Agile Way to First Iteration

Agile Way to First Iteration
Mikalai Alimenkou
http://xpinjection.com

Background
Java Technical Lead/Scrum Master at Zoral Labs
6+ years in software development
4+ years of working by Agile methodologies
Expert in Agile engineering practices
Agile coach (TDD, Testing, Planning, etc.)at XP Injection (http://xpinjection.com)

Ideal Agile project
I have idea of new product!

Ideal Agile project
We can implement it!
I have idea of new product!

Ideal Agile project
I want to do it in Agile way!

Ideal Agile project
Nice! We have cross functional and self organizing team!
I want to do it in Agile way!
Yes, we are ready to start!

Ideal Agile project
I have prioritized backlog and project vision for you!

Ideal Agile project
I personally will be you PO!

Ideal Agile project
OK, but lets sign Agile contract before?

Ideal Agile project
OK, but lets sign Agile contract before?
Sounds good for me!
Lets start first iteration!

What do you have?

What do you want to archive?

When things are simple?
Another CRUD application
Application with many competitors on the market
Ready to use requirements or specification from the customer
Cool idea but simple product
Reverse engineering of existing project

What is iteration 0?
Before first real iteration
Prepare all tools and environments
Establish team practices
Prepare backlog to first iteration planning
Learning new technologies
Establishing team velocity
Even earning some business value

What happens in real world?
Backlog is not ready because customer is not ahead of developers

UI has many inconsistencies without common UI design

Architectural decisions can’t satisfy nearest project requirements

Functionality is ready but product doesn’t satisfy non-functional requirements

Lack of deep common understanding of what product is built

Lead to significant rework

STOP! We don’t do anything upfront!

What we do in Agile?
Refactoring
Simple design
YAGNI
DRY principle
JIT

Agile planning

What do we need to start?
Concepts
Acceptance
Tests
User
Stories
Iteration
plan
???
Budget
Team

What does customer need to start?
Vision
Planning
Concepts
Risks
Release
Plan
User
Stories
Acceptance
Tests
Major
Features
User
Value
Iteration
plan
Budget
Product
Design
Team
Product
Architecture
Efforts
Estimates
Cost
Estimates
Test
Strategy
Skills Set
Execution

Real transformation

Product vision
Help everyone be on the same page
Collective understanding of the product
Define main and differentiating features
Ways:
Product workshop
Users, roles and functions game
UI prototyping

We understand
Who are the customers
Competitors and alternative products on the market
Product category and role on the market
Key features of the product

Product design
Major data flows
Main UI navigation paths
Messaging and communication protocols
Users and their roles in the system
Main user activities

Traditional approach

Agile approach
Actors, roles and goals list
Whiteboard snapshots or simple spreadsheets
Personas for each role (details like name, life cycle, image, etc.)
Paper or other lightweight prototyping
Mockup tools as cheap and quick as possible
Helps communicate effectively
User testing
Execution of scenarios on prototypes
Get feedback from users to avoid early mistakes

Agile risk management
Risk meeting to identify risks
Store main risks on cards and put them into zone by impact and probability
Brainstorm for high right corner risks
Make results visible and revisit during development

Define architecture
Understand key components, flows and technologies
Reduce technological and schedule risks
Prove main assumptions

Traditional approach
Create detailed architectural document
Build all kinds of diagrams and architectural views
Review architecture
etc.

Agile approach
Use informal style of documents
Validate main architectural decisions with architectural prototypes
Mock unneeded components and services

Testing strategy
Testing strategy helps to reduce time of tests automation
Select testing frameworks and tools for each kind of tests
Define roles and responsibilities for testing

Acceptance testing
Define acceptance criteria for each User Story during iteration planning (PO, QA)
Create acceptance tests (PO, QA, DEV)
Implement acceptance tests (QA, DEV)
Use them as part of DONE criteria
At the end of iteration all acceptance criteria must pass

Release planning
Divide functionality by importance
Must have, Important, Would be nice
Estimate features, not stories
Don’t put all top priority stories in first release
Story mapping

Colored backlog
Visible
Invisible
Positive
Value
Negative
Value

Hiring business resources
Important Product Owner role:
Strong business leadership and vision
Understand needs of users
Open to new ways of working
Have planning skills, not just reacting to the facts
Collaborative, decisive, conceptual thinker
Wrong Product Owner can:
– Slow down the project
– Lead the team in the wrong direction

Hiring technical team
Need experienced senior development staff early:
Estimate features
Define architecture
Prepare “proof of the concept” architectural prototypes
Help to hire rest of the team
Full team hiring should wait for budget approval and architectural decisions:
Identify needed skills and team size
Some time should be spent to bring team up to speed on the vision
Team trainings on Agile and engineering practices

You take away
Not all projects may be started quickly with Agile
Some things needs to be done upfront
Don’t use Agile practices fanatically
Almost every traditional activity may be performed in Agile way

Any questions?

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Agile Way to First Iteration

by Mikalai Alimenkou

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