Scrum and the Definition of Ready

Here is a slideshare from Ken Power as http://SystemAgility.com/ that is helping me to understand and implement a "Definition of Ready" for my teams

Definition of Ready (XP2011) from Ken Power

In short, a defined "Definition of Ready" helps a Scrum (or Kanban) team push back if stories are promoted for development without enough information to begin that development.

Agile Manifesto

Today's tools post shares the Agile Manifesto.

This simple manifesto, along with 12 principles that accompany it, have had a fantastic impact on my industry (Information Technology).  I urge you to memorize and understand these agile values, and apply them to your business and personal life.

Start at the Top

I often see people jump into agile by trying scrum, or kanban, or crystal clear.  The critical step that they miss is to understand the overriding values of agile.  The values expressed in the agile manifesto.  Start your agile journey by studying the agile manifesto!  If you are on your journey, refer to the manifesto often.

Sign On

Find the manifesto at www.agilemanifesto.org and consider becoming a signatory.  I signed a few years ago, when I started my agile journey.  I just finished training for my PMI-ACP (Agile Certified Professional) certification and it was fun and refreshing to get back to first values when we studied the manifesto.

5 steps to agile success - webinar link

CA Technologies and ProjectManagement.com offered up an embed code for the just-finished webinar "5 Steps to Agile Success."  I watched the live version and I think the content is very good.  This is also one of my first experiences with "BrightTalk.com" and it seemed very smooth.

Enjoy the Webcast (and claim your PDUs)

Webinar - 5 Step to Agile Success - 1 PDU

Andy Jorden from ProjectManager.com hosts this webinar on March 7th.  Free PDU and could be awesome content!

Scaling Scrum

Mike Cohen published a nice article about "Advice on Conducting the Scrum of Scrums Meeting" a the Scrum Alliance site.  He offers a nice agenda for Scrum of Scrums that looks something like this:

1. What has your team done since we last met?
2. What will your team do before we meet again?
3. Is anything slowing your team down or getting in their way?
4. Are you about to put something in another team’s way?

Mike also stresses scheduling extra time to work issues that arise in the Scrum of Scrums meeting.   Here is a link:

http://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/46-advice-on-conducting-the-scrum-of-scrums-meeting/

Agility in a Fixed-Price Environment

Just finished listening to a PMI Recorded Webinar:

"Achieving Agility in a Fixed-Price Environment"

Jesse Fewell, PMP, CST

PMI Agile Community of Practice (ACP)

PMI-ACP Support & Certification

1 .25 PDU, Category A

On PMI.org – use Search Box to find

Great presentation!

Key Takeaways:
Agile is used for traditional projects in traditional environments.  (Yes, it is a discipline recognized by PMI)

• People can get tangled up in “traditional” terminology and forget other ways of expressing the same thing
• Agile Story Point is equivalent to traditional FeatureStory Point cost and time are equivalent to Feature cost and time

Jesse talks about renegotiation with a client who wants more “stuff” (my word).  My interpretation of his process is:

1.      Arrange schedule and costs by Story Points

2.      Manage Scope Creep by  calculating impact of new Story Points

3.      Manage changes to scope and schedule by adding costs per story point or removing story points

Sound familiar?

Enjoy!

Charles

Fun - A Cynical Agile and Scrum Dictionary

Dave H. posted a link to this fun dictionary in LinkedIn's Scrum Practitioners group.

http://www.yuriy-zubarev.com/blog/2012/04/24/cynical-agile-scrum-dictionary.html?goback=.gde_52030_member_115484624

Some highlights:

xDD Family of Methodologies

1. a choir made up of prophets each singing their own hymns

Enterprise Agile

1. an oxymoron

Agile Certification

1. a pilot license that both an eagle and an elephant can easily obtain

 

The Agile Manifesto

It's been a while since we've talked Agile and Scrum.  AboutProjectManagement.com has embraced Scrum in a big way.  One of the things you need to know about Agile is "The Agile Manifesto."

Here is the text of The Agile Manifesto:

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

We are uncovering better ways of developing
software by doing it and helping others do it.
Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items on
the right, we value the items on the left more.

Find the Agile Manifesto at http://agilemanifesto.org/ and sign it if you agree . . .

Jean Tabaka's Keynote - PDU Opportunity

We've been exploring simplicity - today I watched a keynote discussing complexity theory in agile organizations.  The Keynote is offered on the InfoQ site and is worth 45 minutes of your time.  Here is the link:  Keynote:  Applying Design Thinking and Complexity Theory in Agile Organizations.

 and here is my favorite image from the keynote:

This graphic is awesome and deserves some research and a post of its own - I'll put that on my to do list.

Don't forget to claim 1/2 PDU if you take the time to watch this :)

Why Scrum? Listen to Joe tell us about Team WikiSpeed

Why use Scrum?  Here's why.  In this video, from TEDx Rainier, Joe Justice applies current software development principles to manufacture, achieving extraordinary results in designing a high efficiency and high performance automobile.  These principles include Scrum (My current focus) and other agile techniques.

Very inspirational!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8jdx-lf2Dw

Hat Tip to Scott Dunn at the Big Visible Solutions blog