A good friend of mine, Patrick Neeman, has a great web site dedicated to user experience, Usability Counts. Recently he has been focusing on Agile development and why it works for User Experience. Check out “Seven Reasons Why Agile and Scrum Works for Web User Experience.” On March 31 we did a pod-cast on Agile development and how it impacts UX professionals. Check it out here. Podcast: About Agile And Scrum With Michael Vincent.
More organizations are moving toward Agile, some are doing it well while others are struggling because of underestimating the commitment necessary for success. That commitment is as much about people as it is process.
For UX professionals, a big concern is not having a big chunk of time up front to get their head around the whole intended application and get detailed design. Not to worry. While agile doesn’t do big design up front, we do “just enough” at each iteration. That does include some up front planning. A little change of mindset and it will come together.