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Tech Tips (Greenbar Redux)

What do the following have in common: Converse Chuck Taylors, bell bottoms, skinny jeans, the Mustang and the Camaro (both “greener” these days), John Travola, and greenbar paper? Each was once very popular, went out of fashion for a time, and has since made a fantastic comeback.

Question & Answers - Agile/Scrum for onshore/offshore hybrid model

1. What are the various methods to following Agile programming?

a. Extreme Programming

b. Scrum

c. DSDM

d. FDD

e. Crystal Clear

2. What is the fundamental difference between Traditional Waterfall model vs. Agile?

a. Water fall is plan driven while Agile is value driven.

Putting Data Management in its Proper Place (Part 2 of 2)

First, thanks to everyone for your feedback (both positive and constructively critical) of last week’s post; the interchange of ideas with other IT and business professionals might be the most rewarding part of my job. Last week I made the case that because Information, Knowledge, Understanding, and Wisdom are the decedents of Data, data management should be the first-order magnitude priority of every IT department.

Best practices for Agile/Scrum for onshore/offshore model - A Hybrid Model – Part II

In the previous article we discussed about Roles, Meetings, Processes, and Tools to use in our hybrid model. In this article we will briefly go over the do’s and don’ts that will get us moving in the RIGHT direction.

Do’s

• Offshore Scrum Master can be a traditional PM, but has to have a “Servant leader and Facilitator” mindset.

• For a new Scrum team, it is important to understand the ramp up time for resources, and various environment setup and continuous integration setup – before 1st Dev Sprint begins.

Best practices for Agile/Scrum for onshore/offshore model - A Hybrid Model – Part I

This article plans to cover various aspects with respect to onshore/offshore development using Agile/Scrum methodology. At a high level the article is expanded to include Roles, Meetings, Processes about the hybrid model.

Roles

Traditional Agile Scrum roles are as follows:

• Product Owner: This role defines features from a business standpoint and is the most knowledgeable person about the feature. This role also prioritizes these features on a active basis.

All Vendors Lie!

This was a bullet point in a presentation I was looking through the other day.   Since I work for a consulting company these days, the hairs on the back of my neck immediately stood straight up.  And then I thought about it a little bit, and I realized that the reason that I like working for Alliance so much is that we really don't consider ourselves a vendor to our clients.  We consider ourselves their partner.   That sounds like a pat comment, and one that every vendor would say, but it really is true.

The case for building a prototype

When we start a new software development project with a client, we like to recommend building a prototype as part of the requirements effort.  Especially if the project is to develop a brand new product or to do a major rewrite of an existing product.  But my experience has been that the prototype actually has benefits far past the requirements stage.   There are actually 3 key benefits that can be realized from building the prototype:

Do you know your Net Promoter Score?

As the IT industry as a whole matures, metrics are becoming increasingly important in order to track performance and determine organizational goals around quality and productivity.We spend a considerable amount of time at Alliance measuring what we’ve defined as the RightMetrics: items such as Schedule Variance, Resource Utilization and Defect Density.

Software development: a “recipe” for success

I read recently that custom software development is similar to a master chef creating a new recipe.  No one expects the chef to create a perfect new dish on his first attempt.  Instead, the chef frames an idea of how he wants the dish to turn out and then he experiments with ingredients until he finds the right combination to bring out the flavor he was looking for.  Similarly, in Agile development or even a hybrid Agile like Alliance practices, the process of creating a new software product is iterative.  Each iteration adds new features in an attempt to find the right mix for a releas

Why aren’t you measuring your ROI?

As I noted in one of my previous posts, ROI (Return on Investment) is a potential measure of project success, but it is one that is rarely used.  On the surface that seems odd because almost every company requires some definition of the ROI for a project before approving it.  Some companies are very rigorous in their process, requiring formal business cases, and insisting on a 1 year or less payback on their investment.  So why is it that, once the project is over, very few companies seem to go back and check on whether or not they received the ROI that they were expecting?