An example of release based agile development and delivery model is explained.

The usual activities involved in a release based agile development include the following:

• Maintain Product Backlog – Product owners maintain the product backlog. They continuously groom their backlogs by adding stories, prioritizing and estimating them.
• Release Planning – Organizations have definite release cycles such as quarterly release, bi-yearly release, yearly release. The product owners select the prioritized stories from the product backlog that should be completed in a given release to form Release Backlog.
• Sprint Planning – The scrum teams define their sprint schedule such as two weeks sprint or three weeks sprint. They work with product owner, and select stories from the release backlog that should be completed in each sprint to create Sprint Backlog.

The following illustration provides a high-level overview of the workflow in a release based agile development environment.

An example of project based agile development and delivery model is explained.

The usual activities involved in a project based agile development include the following:

• Maintain Product Backlog – Product owners maintain the product backlog. They continuously groom their backlogs by adding stories, prioritizing and estimating them.
• Project Backlog – Product owners select the prioritized stories and assign them to one or more projects, which creates the Project Backlog. All product owners can create one or more projects and capture additional details such as required resources, cost, risk, strategic alignment. All these projects undergo portfolio prioritization process, and the selected projects are executed by the project teams.
  Note: Some organizations also define release cycles such as quarterly release, bi-yearly release, yearly release. They then move the stories from product backlog to the release backlog. In these cases, stories are assigned to the projects from the release backlog. For example, for SAP product, enhancements are delivered every quarter (quarterly release) and then projects are created to execute the release backlog.
• Sprint Planning – The project scrum teams define their sprint schedule such as two weeks sprint or three weeks sprint. They work with their project manager, and select stories from the project backlog that should be completed in each sprint to create Sprint Backlog.

The following illustration provides a high-level overview of the workflow in a project based agile development environment.

An example of a standalone project development and delivery model is explained.

In this case, request (demand) for a new product or feature or system is raised. Demand managers capture the requirements in terms of stories. They also capture the other details for the demand such as resources required, cost, risks, and strategic direction. Such demands upon approval are converted into projects. Project managers can choose pure agile or hybrid mode of project execution. In hybrid mode, the initial phases such as planning, and analysis are taken up as waterfall tasks, and then the execution is done as agile phase. The agile phase is assigned to an agile group. The agile group then completes the work by sprint execution.

The following illustration provides a high-level overview of the workflow for executing a standalone project development.