Author Archives: Aaron Sanders
My response for a Project Manager trying to improve the use of Agile
tl;dr A Project Manager asks me at the end of a class how best to show progress in Agile projects, since phases can’t be checked off complete. My questions for him are: can measures like lead time, throughput, and defect rates be measured across any type of project? What tools are used to track the work from larger goals and initiatives through to smaller stories and tasks? He decided to have the tool vendors used demonstrate full system capabilities, from portfolio management to daily task tracking.
Certified ScrumMaster Slides Now Available
Certified Scrum Master Course from Aaron Sanders The following is a little story of how I came up with flow to this deck. And what you won’t find in it.
Making changes to Project Management during an Agile transition
What can you change right now At the end of my Certified Scrum Master class I ask people to reflect on what resonated with them in the class and come up with something to try at work tomorrow to make a little positive change. This last time as people went through their notes, wrote ideas down for action and discussed with others, a couple of people came up to run things by me.
43 Ironbark Road
Our house from February to June, 2007. I’m trying to save this off as iGoogle is shutting down. I had a Google map widget to with this address to remind me what it was. Decided to store it here, along with the stories of our trip. Glad it came to me to save it here as I never thought I’d be posting in this category again. Oh.. and the embed isn’t working for me in Safari, although it is in Chrome. View Larger Map
The Weather Channel Lean UX Case Study Now Available
On September 17, 2013 Jeff Hutkoff and I presented a case study on a travel feature made for the iPhone application. Special thanks to Jeff Gothelf from Neo and Lauren Cramer from UIE for organizing the event.
Ten Tales of Positive Change – Conclusion and Acknowledgements
What do all of these tales have in common? They started out as an idea that led to a small change. These changes could be implemented easily, cheaply and quickly when there was complete buy-in from everyone that the change was necessary and for the better. Of course, I didn’t always find myself in a better place. One result had us building a product that became attractive for an acquisition, while our related labor cost did not. Many of us lost our jobs to promote the sale. Another consequence of success was having a senior executive in our organization determine … Continue reading
Allowing for Cross-Functional Teams
A home entertainment provider called me in to facilitate User Story writing followed by release planning. The business unit had not tried either activity before. Leadership had been replaced and the new General Manager and Vice President of Technology decided to invest in the group’s burgeoning Scrum effort. The organization followed a structured work breakdown approach with tasks functionally derived. People were willing to approach product definition in an Agile way and wanted to experiment with User Stories. We discussed the vertical nature of Stories and that teams were formed orthogonally, based on the architectural stack. A few people pointed … Continue reading
Finding Predictability in the Velocity
Being an independent contractor is exciting yet somewhat lonely, having to support myself and find every opportunity. I look to constantly improve my craft by finding others to collaborate with and have found those needs met by joining Rally. I now concentrate on improving my coaching and training practice with other coaches. We have a support system around us and I get to work with people who have different strengths and skills. One of the clients I work with is a networking company. One of the teams I worked with had a difficult time establishing a consistent velocity. Forecasting when … Continue reading
Figuring Out How to Construct Teams
After the Agile coaching group shut down at Yahoo!, I decided to take a chance at being an independent coach. I quickly found work with a network management group. The business unit consisted of over 70 people, mostly working in San Jose and Bangalore. The Vice President of the technology group wanted to “burn all the ships”, and hoped this no retreat attitude would help the team convert to Scrum within a quarter. I spent over nine months with the business unit. Creating the Initial Teams To begin Scrum, the managers created three large teams along architectural boundaries and HR … Continue reading
Gauging the Rate of Progress
An interesting pattern was revealed to me. I noticed it in my embedded team and with other teams who asked for help. Product Backlogs were not being estimated. Teams were not estimating in points, days, nor even time. It is unclear what led to this lack of discipline. A consequence of teams not being able to say when something might be done resulted in other people setting deadlines for those teams. Playing the Team Estimation Game Demand for coaching was high and we were always being called in to situations. In looking around if I found a backlog with hundreds … Continue reading