Rolling-wave planning is the process of
project planning
Project planning is part of project management, which relates to the use of schedules such as Gantt charts to plan and subsequently report progress within the project environment. Project planning can be done manually or by the use of project m ...
in ''waves'' as the project proceeds and later details become clearer; similar to the techniques used in
agile software development approaches like
Scrum
Scrum may refer to:
Sport
* Scrum (rugby), a method of restarting play in rugby union and rugby league
** Scrum (rugby union), scrum in rugby union
* Scrum, an offensive melee formation in Japanese game Bo-taoshi
Media and popular culture
* M ...
.
Work to be done in the near term is based on high-level assumptions; also, high-level milestones are set. As the project progresses, the risks, assumptions, and milestones originally identified become more defined and reliable. One would use rolling-wave planning in an instance where there is an extremely tight schedule or timeline to adhere to, as more thorough planning would place the schedule into an unacceptable negative schedule variance.
The concepts of rolling-wave planning and
progressive elaboration are techniques covered in the
Project Management Body of Knowledge.
References
External links
Rolling Wave PlanningRolling Wave Planning in Project ManagementPMBOK Define Activities Process
Schedule (project management)
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