You're juggling bug fixes and new features in agile projects. How do you decide what takes priority?
In agile project management, deciding between bug fixes and new features is critical. To navigate this challenge:
How do you balance bug fixes and feature development? Share your strategies.
You're juggling bug fixes and new features in agile projects. How do you decide what takes priority?
In agile project management, deciding between bug fixes and new features is critical. To navigate this challenge:
How do you balance bug fixes and feature development? Share your strategies.
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Balancing bug fixes and new features requires a thoughtful approach: 1. Developer Motivation: Mix tasks to keep developers engaged. New features offer creative challenges, while solving bugs provides a sense of accomplishment. 2. Maintaining Momentum: Include quick tasks to create a sense of progress. 3. Stakeholder Communication: Regularly communicate with stakeholders to clarify priorities and ensure alignment with business objectives. Keep an open feedback loop to adjust priorities. 4. Prioritization Process: Prioritize tasks based on user impact, severity, urgency, business value, dependencies, and team capacity.
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Juggling both are generally a challenge, different projects, different strokes. 2 approaches i have applied in general. 1) Using the prioritization principle using Value and Impact. 2) Allocating part of the capacity of scrum team for defects every sprint to ensure system stability for the ongoing issues and delivering value through features.
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Bug fix we talk about which is live in UAT and / Or Prod. Feature is new business requirement which need to be introduced in UAT and / Or Prod. Hence Bug fix takes priority technically and Practically. However if both popup at same time and have TAT same Date then collaboration call along with business need to taken, agreed and signoff. Everyone will be aware and agreed that IT will never keep bench strength for such condition. Such situation is unavoidable and not frequent.
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Here's an approach : Assess severity and impact of bugs: Critical bugs that severely impact core functionality or user experience should generally take highest priority.Evaluate how many users are affected and the frequency of occurrence. Consider business value of new features: Prioritize features that align closely with key business goals and user needs. Balance short-term fixes with long-term value: While bug fixes provide immediate relief, new features drive long-term product growth. Involve stakeholders: Consult with product owners, customers, and team members to align priorities.Keep stakeholders informed about trade-offs and expected delivery timelines.
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Seriously consider using Test-Driven Development (TDD). And Pair Programming and/or mobbing/teaming, or even Extreme Programming (XP), if possible. These more agile approaches reduce bug counts to the point where it's less costly to fix bugs than "manage" them.
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