Optimizing the Project Plan

Beyond the basic recipe just described for planning an iterative project, the bold project manager can attempt to optimize the project plan.

Overlapping Iterations

A certain amount of overlap can occur between one iteration and the next, and this is probably healthy to keep everyone busy. The planning of the next iteration should not wait until you come to a complete stop. Don't lose sight of the fact that to reap the benefits from iterative development, you need the lessons learned from iteration N to do a better job in iteration N+1 ”too much overlap will defeat this built-in mechanism for refining requirements, goals, and process.

Parallel Iterations

When a product has many parts or is developed by a distributed team, it may be tempting to have each team or subcontractor do its own planning. This is fine, providing the work packages are fairly independent. If they are not, then it is better to have everyone work according to the same global clock and to integrate the various subsystems together at the end of an iteration. In some cases, a team may not deliver anything new at the end of an iteration if what they delivered at the previous iteration is sufficient for the other group (s) to proceed.

For example, a group may be responsible for infrastructure code, where the infrastructure is rather mature and its interface stable, and the development may not need to release a new infrastructure at each iteration.

Remember that the slowest team or group is the limiting factor: It will slow down everyone else and force the other teams to synchronize with its schedule.