Have you ever noticed how predicting the travel time of an international flight covering 4,000 miles is often more accurate than predicting the time to commute to your office? The same is true of software development projects — it can be easier to predict longer term schedules. Here’s why. We’ll ignore catastrophic situations. Some flights […]
Be honest. No software development process is flawless — not one. Every process, regardless of approach, has something wrong with it. The reason is simple. Different approaches, and various implementations of those approaches, always focus on a few areas deemed critical to success. Those critical areas vary by company and development group. The narrow focus […]
Does the software project you’re currently working on have a plan? It doesn’t have to be an elaborate gantt chart — frankly, gantt charts are pretty worthless though they force us to think through a variety of project issues. It doesn’t have to be a massive missive either — no one reads those things anyway. […]
I have a question for you. How do you define a successful software project? Here are some choices. If you don’t like any of them, please leave a comment with your definition. A. The product is delivered on time but over budget. B. The product is delivered on budget but late. C. The product meets […]
One of the leading causes of delays in software development projects is simply the state of being not-ready. I see it all the time. A team member tries to work on something and runs right smack into a wall of missing information. Or a someone tries to hand-off a work item to another team member […]
Let’s discuss “done” as it relates to writing software versus testing it — code completed versus code validated. Here’s the scenario. A software developer has finished implementing a code module or, preferably, a story. This means he’s unit tested the code and it works as intended. Is he done? Now, someone specializing in software testing […]
I’d like to draw a couple of analogies between software development and learning a new skill such as playing the piano or speaking a new language. Bear with me and hopefully you’ll gain new insights into the benefits of agile development over waterfall development. Have you ever taken piano lessons? Or, have you ever taken […]
Some people have a hard time accepting iterative approaches to getting work done. It may be because many of us have an innate desire to finish something — we need to be done. Yet, when we iterate over a work item, it feels like it takes longer to get to done. Here’s a simple example […]
Guest Post I’m pleased to share this post written by the folks at Agil8. Project management systems are not methods that are just for big businesses and large-scale organisations alone. They are also suitable for smaller businesses that can benefit a great deal from these methods too. The fundamental principles of project management can be […]
Let’s say your team deploys a new software release every four weeks. (I’m a big fan of short release cycles. In fact, I think four weeks is too long but let’s try that.) On the surface, the team appears to be using an agile development approach. But let’s stir the pot a little. What if […]
Following the rules isn’t good enough. Do you manage by proxy or are you being managed by proxy? It works like this. A manager or management team defines lots of rules — you must do this — you cannot do that. Been there? Some of the rules are sensible like those related to timely response […]
If your team follows a traditional, legacy approach to software development and wants to convert to an agile approach, how should you go about it? Let’s say you want to convert from a waterfall approach that uses a strict command-and-control model to Scrum that uses a self-organizing team model. How would you get from here […]
I’m hearing and seeing the word ‘agile’ more and more around the office. It comes up in hallway conversations and management presentations. Managers have gotten the message and want us to be more agile. That’s great, right? So I ask them what it means to be more agile and the answer I get is rather […]
Many software development teams go to great lengths to prioritize requirements, features or user stories. (I hope your team does.) It’s a valuable exercise if people take the time to truly evaluate the importance of each request they make or receive. Do you want to improve your software development process? Apply the same logic to […]
I’d like to discuss failure — specifically, software development projects that fail. Has it ever happened to a project team you were on? If so, it was probably not for the reason you think. Before we can examine this further, we need to agree on what constitutes failure. I’ll offer my definitions and you can […]
Software development experts, myself included, get caught up in methodology battles. I like Scrum. You like waterfall. My approach is more responsive than yours. Your approach is more disciplined than mine. But, are we losing sight of ‘what’ really matters? The approaches we follow are the ‘how’ of building software systems. My goal (and I […]
Have you ever watched a home renovation show on television? I’m thinking of shows like Love It or List It and Property Brothers (both on HGTV). The specifics vary but they use the same general approach to managing renovation projects. The work crews are given a fixed time period and a fixed budget to complete […]
I’ve advocated for using “Sprint Zero” a few times on this blog and each time I get some negative feedback. I’m going to continue my crusade in this post but with a twist. Firstly, recognize that “Sprint Zero” is about ‘hitting the ground running’. That is, getting the team ready to start writing code that […]
The idea behind “Sprint 0” is that software development teams should spend some time at the beginning of an agile project doing analysis, design and other preparation tasks. I’m not referring to small projects — a few people for a few months. I’m thinking about enterprise projects involving multiple teams deploying to multiple servers. At […]
The headline of this post pains me but it’s true. Real agile approaches to software development will never replace the old and outmoded command-and-control approaches based on waterfall. Scrum, Kanban, XP, Lean, etc. will augment and improve waterfall approaches but never replace them. Here are two reasons for my pessimism. The Safe Choice Have you […]