What is Lean Development

Massive failures of software development projects have been recorded in the literature, and particularly in the popular press, over the years. Yet, rarely if ever have we seen any objective, detailed analysis of the causes of these failures. Indeed, we usually can only surmise how the projects were managed or what the development methodology or approach was. This chapter analyses some aspects of software development projects and development methodologies in terms of the success or failure potential of these methodologies. The conclusion arrived at is that the system development methodologies handed down since the late 1970s as the preferred development approach, generally known as Structured Methodologies, based on the Structured Design Life Cycle methodology (SDLC), bear the seeds of their own failure. It is asserted that they cannot succeed because of the inherent nature and assumptions embedded in those methodologies. After some analysis of these assumptions, considered to be highly flawed and unworkable, the now not so recently published Agile Development methodologies are discussed and proffered as a workable and inherently successful approach to software system development.