Integrating Agile Into a Waterfall Environment

Course Description

This intermediate-level course is designed to help Agile practitioners recognize and resolve many of the common issues that emerge when Agile concepts are introduced into Waterfall organizations. The course begins with 24 video segments from seasoned Agile trainers and practitioners who provide tips and best practices for addressing integration obstacles. The course then presents 20 short case studies that simulate the communication and interchanges that can occur as Agile and Waterfall practitioners work to resolve differences in the ways that they see and execute tasks. As students evaluate these case studies, they'll learn to deconstruct and diagnose any underlying problems that need to be resolved, just as they would in everyday practice. While they work to decode and correct these issues, they'll begin to recognize the common pitfalls that can happen as project teams collaborate and interact, which will allow them to step in to solve potential problems before work is affected.

Learning Outcomes

After completing this course, the learner should be able to:

• Identify whether Agile concepts and methodologies could be integrated into an existing organization
• Describe tools and techniques that could assist in Agile integration
• Recognize the problems that Agile and Waterfall collaborators contend with on a regular basis
• Apply practical tips from experienced practitioners to correct these problems
• Recognize the advantage of "failing fast"
• Uncover impediments or obstacles that may occur when running Agile and Waterfall in parallel
• Examine several project artifacts that can be used to show progress during transitional states
• Identify the essential elements of an integration framework
• Discuss ways to temper expectations as integration takes hold