What differentiates a successful software development culture?
Among successful cultures, what makes an agile one stand out?
We think successful software development cultures are ones that are not just performant but that both delight customers and are a joy for every team member to be part of.
One of the characteristics that differentiates agile cultures is that (finally!), it’s not just managers who are responsible for crafting culture - but everyone. And agile, done well, means every one of us engages in the crafting of it.
In addition to training teams in agile, Ron Lichty has spent years coaching managers about how their roles change with agile. While his recent Addison Wesley book, Managing the Unmanageable: Rules, Tools, and Insights for Managing Software People and Teams, didn’t zero in on agile, both the book and the classes that he and his coauthor give current and prospective managers espouse a deeply agile mindset for managers.
7. Rules of Thumb / Nuggets of Wisdom*
• Measure twice, cut once.
• Life is simpler when you plow around the
stump.
• Brooks’s Law: Adding manpower to a late
software project makes it later.
– Frederick P. Brooks Jr.
* 300 in the book / more at http://managingtheunmanageable.net/morerulesofthumb.html
8. Before We Begin
• What is your role in your company today?
• Manager?
• Project Manager?
• Product Owner?
• Scrum Master?
• Individual Contributor?
• Have you completed Agile Projects?
12. So what defines “Success”?
• Delivering scope?
• Within budget?
• On schedule?
13. So what defines “Success”?
• The Agile Principles begin…
–Our highest priority is to satisfy the
customer…
-- www.AgileManifesto.org
14. So what defines “Success”?
In the beginning, everyone will talk about
scope, and budget, and schedule.
But in the end, nobody really cares about any
of those things.
The only thing they care about is this:
People will love your software, or they won’t.
So that’s the only criterion to which you should
truly manage.
—Joseph Kleinschmidt, CTO
15. So what defines “Success”?
• Go beyond the Agile Principles…
–Our highest priority is to delight the
customer…
-- www.AgileManifesto.org
18. Agile Practices Deliver Value
• Planning Daily
• Planning Weekly (or biweekly or…)
• Planning Publicly
• Ordering Work Based on Customer Value
• Together defining “Done”
• Delivering Frequently
• Sharing how we’re doing
• Reflecting on how to do better
19. Agile Practices Deliver Value
• Standups
– Standups matter:
– Effective, Daily Standups
--2015 Study of Product Team Performance
24. Similarly…
Agile Practices Aren’t Enough to
Make Us Agile
“Becoming Agile is hard. It is harder than most other
organizational change efforts I’ve witnessed or been
part of [for reasons] including…the need to avoid
turning Scrum into a list of best practices.”
--Mike Cohn
26. Agile Values Make Us Agile
The Agile Manifesto
– We value:
• Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
• Working software over comprehensive documentation
• Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
• Responding to change over following a plan
-- http://agilemanifesto.org/
27. Agile Principles Make Us Agile
• Build projects around motivated
individuals
• Trust… to get the job done
• Face-to-face conversation
• Self-organizing teams
• The team reflects, …tunes, …adjusts
-- http://agilemanifesto.org/
28. Agile Principles Make Us Agile
• Build projects around motivated
individuals
• Trust… to get the job done
• Face-to-face conversation
• Self-organizing teams
• The team reflects, …tunes, …adjusts
-- http://agilemanifesto.org/
29. Self-Organizing Teams
• If our self-organizing team were an
acting troupe, …
What kind of acting do we do?
30. Self-Organizing Teams
• If our self-organizing team were an
acting troupe, …
What kind of acting do we do?
• If our self-organizing team were a
music group, …
What kind of music do we perform?
31. Self-Organizing Teams
• If our self-organizing team were an
acting troupe, …
What kind of acting do we do?
• If our self-organizing team were a
music combo, …
What kind of music do we perform?
• Who is the leader?
36. Projects Not Suitable for Agile?
• Micromanagement disrupts Agile
• Micromanagement prevents Best Teams
• Micromanagement prevents Learning
• Micromanaged teams become order-takers
37. Projects Not Suitable for Agile?
• Micromanagement disrupts Agile
• Micromanagement prevents Best Teams
• Micromanagement prevents Learning
• Micromanaged teams become order-takers
• Agile calls for everyone on the team to step up
• Micromanagement causes everyone to step back
39. • Managers of teams
• Project managers
• Program managers
• Scrum masters
• Product managers?
• Product owners?
Shared Leadership… and Managers
40. • What do all those managers have in common?
Shared Leadership… and Managers
41. • What do all those managers have in common?
– we run things
– we give direction
– we tell people what to do
– we like being the center of attention
Shared Leadership… and Managers
42. “If you’re the ScrumMaster and everyone is
looking at you, you’re doing it wrong.”
--Marilson Campos
Shared Leadership… and Managers
52. Leaders and Agile
• Rules of Thumb
Management sets the boundaries of what needs to be done and
says to the team, I trust you to figure out how to get it done.
58. Communicating
• Create a culture of communication
– at every level
– with everyone
• up, down, within and across
• “We have two ears and one mouth. Use them in
this ratio.”
— Kimberly Wiefling
62. Establishing Culture inside Culture
• Does your company live its values?
– What of those values can you leverage?
– Wherever you can, leverage culture & values
• Programming culture corporate culture≠
– Leverage
– Bolster
– Wall off incompatible values
– Substitute agile values
64. Establishing Culture
Publicly reward or acknowledge engineers who act in a way
that supports the culture that you want to create.
-Juanita Mah, engineering manager
67. Capacity
• Slack is critical to throughput
– 100% capacity results in bottlenecks
--photo (c) Bud Adams, SXC, www.aimpgh.com
68. How Do We Foster an Agile Culture?
• Trust Our People
• Empower Self-Organization & Excellence
• Expect / Enable Truly Shared Leadership
• Model, Defend, Evangelize Agile Values
• Foster a Culture of Communication
• Encourage Teamwork and Collaboration
• Shield Teams from Politics & Distraction
the “creamy center” of Managing the Unmanageable: Rules, Tools, and Insights for Managing Software People and Teams
Agile Learning Labs, Laura Powers
Image ID: 529149, Uploaded to http://www.sxc.hu/photo/529149 by winjohn on May 16, 2006, John Evans, Winchester, Hants, United Kingdom, www.thetippingpoint.co.uk
Chapter 8 from Managing the Unmanageable: Rules, Tools, and Insights for Managing Software People and Teams