Universal Credit is the world’s biggest ever “agile development” software project and a massive financial and social (and hence political) risk for the government. Unless delivered on time and on budget then the consequences are grave – some of the most vulnerable people in society could be left literally destitute, with all that entails for their personal welfare and social order.
Yesterday the U.K. finally admitted in public what the rest of us have known for a long time: that the project is in deep trouble. The report placed UC in the “red-amber” category – not yet failing but very close it. The back end – the benefits calculation – has reportedly been shifted to a “waterfall” development process – which offers some assurances that the government at least takes its fiduciary duties seriously as it should mean no code will be deployed that has not been finished. The front end – the bit used by humans – is still meant to be “agile.”
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One of the principles of Agile is that no code is deployed until it is done, done, done. that is completed by developers, integrated, tested and accepted by users and stakeholders. Another key principle is that large projects are broken down into small pieces that can be delivered and deployed every month. It's also much easier to deliver a project with a fixed time and budget with agile than with waterfall because Agile recognises that the scope is negotiable from the beginning. From the descriptions it does not appear that the Universal Credit project was ever operating on an agile basis.
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