Last Updated on 2024-10-11
Are you familiar with Agile? How about Scrum methodology? If youโve been in the tech industry for some time, you might have heard of these two. Read on to find out about the differences between Agile vs Scrum. Also, get to know how they aid software development teams to achieve project success.
There are a lot of discussions about Agile vs Scrum. Essentially, these two have similar approaches thus, the similarities. However, they also vary to an extent. To put it in simple terms, Agile is a project management philosophy that uses an iterative approach. Scrum is a framework within the philosophy of Agile.
When Agile and Scrum are in comparison, one cannot be the same as the other. Take note that Agile is the overarching principle, while Scrum is used to implement Agile. Additionally, Agile accommodates Scrum and other processes like Kanban, Waterfall, crystal, and many others. These processes encourage collaboration between teams. But they do not necessarily follow the same flow.
When Agile and Scrum are used together, they work effectively with change and accommodate new information all throughout the development process. Let’s see how we can differentiate Agile vs Scrum.
Agile Project Management: The Iterative Approach
Weโve been going on and on about Agile being iterative. Agile welcomes continuous development with input from the client. Therefore, your project manager accommodates these requirements and aligns them with a set goal. Finally, Agile primarily follows a specific set of values and principles that apply to different methodologies.
During the development phase, you will need to work closely with your software development team. Why? Firstly, you and your team will need to align the product with your customerโs needs. Secondly, you also need to take into account your company goals. During each iteration, you have to produce a working product.
What are Agile principles?
Now weโve mentioned Agileโs set of principles, it is essential to follow these principles if you choose the Agile methodology in product development. The 12 Agile project management principles are listed below:
- Customer satisfaction is of utmost importance.
- Change is good. Empower your customer to gain an advantage, even in late software development.
- Timeliness is key. Deliver working software products frequently in the shortest amount of time.
- Work with your development team daily until the completion of the project.
- Find motivated individuals and work with them. Enable them to get the work done and trust them to deliver.
- It is essential to have face-to-face conversations with your team members to effectively and efficiently convey information.
- Then, you measure progress with working software.
- Keep development sustainable for all its shareholders.
- Maintain quality and good design.
- Keep it simple. Maximize the amount of work that is not done.
- Self-organization brings about the best architectures, requirements, and designs.
- Do not forget to reflect. Be active in finding out how to become effective and adjust.
To sum up, you can incorporate daily stand-up meetings with your team and talk about their activities. Limit it to 10 minutes and meet at the same time every day. Here you will learn what your team plans to do and discover any roadblocks that they may have. Agile principles practically work with any project methodology.
Try to understand why you want to switch your project management style. By conducting an Agile assessment, you will also have an overview of your people, their skills, and their tech expertise. The Agile methodology is pretty flexible so there is no right or wrong way to start. Moreover, this methodology allows you more flexibility in what works for your team. Now to gain a better comparison between Agile vs Scrum, let’s find out how the Scrum framework operates.
The Scrum Framework explained
Scrum is one of the most used process frameworks to implement Agile. Similar to the Agile methodology, Scrum follows an iterative software development model in managing complex software projects. Additionally, they make use of โsprintsโ where they deliver software regularly within one to two weeks. Then, after each sprint, software teams and stakeholders meet to plan the upcoming steps. Four ceremonies in Scrum provide structure, namely:
- Sprint planning
- Daily stand-up meetings
- Sprint demo
- Sprint retrospective
Agile encourages collaboration. Above all, these meetings are essential to have more transparency and visibility for the project. Having short sprints in the development process helps to accommodate immediate changes. Any modifications or difficulties that may develop are communicated to the team, which, in turn, helps cut costs and increase quality.
Scrum: Process and Accountability
In a Scrum flow, there are a series of steps that are very specific and unchangeable. These steps include:
- Scrum Product backlog – this lists all the requirements that need to be accomplished for the software project.
- Sprint Planning – kicks off the sprint and defines what is delivered in the sprint. This also includes the method of how work will be delivered in collaboration with the Scrum team.
- Backlog refinement or grooming – the product owner and some members of the software team do a review of the items specified in the product backlog. This occurs consistently and could be a regularly scheduled meeting or activity.
- Daily Scrum Meetings – teams inspect progress daily to make sure that they will meet the sprint goal. Here, the software development team measures the progress of work done towards the completion of the sprint backlog.
- Sprint Review Meeting – This is where the totality of the sprint progress is assessed discussing the goal identified in the sprint planning meeting.
As you can see, collaboration is critical in the success of each sprint. Transparency and review help software teams make sure they deliver quality software products. The output of the sprint is reviewed as a demo of the softwareโs new features.
How Agile and Scrum work together
Agile vs Scrum seems to be a hard enough decision if you have no idea which is which. These two are often interchangeable. When you decide to use the Agile framework, you can integrate the Scrum methodology in the process.
Agile and Scrum share a lot of similarities in delivering software products. For example, their iterative nature helps teams collaborate with complete transparency. Though there are different methodologies that you can use with Agile, you have to choose one that works best for your development team for optimal success.
Your teamโs success depends on the implementation of work. That is to say, this includes the methods and frameworks you use in the frequent delivery and completion of your software product. Whether you use Agile and Scrum together or not, your team must make sure to deliver quality.
The high demand for software developers in the technology industry poses a challenge for entrepreneurs. Meanwhile, here at Full Scale, we ensure that the software team you work with has the experience to complete your requirements. Our rigorous employee onboarding process ensures that you get only the best developers out there.
Work with Full Scale, and see your software product launch. Contact us here, and letโs talk about you setting the right goals and achieving them!
Matt Watson is a serial tech entrepreneur who has started four companies and had a nine-figure exit. He was the founder and CTO of VinSolutions, the #1 CRM software used in today’s automotive industry. He has over twenty years of experience working as a tech CTO and building cutting-edge SaaS solutions.
As the CEO of Full Scale, he has helped over 100 tech companies build their software services and development teams. Full Scale specializes in helping tech companies grow by augmenting their in-house teams with software development talent from the Philippines.
Matt hosts Startup Hustle, a top podcast about entrepreneurship with over 6 million downloads. He has a wealth of knowledge about startups and business from his personal experience and from interviewing hundreds of other entrepreneurs.