Itag Jan09 Agile Coclarity

War StoriesExperiences applying Agile in many types of business

[email protected]

ITAGCairnes Business School, NUI Galway, Ireland.

22-Jan-2009

mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

Copyright © 2009 coClarity Ltd.

Overview

• Introduction

• Patterns, PLOPS and OOPSLA

• Scrum

• eXtreme Programming

• GTD and 4HWW

• Conclusion

2


Introduction

• 20-years SW experience

• Currently: coClarity, Limerick

• Intel, Basis & Tellabs, Shannon

• Digital, Galway

• Motorola, Cork, & USA

• QC-Data, Cork & Canada

3


Conclusion

• Great ideas cross boundaries between disciplines

• Software has Borrowed from Everywhere

• Agile techniques can be applied in any kind of business

• Customer Focus, Deliver Early & Often, Simplicity (Product & Plans), Self-Organising

4

Patterns, PLOPS and OOPSLA


Patterns

• Reusable solution to a common problem

• Borrowed from Architecture (Alexander)

• 1987 OOPSLA, Beck & Cunningham

• 1994, Gang of Four

6


PLOPs

• Pattern Languages of Programs

• Conferences Started 1994

• PLOP-2, paper on Episodes (Cunningham)

7


OOPSLA 98

• Birds-of-a-feather session

• 100s arrived

• One page handout of the key practices

• Diagram of how they related to each other

8

eXtreme Programming


Overview

• A light-weight methodology

• For small-to-medium-sized teams

• Vague or rapidly-changing requirements

• Values: communication, feedback, simplicity, courage and respect

10


Practices

• Quick Plan

• Small Releases

• Metaphor

• Simple Design

• Testing

• Refactoring

11

• Pair Programming

• Collective Ownership

• Continuous Integration

• 40-Hour Week

• On-Site Customers

• Coding Standards


A-La-Carte

• The books warn against taking an a-la carte approach

• We tailored it out of necessity

• Didn’t really use: Metaphor, On-site Customers

• Modified: Scrum for planning, Collective Ownership within Team

12

Pair Programming

Photo credit flickr.com/people/lucadex


Pair Programming our Experience

• The most controversial practice

• Some components pair programmed

• Lowest defect rates

• Smaller code sizes

• Small sample set

14


Pair Lessons Learned

• No Keyboard Wrestling, Large Fonts

• Think about neighbours

• No editor wars

• Set key objectives

• Not as useful during bug-fix phase

• Can be done remotely (gotomeeting)

15

Scrum


New New Product Development Game

• Article in Harvard Business Review 1986

• Study of companies in Japan & US

• Fuji-Xerox, Canon, Honda, NEC, HP, 3M

17


Six Characteristics

• Built in instability - broad challenging goal

• Self-organising teams

• Overlapping Development Phases

• Multilearning

• Subtle Control

• Organisational transfer of learning

18

Scrum

• Computer guys borrowed from “New New...”

• Called it Scrum

• I suspect they were never in a real Scrum

Photo credit flickr.com/photos/bohane/


Scrum Overview

• You can manage any kind of project with Scrum

• I’ve used on tiny and large projects

• Not rocket science or expensive (although an “industry” has popped up)

• It works & viral

20


“Opportunities”

• All projects have chickens and pigs

• Pigs are happy: no status reports or boring meetings

• Chickens are happy: they know what’s happening without getting in the way

Photo credit flickr.com/photos/7326810@N0821


The Theory

• Software engineering is complex adaptive system

• Traditional planning - illusion of control

• Empirical process not a “defined process”

• Complexity theory - better to do frequent samples and small adjustments

• Adaptability is better than predicability

22


The Team

• Should be small (6 max) - if bigger, split

• Ideally co-located (can work distributed)

23

The Project

Diagram by Lakeworks http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Scrum_process.svg

• Punctuated Equilibrium - balance team focus, management visibility, and adaptability

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Scrum_process.svg

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Scrum_process.svg


The Sprint

• Easier for team to focus on something a month away

• Daily short meetings

• At the end - write-up or demo

25


The Daily Meeting

• KISS - 15 minutes max, same time & place

• 3 questions

• what did you do? (binary - all or nothing)

• what roadblocks?

• what will you do by tomorrow?

• Everyone responsible for their own tasks

26

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Consequence of “Loads of post-its”

• Low effort - visualisation of progress

• Preparation is fast - post-its on monitors

• Occasional trips to the “big sheet”

• Not great for distributed teams

• 3M make loads of money

28


Planning

• More KISS

• No complex Gannt chart

• Plan is a series of sprints

• Dependencies only at a sprint level

• Can use sophisticated estimation techniques

• Shorter sprints at the start and end

29

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Planning - Sprint

• At the start check project plan & look at new backlog items

• Allocate to individuals - could use simple spreadsheet

• Efforts based on “ideal days”

• Inside/Outside end-date

• At the end: write-up, demo, release

31


The Big Chickens

• Start to trust it - less reporting needed

• Can show up at daily meetings - must remember they are chickens

• Can add new items to backlog

• Other possibilities - earned value, wide-band-delphi, comparison to estimates

32


Scrum Conclusion

• Simple, low-overhead, adaptable any kind/size project

• Everyone gets involved in planning and tracking, team “gells”

• The chickens can actually contribute

• Scrum was more sticky than eXP

33

GTD and 4HWW


GTD

• Getting Things Done

• A new cult for the info age - Wired

• Levels: Actions, Projects, Areas, Yearly, 5-Year, Life

• Collect, Process, Organise, Review, Do

35


Actions and Projects

• Action: always something that needs to be done first

• Each action has a context

• Project: requires more than one action

• Don’t need to plan projects in detail but define outcome

• Choose actions based on context

36


4HWW

• The 4 Hour Workweek

• 80/20 Rule

• Decide two meaningful things to accomplish

• Email twice a day

37

Conclusion


Common Patterns

• Bottom Up Planning (take care of days...)

• Simple Top Down Plan - it will change

• Adaptable more important than predictable

• Don’t Just React - Make Active Choices

• Feedback Loops

• Encourage self-organisation

39


Conclusion

• Great ideas cross boundaries between disciplines

• Software has Borrowed from Everywhere

• Agile techniques can be applied in any kind of business

• Customer Focus, Deliver Early & Often, Simplicity (Product & Plans), Self-Organising

40


Next StepsDecide what aspects you are interested in

Read about them on wikipedia

Read the paper: Fitzgerald, Hartnett “Agile inside Intel” (short.ie/uehtqv)

Try some of the Patterns even on your personal work

Consider trying Scrum with your team

41

coclarity

Thank You

42

SCRUM

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Itag Jan09 Agile Coclarity