SDT Agile Implementation: Sprint 1 completed!

Kaizania is currently coaching the adoption of Agile and the implementation of Scrum at SDT Financial Software Solutions.

The coaching started with Strategic planning where the management was involved in establishing the problem statement and evaluated if Agile and Scrum will be the correct solution to address the problem.

Once agreed, SDT established that they will adopt Agile and Scrum within their Generic Solutions team, the team accountable for the core to their client systems.

Kaizania then trained the whole team and more from SDT at a SCRUM|interact team training day.

Then the real work started, the roles were defined, the backlog creation sessions commenced, the roadmap breadth were discussed, the existing client requests were converted into stories, a Product Steering Council/Scrum-of-Scrums  were appointed to create and groom the Generic Solutions backlog and drive and direct the Generic Solutions development effort… truth be told, this was a mammoth effort and all completed in one week!

SDT truely embraced the Scrum implementation rule of “Don’t wait for the perfect time, start now!” They survived for the better… they completed their 1st Sprint with huge success and established their first velocity tracking point!

The team did well, they embraced the change, some more than others, but they all gave it a go… they estimated, they actively participated in the ceremonies, they planned, they designed the stories and broke them down into tasks and they communicated effectively on all levels, even forcing themselves to communicate better once the realised in the middle of the sprint that they run the risk of not making the Sprint Goal!

Well, after all that, the team and the Product Owner this morning demonstrated their potentially shippable product increment for Sprint 1 to the rest of the organisation! And they did that with pride!

After all the excitement it was time to get serious as a team and conduct the retrospective… at first I was asked, why 2 hours for the retrospective, whereby I had to reply that this is their 1st retrospective, lets see if we can fill up 2 hours…

They did… and it was a wonderful 2 hours, the team continued to be upfront and honest to each other… a lot off good things were discovered and a lot of things to improve were discovered… now we need to assist them in resolving the issues which could be improved and make them realise the value of acting on what you need to improve!

Overall as coach I have to say, Well Done! A few weeks ago, all they could see was a dark hole of Agile and Scrum implementation, but they all got stuck into what they needed to do, everyone pulled together, and yes, there was and will be issues to discuss, things to improve, but the foundation is now in place to build upon!

Well done, SDT Generic Solution Scrum Team!

Kaizania Whitepaper: Project Management in a Changing World

The pace of change, change in all respects, is increasing every day. Industry, trade, financial markets, products, technology, society and all other aspects of human life are evolving more rapidly than ever before.

What is the status of Project Management, especially IT Project Management, as seen against the ongoing changes in our world? Is best practice in Project Management as understood over the past 20 years still best practice today?

Project Management is fundamentally about getting productive work done, and is therefore intricately linked to how work is performed. How has the way in which humanity works, i.e. produce goods and services, changed? How are these changes in turn impacting project management?

To answer these questions, we must start our journey hundreds of years ago…

Click to download the complete whitepaper… or mail us at agile@kaizania.co.za

Implementing Scrum: 10 steps to habit!

Kaizania recently presented at the Scrum User Group in South Africa on how to implement Scrum within an organisation…

As we help organisation adopt Agile and Scrum throughout South Africa combined with the fact that our own Custom Software Development area operates on Agile and Scrum, we obviously had our own views on how to implement Scrum. This however is still a very narrow view, and therefore we embarked on some research to see how the rest of the Agile and Scrum world would do it…

We had to agree that the most publisised Step-by-Step implementation on the web is the 10-step Scrum implementation guide…

We did agree with 90% of this guide, and therefore presented as such at the User Group… the presentation can be viewed at  http://www.slideshare.net/arriev/sugsa-event3-implementscrum

To extend this high-level presentation, we are going to cover all the details for every step in a series of articles…

Please follow these articles and comment as much as you want, as we would really like to understand the differences around us…

The 10-step process:

- Step #1: Get your backlog in order!

- Step #2: How to estimate your product backlog
- Step #3: Sprint Planning/clarify requirements
- Step #4: Sprint Planning/estimate tasks
- Step #5: Create a collaborative workspace
- Step #6: Sprint!
- Step #7: Stand up and be counted!
- Step #8: Track progress with a daily burndown chart

- Step #9: Finish when you said you would
- Step #10: Review, reflect, repeat…
 

Look out for a detailed post on step #1: Get your Backlog in order by the end of the week!

What is Scrum?

What is Scrum? The question we get from individuals, groups and organizations every day…

Recently, at the Scrum User Group meeting in Gauteng, Kaizania did a short presentation on what Scrum is…

Please feel free to view the slides at http://www.slideshare.net/arriev/sugsa-event3-whatisscrum

The summary is:

• Scrum is a framework
• Scrum is a value system
• Scrum is a process

Please feel free to add your comments and links to similar presentations, articles and your own personal opinion here…

Dependency management within Scrum?

How does one identify, manage and track dependencies within your Product Backlog using Scrum?

This question comes up time and again when adopting Scrum on an Enterprise level…

I found the following article, which in my opinion is very much on the point and does not try and hide the fact that when adopting Agile or Scrum, one does need to make a total break from traditional or Waterfall…

Would love to hear from others…

Article: http://agilecommons.org/posts/d716f33c6d

Dependency management in VersionOne: http://community.versionone.com/KnowledgeBase/FAQs/Q10112.aspx

Regards

Arrie