SAP projects traditionally follow the waterfall model or a modified model based on the waterfall model in its development life cycle. However, since the advent to agile, SAP development projects have seen a paradigm shift, especially for post-implementation releases. However, the adoption is less prominent in implementation projects where the build duration is significantly large. However, it’s changing now.

The inflexion in favour of ‘Fit To Standard’ over heavy customization has drastically affected the project management approach. With fewer customization and extensive standardization, Agile seems to be a more organic choice for SAP implementations.

With Agile, the development approach disintegrates the solution into smaller achievable pieces/solutions/goals catering to modularization and reusability principles. This leads to quicker development and greater flexibility in delivery. With smaller solutions, tracking becomes more accurate and issues can be identified early in the game. Agile also promotes cross-function/domain skillsets. As a result, teams have greater visibility to the overall picture rather than delivery in silos. SAP caters to a highly dynamic business environment and with Agile, implementation can be done in a shorter time and releases can be done frequently.

Further Reading: Agile For ABAP Developers

~S