Whats wrong with waterfall? Surely mis-using waterfall was the culprit. I'm guessing same goes for Scrum. I've never followed true scrum so my opinion might be jaded however the devil generally lies in the implementation of the process.
You cannot fit the same tire on a truck and a kid's tricycle, same way you cannot fit the same process for all development cycle. If you team needs clear direction and everything well defined (written in stone), follow waterfall. If your team needs formal process but can do some things on their own (say a team filled with new hires and one lone experienced dev), scrum might not be so bad. Kanbaan is good when everyone knows what they're doing and you really just want to know which stages do you need to focus more on.
You're best bet is probably to try all three and whatever else exists, mix and match until you can successfully deliver your products without a whole lotta overhead and then keep tweaking the process when conditions change (new hires, folks leaving, change in goals/features).
Waterfall is literally a strawman methodology made up to illustrate the worst possible way to build software (short of having a million monkeys trying random programs), in order to serve as contrast to a way that actually works.
I wasn't really going towards defending waterfall[1] but lemme give it a try.
Waterfall might be not bad when you cannot have feedback mechanisms, you cannot roll out changes in phases, where requirements/scopes are fixed, tech stack is well defined and products have matured enough.
[1] : wanted to more say, use the right tool for the right thing in the right way. I don't think its easy but its doable.
You cannot fit the same tire on a truck and a kid's tricycle, same way you cannot fit the same process for all development cycle. If you team needs clear direction and everything well defined (written in stone), follow waterfall. If your team needs formal process but can do some things on their own (say a team filled with new hires and one lone experienced dev), scrum might not be so bad. Kanbaan is good when everyone knows what they're doing and you really just want to know which stages do you need to focus more on.
You're best bet is probably to try all three and whatever else exists, mix and match until you can successfully deliver your products without a whole lotta overhead and then keep tweaking the process when conditions change (new hires, folks leaving, change in goals/features).