The concept of continuous improvement is to stop, pause, reflect, and make small adjustments for the team to improve. But are retrospectives really enough for your teams to improve sprint to sprint? What if your best retrospective still doesn’t yield the results desired and doesn’t move your team out of first gear? What often happens is a narrow view from a team’s perspective on the last sprint or retrospectives don’t provide enough coverage on the broader topics beyond the last iteration.
Simply put, retrospectives are no longer enough!
Join Craig and Michael as they both share their experience and taking your teams to the next level!
Thanks to Craig Smith and Michael Huynh for a constructive session where we learned more about retrospectives and the concept of practice and continuous improvement through methodologies as Micro- Retros, Team health Retros, and double-loop learning. @SummitAgile#CertiProfpic.twitter.com/ajclrIynUD
Communities of practice are about building knowledge, giving people support networks they need to give them the confidence to do their jobs well and making that practice better and as good as it can be
Most communities of practice are organic but they tend to be closed and often lack direction
After chasing him across the east coast of Australia, Craig sits down with Jeff Patton at YOW! Conference in Sydney. Along the way they fail to remember the subtitle of Jeff’s “User Story Mapping” book and talk about:
Art school dropout to software developer to early Extreme Programming
My presentation from Agile 2011 that I delivered with Greg Smith called “Agile 2.0: Rebooting a Raccoon in an Imperfect World” is available on Slideshare.
On this 10th anniversary of agile, our community is struggling to address the issue of how to take experienced agile practitioners to the next level, while still providing training and tools to support those who are beginning their journey. With the “agile” word getting so overloaded, the challenge is to continually innovate without assigning labels. In this talk we will discuss how to use the best of traditional, lean and agile methods to suit any team and showcase numerous patterns that demonstrate the best process to use is often a mixture of traditional practices and new innovations.
Some of the comments on Twitter included:
@teradee: watching @smithcdau speak on “rebooting the racoon. Craig has this stuff nailed. A bright spot in our community #agile2011
@teradee: Listening to @smithcdau talk a on the Oath of Non-Allegiance via @TotherAlistair Thinking this needs more shine #agile2011
@theagilepirate: Look up the manifesto manifesto – we have enough manifestos Kumquat, raccoon is a community #agile2011
@codingbynumbers: @smithcdau gives birth to #racoon at #Agile2011 (but we know it was conceived on @codingbynumbers)! http://t.co/CyvgOer
Scaling Software Agility: Advanced Practices for Large Enterprise
Dean Leffingwell is the author of Scaling Software Agility (which was written in 2006 and, in his own words, the world has changed since then) as well as Agile Software Requirements (which is really about portfolio management). Dean presented this session, a copy of his presentation is available here.
scrum is designed for small teams and makes no claims for scale
scale might not work, you can make it work
economics and technology have changed to make agile work
Not everything is a user story:
user stories came from XP, builds the user right into the requirement
lots of teams have their own stories in their own sprints
if something is in the backlog we might do it, if it is not in the backlog we won’t do it, anything that needs to be done goes in the backlog
best code comes from XP shops – it’s a form of hygiene, like brushing your teeth
the user story model lacks context – the things around it
at enterprise scale you have a large, large amount of stories but how do you reason about that and get the context
we need an additional level of planning – features which get decomposed into stories
features need to fit into potentially shippable increments as well, because they need to ship
stories need to get tested, as do features and non-functional requirements
use epics to describe features that are too fine grained at the enterprise level – may be implemented over long periods, even years
investment themes represent the budget allocations that drive the authority – at a program level figure out your epics that make up 17% of the budget, for instance
Think agile programs, not just agile teams – manifesto does not mention teams at all
there are lots of teams in the enterprise
need to train everybody, but that is slow and expensive
regular release train, build it this way even if if the customer / factory is not ready for fit
change value system from plan driven to value/vision driven – move from Clarity driven estimates which we then fix to fixing a date which we strive to meet
in software industry we always miss dates, build credibility by meeting dates
most teams are overly optimistic
quality needs to be built in, but features need to be variable
everyone needs to be on the train – waterscrumming does not work
hindsight brings us perspective
cadence alone is not enough – worst nightmare is not the facts but the false sense of security that you are going to deliver
slowest component drags the train – if you have a VP of system integration you are already screwed
make sprints the same length – two weeks is a good cadence, three weeks is too long, you can’t figure out when you should start testing
have regular system wide integration – use PSI (potentially shippable increment) to ensure you have a product, use hardening sprints for the things you can’t do in a normal sprint and let the team catch up
release train process – when you have an asset that adds customer value, ship it or ensure you have a asset that you could ship – it could save you with large maintenance renewals
pacemaker is release planning – need a full day or two for release planning – if you can’t spare that then plan badly – also gives us full alignment, a good point to get the architects involved because at this point you can make a change – plan using stories because that is the teams currency
scrum gave us a framework for sprints – plan and commit on day 1, execute for 8 days, demo and retro on day 10
at enterprise level raise this to the PSI level – plan and commit at the program level and demo and retro together at the end, sprints at team level in between (a program is usually 5-10 teams)
do a one week all in training for the team and then fire straight into release planning – then coaching is in context – don’t have good experiences with teams that go ahead without coaching support
take into account that your first sprint will be a little rough
Enterprise systems require intentional architecture – it matters!
refactoring is part of agile, list on the wall and get the product owner to stand by them, but it doesn’t scale very well
architecture can emerge, you can’t always plan for it
principles of system architecture are important
the architect needs to be part of the team to succeed
the team owns the design of the system, gives them accountability – design spike is our currency for architecture and it needs to be demoed
sometimes we need architectural epics – architectural epic kanban system
Portfolio management must be agile too – the mothership of all impediments!
PMO is governing us to a model we have abandoned, yet we created it in the first place
need to move from a portfolio of projects to a backlog of content management
need to move from cost estimation to velocity estimation and planning – so estimate your releases and epics in points too, not in dollars or hours
the team manages a project, not a traditional PMBOK manager
Overall, there was nothing really new in this session for me, although it was great to hear from Dean directly, especially on the topic of PMO’s and leadership. His latest book is still on my list to read.
Removing Impediments with Drawings
Carlton Nettleton led this interactive session, the instructions and agenda of the session is available here.
A drawing is more memorable, particularly when related to a story, helps your audience visualize your message, pictures drawn by a human are better than those drawn by a computer because they look too perfect
SQVID is a metaphor of how to draw pictures. Are you drawing:
simple or elaborate pictures
quality vs quantity
vision vs execution
individual vs compare
change vs status quo
Imagine:
discuss why you are imagining
draw simple
don’t overwhelm by drawing too much
iteration and refinement
think outside the box
Show:
focus on the audience
feedback
evolution – start, middle, end
outside perspective
drawing is only for support
This was a very hands on session, and the charts that we used in the exercises were very good templates that I will recall and use in future. The takeaway for me was to draw pictures in real time more to illustrate and get engagement for my message. I will also take another closer look at Dan Roam’s book.
Agile 2.0 – Rebooting A Raccoon In An Imperfect World
in lean 99% of behaviors are driven by the system – people were driven by the situation at hand
focus on behaviors not values or judgements
Formula:
be specific on timeframes eg yesterday
your observed behavior
perceived impact
recommendation or suggested solution
make it a conversation – set aside time such as feedback frenzy Friday
give feedback earlier, not just at annual review time
create safety – “is now a good time”, not a public theme but in private
seek clarifications – apply the five why’s to feedback
say thanks for feedback at the end – appreciate being helped to grow
take action on the feedback
Overall I have always found Patrick’s writing on retrospectives helpful, however there was little new in the presentation for me.
After Dark
Wednesday night was the Sponsor Reception, where the prime aim was to get to every booth and get a sponsor stamp (the real rule was to get one stamp per page, but it was far more fun ensuring I visited every booth!) One of the amusing things in Salt Lake City was that they do not take themselves too seriously, as evidenced by this beer.
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