Agile Project Metrics
Published December 16th, 2009 Under Project Management | Leave a Comment
Project managers new to agile methods often have questions about how to track progress on agile projects. Some of the traditional measures don’t line up very naturally with agile thinking and agile practices. The presentation shows how to project realistic completion dates based on empirical observations based on Velocity for iterative methods and on Cumulative Flow for non-iterative methods.
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/agile-project-metrics
Effective Pairing: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Published April 23rd, 2009 Under Coding, General, Open Source Tools | Leave a Comment
Pairing can be a highly effective practice that adds significant value to a project, or it can be a disaster whose cost far exceeds managers’ fears that they are just paying two people to do the work of one. In the worst case, you won’t get the work of one out of the two. They might even do damage that others have to clean up later. The challenge lies in the fact that working as a pair demands a level of attentiveness, collaboration, and continuous focus that working solo just doesn’t require. We want to demonstrate some of the behaviors that can undermine the value of pairing, solicit audience feedback about their own experiences and observations, and explain how and why pairing works or doesn’t work. This session was first presented at Agile 2008, where a group of four people rehearsed and acted out “bad pairing” scenarios. In this case, the scenarios have not been rehearsed. Participants in the session will be asked to come forward to act out scenarios with the facilitator. Participants may also suggest scenarios based on their own experiences. Together, we will discuss approaches to correcting the unproductive pairing behaviors.
Agiles 2008 – Final Discussion Panel
Published January 19th, 2009 Under General | Leave a Comment
Discussion panel at the end of the Agiles 2008 conference in Buenos Aires. The debate was around “The future of Agile”, featuring Mary and Tom Poppendieck, Tobias Mayer, Micah Martin, Matt Gelbwaks and Dave Nicolette.
Manager’s Introduction to Test-Driven Development
Published December 8th, 2008 Under Software Testing | Leave a Comment
Dave Nicolette and Karl Scotland try to introduce non-technical managers to one of the most popular Agile development techniques: Test-Driven Development (TDD). The presentation intends to be a primer for managers who want to understand the value of TDD, and of Agile in general, in software development.