According to the PMBOK® Guide and the Agile Practice Guide, the role of the project manager in Project Integration Management shifts significantly when using an agile or adaptive approach.
In a predictive (waterfall) environment, the project manager is the primary integrator who consolidates various plans into a single, cohesive document. However, in an Agile/Adaptive environment:
Distributed Responsibility: The responsibility for integration and decision-making is often distributed among the team. The team members take the lead in integrating the various functional elements of the product themselves.
The PM ' s Role: The project manager’s (or servant-leader’s) primary responsibility becomes building a collaborative environment. This involves ensuring that the team has the necessary tools, resources, and culture to make integrated decisions.
Empowerment: The PM focuses on facilitating collaboration between the team and the Product Owner to ensure that the evolving product scope is integrated with the organizational goals and stakeholder expectations.
Analysis of other options:
A. Defining the scope: In Agile, the scope is evolving and managed primarily through the Product Backlog, often led by the Product Owner rather than being a " key responsibility " of the PM during the Integration phase.
C. Creating a detailed project management plan: This is a hallmark of Predictive project management. Agile avoids high-level, up-front detailed planning in favor of iterative planning.
D. Directing the delivery: Agile emphasizes " self-organizing teams. " The PM facilitates and supports rather than " directs " the team ' s delivery in a top-down manner.
Per PMI standards for adaptive environments, the Project Manager ' s value in integration is found in fostering communication and removing impediments so that the team can effectively integrate their own work.
