with concerning the need for agile development on one side and the need for maximizing the lifetime value of their software on the other side," says Hans Peter Bech, CEO of TBK Consult. "Hans-Bernd Kittlaus, who is one of the world's leading experts in this field, has written the whitepaper for us. He is also the instructor on our 3-days Software Product Management training with ISPMA certification."

From the whitepaper:

“Agile Software Product Management – from a marketing perspective, we should use that as the title of this whitepaper. But we do not – for several reasons. First of all, a software product manager being responsible for the economic success of a product has always had to be “agile” if he or she wanted to be successful. That is nothing new, but it has been part of the job description long before the term “agile” was applied to a software development approach.

The success of agile approaches to software development does not mean that one size fits all. There can still be development projects where due to contents, people and other conditions different methodological approaches like iterative development or even the good old waterfall model may be appropriate. A mature software development organization should be able to choose the optimal method for each individual project, and the software product manager should be able to cooperate with the project teams whatever the chosen development method is.”