This often manifests in challenges of translating the visionary goals set by CEOs or Project Sponsors into tangible business requirements, a lack of proper prioritisation, oversight of crucial cost-benefit considerations, and no close-loop communication with Project Sponsors.
Scope creep can lead to domino effect of underestimating solution complexity, resources, timeline, and consequently, the budget. In the worst-case scenario, this could result in an inferior solution that fails to achieve the original project intent. While Agile method excels in adapting to change, it may not be the ideal solution for addressing scope creep in predictive environment.
The accumulation of technical debt can worsen without a long-term enterprise architecture blueprint and proper architectural governance in place. This is especially true before embarking on the creation of a new application solution landscape or building a new application on top of outdated technologies or rigid legacy designs.
Without effective program/project leadership that considers the needs of the business and stakeholders while pragmatically applying holistic project management techniques like those outlined in PMP/PRINCE2, real-life project execution faces the looming risk of failure in any aspect listed in the risk register. Even worse when risks were not accurately or comprehensively registered.
Overarching View
Maximising business value remains paramount. Aligning ICT Strategy with the overarching business strategy is crucial to realising the organisation's collective goals. This involves comprehensively understanding and assessing the business's value chain, followed by defining a technology and application portfolio blueprint and roadmap aimed at maximising value.
Planning & Execution
Program & projects start with clear business objectives, building high-performing team, meticulous planning, and effective execution, regardless agile, waterfall or hybrid methodologies are picked. Manage scope, budget, schedule, resources, risk, issue, stakeholders, product & service partners and governance throughout the project lifecycle.
Cohesive design than patching
Agile approach does not imply solely focusing on quick wins at the expense of addressing technical debt. Rather, it entails adopting a systematic methodology that enables the decomposition of applications into re-usable modules or microservices, and have them delivered by waterfall milestones or MVP/MBI/PI.