Agile Vs. Waterfall

Both project management approaches are equally as good as the other. There are pros and cons of Agile and Waterfall; I think it depends on the project.

What are ‘Agile’ and ‘Waterfall’?

Agile

A small group of developers starts a project with a simplistic design instead of typing to develop it all at once and the methodologies are based on iterative development. The products are much closer to what the customers need because they can talk with the developers frequently.

Waterfall

It has distinct goals for each phase of development:

1. Requirement Analysis
2. System Design
3. Implementation
4. Testing
5. Development
6. Maintenance (* each phrase flows from 1 to 6)

The pros and cons of Agile

The pros

1. Throughout the project, customers can make decisions and change the plan rapidly and effectively.
2. The quality of the project is improved by finding bugs and providing feedback during each iteration.
3. The cost is predictable. Customers can set the limit to work and manage the additional iteration.

The cons

1. Everything is vague and nebulous because of the unclear plan.
2. Team members must be highly skilled because they must be adaptable with the changeable plan.
3. The project is mush more people based, which means they cannot drop out until the project is done.

The pros and cons of Waterfall

The pros

1. Developers and customers can set a clear goal, and it makes planning more straightforward.
2. They can estimate workloads and budgets more accurately.
3. Other developers can take over their coworker’s tasks easily because they can follow the concrete plan.

The cons

1. The development plan is rigid and inflexible.
2. Developers cannot get feedback from customers until the project is finished.
3. If there is a problem, much money and laborious work are needed to fix it.

Which approach is better?

Each approach has good and bad sides. If a project is not likely changed a lot throughout the development process; Waterfall is the best way. In contrast, Agile provides many opportunities to improve the project if the requirement are unclear. In my opinion, we just think about which approach is suited for the project before getting down to business.