Scaling agile is not simple. The complexity increases not in proportion to
the size of the team but at the square of the size of the team. That means a
20 member team project will be 4 times as complex as a 10 member team.
To ensure that complexity does not turn into chaos it is inevitable that the
pure agile way of working may have to be sacrificed – is it possible
without violating agile manifesto? It is also inevitable that the agile
practices will need to integrate into other practices of the enterprise.
To be able to scale agile we need to understand:
What the dimensions to this complexity? How to split the problem and the
team? How to introduce processes and tools? How to manage collaboration among
distributed team members? How to plan and manage workflow?
Dimensions of scaling and the need to integrate with other enterprise
processes
Scaling Agile: An Executive... (more)
Irrespective of what the Agile Manifesto says (“Customer Collaboration over
Contract Negotiation”) we do require a signed contract for ANY medium to
large software outsourcing engagements – and that includes agile projects.
Why? Because when there is a commercial arrangement between two parties for
delivery of any service where a significant amount of financial transaction
is involved, there needs to be a clear agreement on:
What is the service that is going to be delivered and what will be the
charges for those services? What happens when things go wrong? Do's and
Don’ts of how ... (more)
The Apache Software Foundation (ASF) is an all-volunteer group of developers,
stewards and incubators of technology. They bring us many of the
technologies powering our enterprises and consumer solutions and are
continuing to innovate in ways that are absolutely amazing and enjoyable to
try to track. One of the greatest projects at the ASF is Hadoop, a capability
that may turn out to be the greatest innovation of the century. I have been
accused of hyperbole for emphasis in the past, so please dig into the facts
of this capability and judge for yourself. As for me, something that... (more)
Surveys conducted by Scott Ambler have consistently (2008, 2010 & 2011) shown
that Agile and Iterative Projects have been more successful.
Apart from the fact that Agile has been consistently been more successful
compared to traditional approach, these survey result show two more
interesting result – one of them is very surprising.
1) The gap between “Iterative + Agile” and “Traditional + Ad-hoc” has
been increasing
It is not clear why there is a dip in the success rate of all types of
project in 2010. But, leaving that aside, the gap has been consistently been
increasing (2008=7... (more)
In short the answer is a big NO.
Agile@Scale ≠ Agile@Manifesto
Why do I say that Agile@Manifesto cannot be scaled?
Apart from what is explicitly stated in the manifesto, there is an unstated
belief that “any” software can be developed by a small group of highly
talented & motivated individual as long as they are sitting within shouting
distance, have continuous access to people who can decide what the software
should do and they can work the way they deem fit. This belief is elaborated
through 4 value statements and 12 principles behind it. These 16 statements
can broadly be clas... (more)
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