Agile development

Overheard - Pigs and chickens

People who are not committed to the project and are not accountable for deliverables at the meeting do not get to talk. They are excess overhead for the meeting. They might be called eavesdroppers if you don’t like chickens. Whatever we call them it should have a negative connotation because they tend to sap productivity. Jeff Sutherland, SCRUM: Pigs and Chickens

Today’s WhatIs.com Word of the Day is pigs and chickens.

Overheard - Defining kanban for programmers

“We in the software community are new to kanban, and it is easy to get a bit too enthusiastic, and unintentionally change the meaning of kanban when we discuss it.” Henrik Mårtensson, Defining Kanba

Kanban is used by in both lean and agile software development methodologies. Henrik explains that the kanban boards filled with sticky notes used by software developers are work-in-progress (WIP) kanban cards.

Scott Miller says

Each sticker or card represents a task at a small level - design login screen, develop reservation stored procedure, test login (the smaller the task the better). The stickers/cards may also be agile user stories. In addition, there are usually columns for “To Do”, “Active”, “Failed Test”, and “Complete”. There may also be columns for the different teams that are touching the task.

The task is moved along from one column to the next and everyone on the team can see what the status is and what task is due next, without everyone needing a copy of Microsoft Project on their PC’s (not that there’s anything wrong with that…). This also empowers the development team to be a “pull” system. A developer can pull a card from the “To Do” column and work on it. The project manager can see what the status is at any moment.

Kanban - a way to visualize bottlenecks in your software development project

A Kanban Board shows the current status of all the tasks to be done within this iteration. The tasks are represented by cards (Post-It Notes), and the statuses are presented by areas on the board separated and labeled ToDo, Doing, and Done. This Kanban Board helps the team understand how they are doing well as well as what to do next and makes the team self-directing. Kenji Hiranabe, Visualizing Agile Projects using Kanban Boards

Today’s WhatIs.com word of the day is Theory of Constraints.  It’s an approach to systems management that can be used by anyone in just about any type of management field.

Let’s say you have a very simple system where components  A + B + C + D = Output.   In the 1950s, the conventional American approach would be to make sure that each component in the system was optimized to its fullest so that the total output would also be optimized to its fullest.  (Component A would be optimized, componenent B would be optimized, etc.)

The Theory of Constraints proposes that you should forget about trying to optimize each part of the system.  Instead, you should look at the system holistically and identify the weakest component in the system.  The weakest component — the constraint — will determine, ultimately, how successful the entire system is.

A constraint is a bottleneck.  It impairs or stops throughput.  Because the bottleneck ultimately rules the sucess of the entire system, THAT is what you should place your attention.  The Theory of Contraints proposes that every working system has at least one bottleneck but no more than three (or the system wouldn’t work at all).

So the question becomes, how do you identify the bottleneck?  In a manufacturing plant, you might be able to physically see the bottleneck — it might be a machine that’s backed up.  But what if the system is distributed or the one you’re managing is knowledge-based?  That’s where Kanban comes in.

Kanban is Japanese for “card.”  In manufacturing, it’s a sign or signal in an inventory control system. As supplies are used up, new supplies are requested simply by sending a re-order Kanban card to the supply point. The new supplies are being “pulled” instead of being “pushed” a la Lucy and Ethel at the candy factory.

Agile software development teams have adopted kanban as a way to track progress and identify bottlenecks in the development process.  It’s a pretty common practice to see big sticky-note charts on a wall of a project room.  Now you know the name for those charts — kanban.  And the part of the chart where the sticky notes are jammed up together and overlapping? That’s a visual representation of a constraint.

David J. Anderson explains how he uses kanban to identify bottlenecks and manage software engineering projects.

Overheard: Agile project managers must be xenodochial

Most agile coaches move around from team to team and need to fit in with different groups. Not only do they have to be approachable by different people, but they also have to ensure that what they say and how they act doesn’t work to exclude people. Patrick Kua, The Agile Coach, from A to Z

Agile Development Glossary

Alex Howard created a handy glossary for business owners who want to learn how to speak Agile to their PMO.

Overheard: Advantage of agile development

“One of the truly great advantages agile development has over traditional waterfall projects is in team dynamics. There is far more interaction and communication between disciplines. Just being on the project at the same time is an advantage over “throw it over the wall” processes.” Jeremy D. Miller, A Taxonomy of Tests

Overheard: DBAs and developers

“That we DBAs and Oracle developers frequently come across as grumpy old men (and women) who oppose change and who want the IT world to remain the same as it was in the 1980s is partly our fault. And honestly, isn’t there some truth to it?” Sandy Mamoli (Nomad8), Bridging the gap between DBAs and developers

Sandy writes: One of the things I have learnt from the development community are agile methods which certainly aren’t the answer to all problems but which represent an honest and intelligent attempt to improve our systems by applying an empiric approach which is based on reality rather than wishful thinking about how things should be. For me those methods are worth to be looked into and to be tried in real life.