Agile Development
March 20th, 2008by Jeremy Thomas
Since this is a blog that “covers the transparent enterprise”, I thought I might include a presentation I put together about SCRUM - a collaborative and transparent way to build software applications.
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March 22nd, 2008 at 2:52 am
Hi Jeremy,
I guess the challenge is with the initial project setup. Most clients in Australia are still in a Water Fall mind set… hard requirements, hard delivery milestones. The engagement model is perhaps where some agility is needed.. How do you scope requirements in slices, if you want to develop with agility the business needs to think in an agile manner. To me most organisations cannot even handle a simple slowly moving elephant Waterfall lifecycle let alone many moving parts in the agile methodology. So with agility is the benefit identifying requirements as you go or locking them down initially and building the system in parts.
The latter could get expensive if the initial requirements were to be revisited every iteration. On the other hand if you didn’t scope the intial baseline requirements and tried to solve them in slices you may hit some complex stuff in the midst of development…
Anyways great presentation…
March 22nd, 2008 at 4:49 pm
Hi Jeremy,
Great slide !!! I am already envisaging problems with the traditional waterfall model while working on the current RM project. The requirements are changing, and the scope is getting bigger. Your slide will come in handy for me to sell this to the team as well as mgmt in future project takings.
SCRUM looks like a good methodology to bridge that communication gap to address changing requirements/scope in projects.
March 24th, 2008 at 3:38 am
Mmmm I think I had a dream about that…
Reading the first half was like dejavu… :-p
When I think about large software projects trying to merge several silo’d development streams at the tail end of a project, it reminds me machine translation.
In machine translation the goal is to have the seamless conversion from one language to another, taking into account structural, semantic, dialectal differences. As you could relate to Jeremy (given your Spanish degree) this is an entire field of research on it’s own, one fraught with complexities.
The long winded point I am trying to make is this. Even though a project team may write in the same language, it doesn’t mean they are speaking the same dialect. We distribute use cases to teams and ask them to code them. What results is a multitude of subtly different modules that cannot “communicate” with each other.
What I like about SCRUM, is the way it redefines methodologies like RAD into more managable chunks. Manageable chunks overseen by one figure head (theoretically) divoid of allegiance, resulting in more usable, deliverable code speaking the same dialect. The end result of which is something that is more cohesive and maintainable.
March 25th, 2008 at 2:45 am
Jeremy, excellent presentation! I might steal your format.
However, your example user story setup is missing the WHY. It should be…
“AS A consumer I CAN upload and play videos on the website SO THAT I can share them with a global audience.”
@Sadi
at Renewtek we’ve been pretty good at getting clients to use Scrum and there are some good methods for getting them to move towards Scrum in baby steps (including a large bank).
March 25th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
Hi Jeremy,
Great presentation. Any chance you’d be willing to share this in a more portable format?
March 25th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Scratch that…. found it here: http://www.slideshare.net/jgrahamthomas/scrum-307121/download
Thanks!
March 25th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Hi,
I liked alot of the presentation but I felt the lack of visual aids limiting the ability to get some of the key aspects of Agile / Scrum accross. You need to include the scrum diagram within the presentation to allow viewers understand the flow / process a little better.
I am working in Australia and have had my first true agile contract in place. Agile and Scrum are taking off in Australia, two of the top 4 banks in Australia have coaching arrangements with myself to assit in agile transitioning ( in Scrum ). And if the financial sector is taking on Scrum it is close to becoming mainstream.
I have also had more converstations with senior management then developers into the introduction of agile concepts. The bottom up approach is not as common in 2008.
Regards,
Martin.
March 25th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
@Jay agreed, the “WHY” is important. Glad to hear you’re having success with Scrum. I don’t know why I’m always surprised to hear of Australian companies being in the forefront when it comes to adopting things like Scrum and Enterprise 2.0. Guess they’re not as traditional as everybody thinks.
@Martin glad you found the download link, and thanks for the link to my blog!
March 26th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
I LIKED the lack of visual aids. It makes the whole thing feel like a teaser (which it is).
It does need some sort of climax between slide 41 and 42 (which could be the ONLY visual aid or animation). 42 seems to start a dénouement.
March 28th, 2008 at 7:40 pm
Very nice presentation overall - tiny little niggle tho - slide 33 says that Scrum Masters estimate users stories?
The team estimates the user stories in a collaborative fashion, but not the Scrum Master. The team commits to the work so they estimate its complexity.
Cheers,
Eben
March 29th, 2008 at 10:46 pm
Liked the presentation, as it’s pretty easy to get through
I think the other great advantage we’ve found using scrum is the shorter feedback loop. Requirements will never be 100% right, as people have trouble envisaging systems, plus there’s a level of interpretation that means you won’t always get what you expect.
March 31st, 2008 at 8:33 pm
@Jay Jenkins,
I agree with the Method and its great to hear Renewtek is driving leading edge methods and technologies. One of the strongest points Scrum made for me was the importance of delivering something to the client rapidly.