SmartAgile.com

Keeping iteration plans firm in a fast moving organization

2009-05-17T22:14:00.000-07:00

Awhile back I wrote a post called The Cone of Sanity about how priorities can change like crazy leading up to an iteration, but that once the work hits the development team, it should stay pretty firm for the duration of the iteration.I received a comment that raised a great (and common) question that is worth posting on its own.The QuestionI've found that this can work sometimes, but often the

My CSM Training Experience

2009-04-11T17:43:00.000-07:00

As promised, albeit a few days late, here are some details regarding my certified scrum master training experience. As I mentioned in my last post, I'm not a big fan of certifications proving anything one way or the other, but I am always trying to learn, and it seemed like a good idea to get away from the office for a few days to learn a few new things.My instructor was Alistair Cockburn, one of

Scrum Master Certification

2009-04-08T22:32:00.000-07:00

To my knowledge, I have never earned an official professional certificate, but that will change in a few days. Over the years I've attended a variety of conferences and training sessions, read a fair number of books, googled a variety of professional topics online and followed a few blogs. I suppose I feel like I've already got both the theory and the experience, so do I really need a certificate

Discovery Phase in the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC)

2008-06-30T21:48:00.000-07:00

Anyone who has completed a few software development projects should recognize most or all of the Design and Delivery activities listed on this software development life cycle (SDLC) slide. However, in my experience, a much smaller percentage have been involved with projects as early as the Discovery phase. In some cases, Agile projects are so anxious to get to coding that they skip this phase

Agile Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC)

2008-05-23T15:24:00.000-07:00

One of the biggest critiques of Agile software development methodologies is that the planning is almost non-existent. Indeed, there are some Agile teams that get pretty aggressive and begin developing with very little detail of the system requirements. The idea is that as they receive more information, they’ll just refactor their code as necessary. While the ability to quickly refactor is a

The Art of Lobbying in Software Development Projects

2008-04-30T13:59:00.000-07:00

It happens many times every day all over the world. Someone enters an important meeting and makes a proposal. First one person raises a concern, then another, then another. Much to their consternation, their proposal goes down in flames. They might ask themselves, "Why do people have to be so critical of my ideas? It didn’t even seem like some of them wanted to understand. Why can’t they just

Agile Project Planning Spreadsheet

2008-04-10T21:19:00.001-07:00

Here is the updated agile project planning spreadsheet. The tools in this spreadsheet enable a realistic and highly accurate approach to project estimation and planning. I'd like to thank my colleague Lori for quite a bit of help with these updates.For one, it accounts for all of the activities that developers take on while coding, such as bug fixes, stand up and iteration meetings, training,

Development Estimates Are Like Sausages

2008-01-10T19:28:00.000-08:00

Have you heard the old quote from Otto von Bismarck that laws are like sausages, it is better not to see them being made? The same can hold true for estimates. Sometimes estimates and the method to arrive at them can be completely sound, but describing how you got there is never going to please everyone.As you may have read in my post on user story estimates, I like to come up with raw estimates

The Cone of Sanity

2007-12-03T15:47:00.000-08:00

I recently spoke with a colleague who was pretty stressed about a project she is managing. She would work with the developers to define doable iteration work plans, but the deadlines were rarely met. The source of the missed deadlines was scope creep. With demos at trade shows looming and new ideas flowing like a fountain, the customer was always coming up with sweet new ideas to enhance the

Agile tips when co-location is not possible

2007-11-08T14:23:00.000-08:00

I was recently asked if Agile is even worth doing if your team is not co-located. For example, some teams are split between two nearby locations, some are telecommuting teams working from their homes, and others have people at various global locations (NYC – London – India, etc.). Certainly the distance and time differences make co-location and face-to-face communication, two hallmarks of Agile,

Are product roadmaps dangerous?

2007-11-05T10:28:00.000-08:00

I recently ran across a blog post called “Product roadmaps are dangerous.” The main point was that publishing a long-term roadmap shackles your ability to accommodate evolving priorities. The comments posted were interesting for their diversity and disagreements. It was as if some of the people felt that their projects were how all projects are, reminding me of the Blind Men and an Elephant

Is a user story card enough?

2007-10-26T11:22:00.000-07:00

For the uninitiated, the Agile approach to business requirements can seem confusing. For those who have been on a project with a cowboy coder who claimed they were “Agile” as an excuse to avoid a disciplined approach to requirements gathering, it can seem like a downright fraud. Can a developer really build to the light-weight requirements on a user story card? Isn’t this cutting corners, and don

Incomplete Stories at the Iteration Review Meeting

2007-10-22T16:05:00.001-07:00

Imagine your iteration ends and 1-2 critical stories are close but not quite done. They are far enough along to be demoed, but still needs a few tweaks and haven't gone through testing. It is tempting to include these in the iteration review, isn’t it? After all, they are most of the way there, and the customer wants to see a return on their investment, right?Before you go ahead with this,

Agile Project Teams

2007-10-18T14:22:00.000-07:00

Teams are the heart of Agile. Getting the right team assembled and working as a unit greatly increases the odds of a successful delivery. I recently re-read my articles that cover team-related topics and found that there is extra potency when reviewing them in succession. Here are links to the team-related articles; have fun! Feel free to comment if you have other important topics to raise about

One-on-Ones

2007-10-15T10:05:00.000-07:00

Team co-location can greatly improve team interaction and efficiency. However, just like it can lead to tighter collaboration on positive efforts, it can also enable individual discontent to spread like wildfire. A team member shares a complaint, and pretty soon the whole team can be dragged down. Rather than launching into damage control mode whenever problems arise, I prefer to preemptively

The Bench

2007-10-10T15:16:00.000-07:00

Have you ever been on a project where business requirements were written so far in advance that they were obsolete before development had even been started? On the flip side, have you ever had a rock star developer scrounging for odds and ends part-way through an iteration because they finished early but there were no more development-ready stories queued up for them? Wouldn’t it be cool if

Agile Project Planning

2007-10-08T11:57:00.000-07:00

People often think that Agile is all about shooting from the hip and that planning is shunned. In actual fact, even though Agile rejects the Waterfall approach of defining system requirements for months and years before development even begins, a successful project will always be well planned and have a clear path forward.Warning: There are lots of ways to plan for a successful project. Below are

Budget Planning

2007-10-08T10:30:00.000-07:00

Now that you have your resource plan you are ready to complete your project budget. The bulk of the work was figuring out the budget for your resources, so completing your budget is a snap.Here is a link to a sample budget plan that I’ll use as a reference. If you’d like a soft copy, email your request to aaron@agile101.com. Enter the budget for your resources, then any other costs that may

Project Resource Planning

2007-10-05T12:47:00.000-07:00

Whether you are putting together a budget proposal or preparing to assemble a project team, you will need a resource plan defining how many people are needed in which roles. This plan needs to be backed up by hard data such as your user story estimates. Don’t worry, though; drafting your resource plan can really be a simple task. Here is a link to a sample project resource planning

Project Timeline Planning

2007-10-03T13:05:00.000-07:00

Once you have a product roadmap that the customer likes, there is a short but effective “rubber hits the road” exercise that helps you plan a high-level project timeline. This helps clarify what your team can actually deliver by when and with how many developer resources. Some would argue that a timeline is counter to Agile. I personally believe that a timeline is key to maintaining focus so that

User Story Estimates

2007-10-02T14:15:00.000-07:00

Most software applications are a part of an overall business strategy. For many software development projects, delivery must be coordinated with a business event such as a trade show, product launch, marketing promotion, etc. Your customer will want your best estimate of what can be delivered by when. The key to successful planning and communication is accurate estimates. With an Agile project,

Product Roadmaps

2007-09-27T08:41:00.000-07:00

People often think that Agile is all about shooting from the hip and that planning is shunned. In fact, even though Agile rejects the Waterfall approach of defining system requirements for months and years before development even begins, a successful project will always be well planned and have a clear path forward. The product roadmap is one tool that helps with strategic project planning and

Test Driven Development

2007-09-24T10:17:00.000-07:00

Test Driven Development (TDD) can seem completely counterintuitive. Testing before development? The tests won’t even compile! Also, does this mean that you would no longer need QA resources, since the testing would already be done? Let’s first take a look at the standard TDD process.