Chapter 2. Value over Constraints

The agile value “Delivering Value over Meeting Constraints” provides a focus for rethinking how we measure performance on projects. Although constraints such as cost and time are important, they should be secondary to creating value for customers. All too often, we focus on what is easily measurable and ignore really important characteristics that are harder to quantify. Agile development attempts to change that bias and focus on the most important things, and value is at the top of that list.

Traditional project managers tend to focus on requirements as the definition of scope, and then concentrate on delivering those requirements. Agile project leaders focus on delivering value and are constantly asking questions about whether different renditions of scope are worth the value they deliver. Traditional teams also focus on delivering to scope, schedule, and cost constraints. The traditional rationale goes that development teams have no control over outcomes or value, therefore they should not be held accountable for them. However, when a development team is divorced from outcomes they become fixated on requirements, requirements that should change as projects progress, but often don’t because they are deemed a critical piece of performance measurement. When teams are focused on outcomes, even those over which they have minimal control, they are more apt to deliver true business value.