How your project/product is delivered at the end or at regular intervals, how it helps the business or your project owner is considered business value. Because your business may not get any value from your project until you deliver something that can be used by customers/end consumers.
Whether at regular intervals (in the Agile approach – BETA) or at the end (in traditional development methods – ALPHA), Business Value is often ready to be consumed at the end of the project cycle. In this context, ALPHA and BETA may look similar, but they differ in how they deliver business value.
At ALPHA, we usually reach our target value at the end of the project, from -0 to the highest point at the end of the project. During this time, we try to comply with the budget we have planned, and we can often exceed the costs. We resist change requests and make revisions to the plans when we accept them. Often there are deviations in our project baseline and the time and costs required to reach point C increase. Our customer has to wait until C to reach the result they want to achieve, the goal they want to reach, i.e. Value.
BETA, on the other hand, allows us to reach a large portion of the total Value generated by the requested requirements faster. The first step to achieve this is to optimize the Value of the requested requirements. The business value starts to be generated with the first cycle and continues until the last cycle or the intervention of the product owner. This way we can achieve a significant portion of the Value at point A (in a shorter time). Our cost in each cycle will also usually be constant.
From another point of view, even if it takes the same amount of time to complete all requirements, we can predict the cost we will incur to reach point B and reduce our risks. Our business/project owner/end users can make a decision on the time and cost to be spent between point A and point B and the Value increase to be achieved.
Should he continue with the project?
Should we focus on a different Value during this time?
In summary, with BETA, we give importance to value optimization. We can present our prioritized requests to our customers at short intervals, increase collaboration, and receive feedback more frequently. In doing so, we provide a more transparent environment. We can put our customer in a stronger position in the market, we can reach the main functions to be achieved and the main Value they will create faster. We can help our customers in their decisions and be more flexible against the effects of changes.
