Agile

Conference Presentations

Agile Release Planning: When "You'll Get it When You'll Get It" Won't Sell

When some people hear the words "agile planning," they think it is an oxymoron. While more knowledgeable people think of agile planning as getting ready for one iteration of development, there is more to agile product planning than a single iteration. Although agile teams like to focus on one iteration at a time, what do we say when executive management asks questions like "What will this product actually do?" or “When will it be ready for the customer?" or "How much will it cost?" When the answer "You'll get it when you get it" just won't sell, you must perform high-level release planning to address these important questions. Stacia Broderick describes an agile release planning framework under which agile development can be effective. Stacia takes you through the complete process she recommends for release planning and explains, most importantly, why and how the agile release plan can and must remain just that-agile.
Stacia Broderick, Agile Evolution, Inc.
Balancing Agility with Discipline: The Citigroup Process

Agile practitioners are aware of the business benefits that can be derived from faster and more effective software delivery. At the same time, companies in many industries are facing increasing regulatory compliance issues. What do you do when you want to apply agile software development methodologies in an audited, validated industry? How do you get regulators, who want your software to work right and who have the force of the law behind them, to believe that it's all going to be OK using agile development? Eugene Levin describes the motivation for introducing an agile methodology framework to complement Citigroup's waterfall SDLC process, the challenges related to using a light-weight agile methodology in a regulated industry, the experience of defining Citigroup's Disciplined Agility process, and the lessons learned in piloting the company-wide adoption of agile development.

Eugene Levin, Citigroup
When Others Aren't As Agile As You Are

As agile software development methodologies take hold in the mainstream, organizations are finding that working with outside consultants poses a new set of challenges. In some instances, consulting organizations are able to work within an agile framework quite well. But in other situations, working with a consulting company can be more challenging than the project itself. Connecting outside consultants to your inside processes must be done. Consultants who are interested in, but not experienced with, agile will need an introduction and coaching. Consultants who aren't interested in changing their methodologies will need adaptive processes to match their approach with yours. Alicia Yanik describes how to work with vendors already under contract as well as how to contract with future vendors.

  • Adopting an agile methodology after project inception
  • Aligning consultant relationships with agile principles
Alicia Yanik, eBags
The Agile-Traditional Development Cooperative

In large organizations, it is simply not practical to just "flip a switch" and have your development department start doing full-on agile all at once. Newer agile teams and more traditional or waterfall teams find themselves having to work together during a long transition period or even permanently. Whether your agile-traditional project is dealing with waterfall-up-front (a project approval process), waterfall-at-end (separate system testing), or waterfall-in-tandem (products so complex that multiple teams work together to complete a release), Michele Sliger presents techniques she has used to make coexisting less painful and more productive. Find out the specific points in the project where agile and traditional teams must plan their work together. Learn the special techniques you can use to coordinate ongoing efforts of all participants and ways to review and understand each other's work patterns and artifacts.
Michele Sliger, Sliger Consulting
What Snake Oil Is Your Organization Buying Today?

As always, the snake oil bandwagons are circling your organization. But unlike snake oil, a purported health supplement of old, modern organizations bet their success on technologies with often equally dubious claims. Did your organization jump on the CORBA bandwagon? It's now dead. How about outsourcing? Have you discovered all the hidden costs and quality problems yet? Perhaps you were mesmerized by Extreme Programming-a fading religion that once had many believers but few actual practitioners. There are many other software religions with many practitioners but few real believers. Do you use sound business judgment in choosing your technologies and methodologies? Or do you choose it because you heard an impassioned presentation by a noted expert? Ungrounded choices based on testimonials place us squarely back in the days when snake oil salesmen crisscrossed the land.
James Coplien, Nordija A/S
Using Lean Thinking to Align People, Process, and Practices

The operational structure of many organizations fails to support their software development teams. Continuously creating and reforming teams, isolating development from the organization, lack of participation by customers, and rapid task switching cause huge amounts of waste in development. Although agile development practices have made great strides in the last ten years, they have largely ignored the issue of the structure of the organization. "Lean Thinking" is the shorthand phrase for the paradigm, thought processes, and principles that Toyota follows in producing high quality cars at low cost-with a faster development cycle than their competitors. Software development is not exactly like manufacturing, but the principles of Lean Thinking-optimizing the whole, eliminating waste, and respecting people-apply equally well to software development.
Alan Shalloway, Net Objectives
Preparing the Test Team to Go Agile

When we read about agile development, we find developers using nUnit for unit testing while customers are using FIT for acceptance tests. But where are the testers? You know--those folks who have years of experience in testing. Is there a place for testers in the agile world? Janet Gregory believes there is and shares specific things that you and your test team need to understand to effectively work within the agile context. It is important to adhere to the agile values and principles while improving the product's quality. For example, a heavy test planning process that requires knowing all the requirements up front and
developing thousands of test cases will not be acceptable. Janet will describe a lightweight process that is effective for all and discuss the handling of traditional testing processes such as defect tracking, reporting, and sign-offs.
Janet Gregory, DragonFire Inc.
STARWEST 2006: Improving the Skills of Software Testers

Many training courses include the topic of soft skills for testers, specifically their attitudes and behaviors. Testers are told that to be effective they need a negative mindset and a negative approach. Krishna Iyer challenges this belief. He believes testers must be creative rather than critical; curious rather than destructive; and empathetic rather than negative. Join Krishna as he leads exercises in mind mapping, systems thinking, and belief deconstruction to improve our eye's ability to perceive detail, our nose's ability to sniff out defects, and our brain's ability to discover. Finally, Krishna will list the beliefs that hinder testers and the beliefs that help and share how he has been successful in deconstructing some of these beliefs and inculcating new ones.

  • Hear the latest research in cognitive thinking
  • Learn practical techniques to improve testing skills
Krishna Iyer, ZenTEST Labs
A Tester's Role in Agile Projects

Some agile methodologists claim that testers are not needed in agile projects--all testing is done either by developers or users. Chris Hetzler has seen the effects of that approach, and they are not pretty. When customers find
bugs in large projects, the costs can be staggering. Chris believes that testers must be involved in agile projects at an even higher intensity since timelines are shorter and the risk of failure is higher. But Chris explains that testers' roles change and testers must be prepared for that change. In agile projects, the testers' role is one of quality engineer rather than the traditional product
Chris Hetzler, Microsoft
What Every Tester Needs to Know to Succeed in the Agile World

Agile methodologies may be coming soon to a project near you. Agile software development holds the promise of faster
development, less cost, fewer defects, and increased customer value, all while maintaining a sustainable work pace in a high morale environment. As a tester, you may be wondering, "How will agile affect me?" We've all heard stories that agile methodologies have no place for testers. In this presentation, Jean Tabaka changes that perspective. She will highlight the fundamental tenets of agile software development, the project management frameworks that support these tenets, and the engineering disciplines that naturally fit in these frameworks. For some testers, the agile approach can be a jolt to their longheld beliefs of how testing should be done. Jean will help you adapt to this new world by explaining how to make tests talk,
Jean Tabaka, Rally Software Development

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