Agile Liftoff
Use when asked to run an agile project liftoff — aligning a team on vision, objectives, stakeholders, and initial plan at project start — as distinct from an agile chartering session's working-agreement focus (see agile-charter) or a formal project charter document (see project-charter).
Liftoff is the initial stage of an agile project, where the team comes together to define and align on the project's goals, objectives, and initial plan — setting the foundation for the whole project by creating a genuinely shared understanding of vision, goals, and plan before work begins in earnest. The name conveys the idea directly: the project is just getting off the ground, and the team needs to work together to actually achieve liftoff and get moving in the right direction.
General steps
- Align on the project vision — the whole team agrees on the overall vision, so everyone is genuinely working toward the same goal rather than each person's own interpretation of it.
- Define project objectives — identify the specific objectives the project must achieve to realize that vision (see Smart Criteria for writing these well).
- Identify project stakeholders — everyone affected by the project, and their needs and expectations.
- Create a high-level plan — key milestones, deliverables, and activities required to reach the objectives.
- Establish project governance — roles and responsibilities, decision-making processes, and communication protocols for the project going forward.
Who runs it
Typically facilitated by a project manager, who guides the team through the liftoff activities and ensures everyone stays aligned and engaged throughout — a facilitator matters here because genuine alignment (not just information transfer) is the actual goal, and that's harder to achieve without someone actively managing the conversation.
How it differs from related practices
- Agile Charter — overlaps significantly with liftoff, but agile chartering's emphasis is specifically on co-creating a working agreement (the rules, norms, and values governing the project) as a distinct deliverable, alongside vision/objectives; liftoff is the broader project-start activity that a chartering session can be one part of.
- Project Charter — a formal, written, approved document; liftoff is the collaborative activity that might produce (or draw on) such a document, rather than the document itself.
Common pitfalls
- Treating liftoff as a status meeting rather than a genuine alignment activity — the point is building real shared understanding, not just broadcasting a plan someone else already decided.
- Skipping stakeholder identification — a plan built without knowing who's actually affected risks missing requirements or expectations that surface expensively later.
- No governance agreed at liftoff — without established decision-making processes and communication protocols up front, the team improvises these under pressure once the project is already underway.
Learn more
- Agile Charter for the closely related working-agreement-focused chartering session.
- Project Charter for the formal document counterpart.
- Smart Criteria for writing the project objectives well.