The Rolling-Wave planning technique
Innovation and product development projects have environments characterized by many unknowns and rapid change. Recently, an emerging set of practices termed agile product development has caused traditional orthodox product developers and project managers to rethink their approach to creating fast and flexible projects [1]. As stated in The PDMA ToolBook 3 for New Product Development, flexibility is one of the most important corner stones whenever considered the project planning. Moreover, in new-product development, most management approaches presume a high ratio of knowns to unknowns , and most planning defines prescribed pathways through developmental stages and decision gates [2]. At the same time, project environments reflect a very low amount of information at the beginning of the project, when the decisions importance is more relevant, while it increases as the project lifecycle is developed.
To counter with this paradox, the Rolling-Wave technique is one of the newer agile tools that has been widely adopted as it yields benefits of improved speed, flexibility and customer value. Rolling wave is a robust, sophisticated way to manage the risks of innovation, to adapt to change, to align the organization, and to align the team towards breakthrough reults [1]. Recognizing that not all the aspects of a project can be fully defined or known at the starting stage, the Rolling-Wave planning allows the progressive elaboration of all the details as far as the project go on. The project management profession has used the term rolling wave referring to the expression "plan a little, do a little" to characterize its use of iteration along the project lifecycle[1].
The aim of this article is to contribute to the profession of project, program and portfolio management in:
- Understanding the purpose, importance and principles of The Rolling-Wave technique.
- Identifying its key characteristics and major aspects.
- Recognizing its boundaries and limitations.
Developed by Gianluca Santinon
Overview of the Rolling-Wave technique
Projects environments nowadays are evolving rapidly and business systems have become increasingly complex in order to optimize cost, quality, timeliness of results and comply with variations in regulations in marketplace [3]. Most innovation and product development success stories show that reduced organic teams of competent and motivate people, small batch sizes of information, iteration, and rapid feedback from the customer or user are the key principles to succeed [1]. In a context described by the former quotes, the agile approach has become more and more popular, underlining the key of success for each project. As mentioned in the The PDMA ToolBook 3 for New Product Development, an agile enterprise rapidly adapts to changing business challenges and opportunities. Agility has always been important for an enterprise to achieve and maintain competitive advantage. Agile organizations have the capability to quickly anticipate change as well as react to the unexpected. With this agile capability, these organizations are able to create value and do it with speed and flexibility [1].
In these situations where the conditions are intricated and not easily predicted, the Rolling Wave has revealed to be one of the agile techniques that offers clear benefits and permits to overcome the brittle schedule problem towards an alternative robust planning. Defining a brittle schedule as a project that breaks easily due to a change in assumptions, the alternative robust planning can be seen as a project model that can withstand the stresses of change in the project, adapt to changes and serve to focus the project success. A robust plan is a useful tool for the project team to align and integrate its efforts in order to achieve a project characterized by speed, flexibility, and customer value added [1].
The Rolling-Wave technique: three main principles
With the term Rolling-Wave it is intended an iterative approach that can be described using the expression "plan a little, do a little". Dealing with unclear picture of the whole project, the Rolling-Wave techniques permits to focus on iterative work and frequent updates to the project plan. It permits to focus on what is known, "plan a little", and work on it, "do a little", until more information becomes available and other data is relevant, so it is possible to evaluate the next "wave" [1]. It is therefore a project planning techniques for projects that don´t offer all the data needed to create a plan or a schedule up front: the project plan evolves as more details become clear. In this context, "plan a little" means to create a rough plan for the next wave of work, while "do a little" means to execute the current one. This approach allows the team to move forward with the work for which there is enough data to ensure a clear understanding of. Simultaneously, it is also possible to plan the future work that has still to come. As the project goes on, it is possible gather more information and refine the plan: the key point of the Rolling-Wave planning underlie in this step where the team has the possibility to adapt and refine the plan eventually considering any changes or new information encountered along the way.
In essence, "plan a little, do a little" is a balance between what is planned and the actions that can be taken, with an emphasis on flexibility and adaptation. This approach allows for a continuous feedback loop where the team can adjust their plans based on what they learn in the execution phase, improving the overall outcome of the project.
To apply the Rolling-Wave planning and understand the benefits that this technique can take advantage of, it is important describe the three main principles that undergird Rolling-Wave´s effectiveness [1].
Principle One: Project and Product Architecture
An architecture defines the basic structure of a system, it defines the chunks of a product and project work. Good architectures allow the team to keep a big-picture perspective even as they drill into details. Good architectures provide a basis for assessing the priorities and aligning activities. The result is improved development speed and flexibility. Product architecture and the project architecture are fundamental to formulating a Rolling-Wave approach [1].
Principle Two: Uncertainty and Ambiguity
Principle Three: A functioning team with good leadership
Implementation of The Rolling-Wave technique
Step One: Get the team and strategy in place
Step two: Perform Top-Down planning, starting with the Level 1 of the Work Breakdown Structure
Step three: Decompose the first set of "Plan a Little" activities
Step four: The baseline
Step five: Execute the planned work
Step six: Iterate through the planning horizons and close the project
Real-life case study
Limitations
Annotated Bibliography
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 Project Management Institute, Inc. (PMI)., "The PDMA ToolBook 3 for New Product Development", 2008
- ↑ Mark P. Rice, Gina Colarelli O'Connor, Ronald Pierantozzi,"Implememnting a Learning Plan to Counter Project Uncertainty "], MIT Sloan Management review, Winter 2008
- ↑ Larman, Craig, "Building the Agile Enterprise", 2004
