036-39_SDT017.qxp_Layout 1 10/23/18 1:17 PM Page 37
www.sdtimes.com
Central, an Agile software provider. “I am using the term Agile less and less in my conversations and I am having more conversations with organizations around evaluating the way they work, and how they are trying to change those ways of working to be more modern, responsive and adaptive,” she said. But how can you tell if things are falling apart and Agile is becoming stale or stagnant within your business? Stop and ask yourself what are your objectives and how are you tracking the results of those objectives, according to Atlassian’s Price. “Do people frequently no-show to your weekly meetings? Do projects languish in your ticketing system? Are you delivering reports that nobody reads? Are you going through all the rituals, but not feeling any better or faster?” he asked. Price experienced Agile going stale in one of his own teams when they became too busy to fill out reports on objectives and key results. “Months later, nobody asked what objectives we’d set, how we were tracking on our key results,” he explained. “So the next quarter, we just didn’t do them, and again, nobody noticed. It turns out that at that time, this initiative had become stale, and people were just going through the motions. If you take a look at your boards and meetings and project status updates, what insights are you gaining that lead to actions? If you’re just sharing words every week but never changing your behavior, you’re stagnating.”
How to avoid stagnant Agile As the software industry constantly evolves, so must the approaches we use to build software. With Agile still as the underlying motivator, businesses have come up with a number of new and modern ways to approach delivering software: Back to the basics: It is not a new concept, but it is good to go back to the basics to make sure you understand the values and tenets of Agile. For instance, Agile isn’t just about moving faster, it is about putting the customer at the center of all your decisions, choices and thinking, CA’s Mason explained. Remember to start small, get it right
November 2018
SD Times
The four values of the Agile Manifesto David DeWolf, founder and CEO of 3Pillar Global, a software development company, explained that businesses find themselves stuck because they have lost sight of the true meaning of Agile and why the movement started in the first place. When we become too focused on just doing Agile for the sake of doing Agile, we become too focused on executing practices that are defined as Agile practices without remembering why they are good Agile practices in the first place, 3Pillar’s DeWolf explained. “Without understanding the values of Agile, you won’t be able to deliver on the promise of flexibility and react to change as you hoped for,” he said. To get back to its core meaning, he suggested revisiting the Agile Manifesto. While the four principles have been around since 2001 and are widely known, they are often overlooked. “If we go back and look at the manifesto, it was supposed to be something that was at the center of everything we do, but it hasn’t been,” said Shannon Mason, vice president of product management for CA Agile Central, an Agile software provider. “What does it look like to truly have the user or different types of personas we serve at the center of our decisions when we are making product application David DeWolf, founder and decisions and choices versus just doing everything on a whim or using our gut to CEO, 3Pillar Global make decisions?” As a reminder, the Agile Manifesto states: “We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. Through this work we have come to value: 1. Individuals and interactions over processes and tools 2. Working software over comprehensive documentation 3. Customer collaboration over contract negotiation 4. 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.” z
and leverage that small team as an example for the rest of the organization, according to David DeWolf, founder and CEO of 3Pillar Global, a software development company. “Be nimble. Start small. Instead of trying to turn the crew ship, turn the little boat,” he said. Get a team up and running that truly understands the values, buys into the principles, and then put the practices into play, he explained. In addition, establish clear objectives, according to Andrey Mihailenko, co-founder and co-CEO of Targetprocess, a project management software provider. “Put team members together in the same room, at the same time and actually have an open conversation regularly about how well the business is doing,” he said. Outcomes versus outputs: Measure the results or business values, not
just the amount or speed of software you produced, according to Mason. To do this, focus on metrics and understand what those metrics mean in terms of the business. If you are truly looking at people over process, you’ll ask, “What does your customer satisfaction look like? How much feedback are you receiving? And are you building the right things?” according to cPrime’s Irani. Focus more on the leading indicators rather than the lagging indicators, continued on page 38 >
37