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¶ Dependency Resolving
¶ What it is
Dependency resolving is resolving potential issues and dependencies during a project. It includes the dependencies prioritisation, communication plan, milestone or due date checking, deciding the owners and assignees, etc.
¶ Why it is useful
After identifying dependencies and the corresponding owners, resolving and plans to resolve are the most crucial activities to remove road blockers and minimise the risks to achieve the project goal.
¶ When to use it
During the whole project life cycle, there could be dependencies to resolve. This must be planned and regularly checked to avoid any risks.
¶ How is it done
There are intra-team, inter-team, and extra-team dependencies. Here we will discuss the most common cases of inter-team dependencies. What could we do to help:
- Try to have only one product owner to reduce the possibility of conflicting messages
- Ask the PO to join all the important meetings so that they can understand how work is divided
- Choose one representative from each dependency team as the committee member when changes and decisions are to be made
- This small committee can have pre-and post-sprint planning & review, so preparations are done, and follow-ups are guaranteed.
¶ Do's & Don't
Do's
- Keep communication transparent and straightforward to reduce communication costs.
- Regularly review the dependency list to check status changes and progress.
- Find the workaround if the original dependency is about to fail.
- Set up sustainable processes and toolsets for future use to reduce the number of possible dependencies.
Don't
- Don’t try to solve all the dependencies on your own, but find the right party who’s in charge to make the resolution efficient.
- Don’t wait in vain when you find the dependency owner is about to fail, but try to accelerate to avoid the failure proactively.
- Don’t forget to replace the temporary workarounds when a formal resolution can be in place.
¶ Tools needed
The tools above can manage tasks, view timelines, and cross-project dependencies. Teamhood and Asana also have the features of task dependencies and workload view.
All three tools have free versions for trial.
¶ Example
Check the example and find the dependencies marked with blue dots.
Once any dependency resolution has failed (see the black flag), the team needs to start Plan B, make sure the project can react quickly with no resource wasting, and adopt the prepared workaround to minimize the impact on the project.
