Agile vs. PMI -- The Debate Continues

After reading "Agile: The Great Debate" I approached ASPE President David Mantica to get his thoughts on the article. Here is what he had to say...

It is great to hear some strong feedback from PMI about the implications of the Agile trend on the Project Management industry. Certainly PMI has developed the defecto standard for Project Management and as aspects of the PMBOK are being questioned by other methods and practices, it is important to hear how PMI sees the trends.

First thing to note, there is no right or wrong in this debt. The key in this trend is “HOT”. Meaning for some reason, professionals who see themselves doing project management work, whether in software development or other disciplines say for example Product Management or Product Marketing, are looking for something else. Right now, Agile is that something else.

I am most interested first in finding out why they are seeking something new, especially since the PMBOK has been in existence over 35 years. So why now? From what we are hearing from our customers the industry is changing faster then the PMBOK can be mapped to those changes.

Now the interesting thing, is that a first mover in anything new is not always the winner, just look at Microsoft. So I think there is a big opportunity in 2009 for one of two things to happen. One, PMI figures out the answer to my why question above and makes the necessary changes to the PMBOK to map to industry change.

Two, PMI doesn’t make the needed changes and one of the many current organizations or a start up organization answers fully the why question and starts to take their place as the “go to” source for leadership in the field of project management or off-shoot fields in software project management or some other industry specific project management techniques.

The growth of the Agile industry reminds me a lot of the Linux industry. Yes, one is a process and the other a specific software tool, but both developed because of critical industry needs that were not being met and both truly rely on a community for enhancement and evolution.

ASPE-SDLC will look deeper into the issues PMI has brought out in their fantastic posting. We hope we can help professionals better understand their options and the pros and cons of each.

**This post references "Agile: The Great Debate" post on PMI's Voices of Project Management which can be found at http://blogs.pmi.org/blog/voices_on_project_management/2009/04/agile-the-great-debate.html