Practicing agile theory

Here I discuss the curious case of mixing story points and person days and using them synonymously, not understanding what a monumental difference it is, in terms of arriving at a schedule using the two. While the team is using T-Shirt sizing (or planning poker) to come up with a backlog size in Story Points, they are using the words "Story Points" and "Person Days" interchangeably. As a prologue to my previous post https://practicing-agile.blogspot.com/2019/08/when-you-equate-story-points-with-time.html - the objective in this one is to find the answer to the question -  "How does a backlog estimate in terms of Story Points translate to how long will it take for the team to deliver the backlog, given that requirements, technology and a lot of various other factors influencing estimates are bound to change?" In other words, if the backlog size is 120 Story Points, its equivalent to saying that the backlog is worth 120 PDs of work! A derivatio...

Agile becomes fragile! When you are "doing" agile (most likely because it's in vogue) but have not come out of the "sequential " SDLC execution syndrome or the traditional waterfall way of thinking and executing a project, you are most likely headed for a disaster! Of many things that may or will go wrong, is the estimation of work . The traditional methods of estimation like function-point analysis helped us answer the question - "how long (or duration) will a piece of work take to complete?". On the contrary, Agile keeps it simple and takes a minimalistic approach to estimation. In my opinion, estimation in agile is no rocket science as long as you are clear with the basics and understand "what story points are" and how to use them. Visit my blog post on story points for an understanding. Story Points vs. Time (Person Days) Mike Cohn shares a mantra that makes estimation easy - " Estimate size, measure velocity, derive ...

I n my earlier post , I discussed about self-organization/spontaneous order as a process, its trigger and the result of self-organization. In this process of self-organization, I also mentioned about "collective animal behavior" and the emergent properties of groups formed as an outcome of this behavior.   In this post, I go further to discuss about the formation of this group of animals and what's so special about it in a "non-homosapien" context. Allelomimesis: The act of any groups of animals swarming together in unison appearing as one m ulti-individual creature is a behavioral process known as ' allelomimesis '. The flight pattern emerging out of self-organization has multi-fold advantages for birds: The most obvious being that since each bird is slightly behind the next, all the birds can see the lead bird, and the bird immediately in front and to the side, allowing them to coordinate their flight paths and not cr...

I start this blogpost with a visual illustration of what I had seen and captured in my "then new" Nikon D750 (Full Frame) , as an excellent real-life example of self-organization. Picture credit: "Lightnlens Fotographie" by Jasdev Singh| Web: www.lightnlens.net Self-organization , also called spontaneous order (in the social sciences ), is a process -  where some form of "overall order " arises from local interactions between parts of an "initially disordered " system . The process is spontaneous , NOT needing control by any external agent.  Trigger for self-organization: It's often triggered by random fluctuations , amplified by positive feedback . The resulting organization is wholly decentralized and distributed over all the components of the system. Such an organization is typically robust and is able to survive or self-repair substantial perturbation.    “Collective animal behavior ” is a form ...

An analogy - Ever thought of how Agile scrum could very closely be compared with a "road trip" that almost everyone must've taken sometime in their lifetime? In arriving at the destination ( Product ), there's a lot that goes into the journey -  the Scrum Team must have visibility ( Vision, Roadmap ) to start with, along with an awareness of the road conditions ( Project Transparency ).  That said, the team must have an understanding of traffic/driving rules ( Scrum Processes ) and the vehicle chosen for the trip, should be in a good working condition ( Dev Environment ). With those as prerequisites to begin - The driver must have the knowledge of the route/directions to get to the destination ( Knowledge/Expertise/Competence of developers ). In addition, the driver must have enough fuel ( Motivation ) to get the journey started & keep it going until the team has arrived at the destination ( Product ). While the above sounds simple, during the j...

The agile game called "Solve the puzzle" This is a simple game that teams using Agile can play to understand values and principles. Needless to say, the scrum master is the "facilitator" and a keen observer.  Below are some key points I'd like to share about this puzzle game - it takes 5 mins. of preparation for the scrum master game ideally finishes in 15 minutes; it should not take longer than that while the game is played by teams, the scrum master's role is to facilitate, observe and take note of the observations Prep work required: 10 mins. max The SM needs printout of 3 images (color prints would be better but procuring that is a challenge, even black & white prints are just fine). To add to a little complexity in the game, you can choose to use images where the subject is the same - just placed differently. Below is what I used as pictures for the game - If you observe closely, ...

Well, by now I’m sure you must’ve understood about the topic of the post and what it is all about – servant leadership of course! One of the attributes of a scrum master is “being a servant leader”. But what are the attributes/actions that qualify a scrum master to be called a servant leader. Let’s look at some of them below – Serving others and not yourself; in other words, selfless management of team members Being a servant means you do not or should not command others. On a lighter note, does your housecleaner/household help ever give you instructions regarding what to do? No right?   Let go of the command and control that our traditional managers are used to exercise as part of their role, in your journey to become a scrum master.   Leading by example & helping people develop and perform as high as possible Think of the Scrum Master as a personal trainer who helps you stick with an exercise regimen and perform all exercises with the correct fo...