One thing that's seductive about agile is the name. We like the idea of being agile in our thinking. Agile as a methodology cannot deliver agile thinking, however, and inevitably ends up preventing it.
Think of "agile" as the ability to take the input of all the variable elements of the project—budget, time, design patterns, reusability, customer needs, corporate needs, precedents, standards, technology innovations and limitations—and come up with a pragmatic approach that solves the problem at hand in such a way that the product is delivered properly.
If there's one key quality a good project manager needs, it's prioritization: The ability to take the pressures of all project elements and determine which path to follow based on what's most important to achieve
This principle encourages poor and irresponsible planning while hiding its effects. As iterations continue and the defect list grows, the customer becomes more frustrated—not only because of the lack of quality, but because delivery expectations aren't being met either. This is much different from more traditional practices, where you have a project based on well-defined requirements and changes are managed through a Change Management process—which, while sometimes byzantine, will at least state time and monetary costs more clearly.
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