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Agile Retrospectives
Is Agile solving more problems than it is creating?
Chris Pratt and Laurence Wood, 10th October 2012
Introduction – Chris Pratt
• 9 years IT Project Management
• Registered PRINCE2® Practitioner also trained in DSDM
• After completing his BSc (Hons) in Bio Science, Chris spent6 years in project management at Ventura in Leeds
• Having learned a great deal about project management infinancial services, telecoms and outsourcing Chris movedto Callcredit in November 2010
• He has been using DSDM for almost a year and is heavilyinvolved in supporting the move to DSDM at Callcredit
• Lead one of two DSDM pilots at CIG
• Chris is now running his third agile project
Introduction – Laurence Wood
• Discovered ‘Just In Time’ and Kanban as an apprentice atJaguar Cars in 1988. Supervised V12 engine and XJ vehicle trim.
• Jaguar sent him to The University of Birmingham to studyManufacturing Engineering with Management and Robotics.
• Ford’s takeover prompted a move to IT as RAD (RapidApplication Development) programmer at Marks and Spencer.
• Freelance RAD team lead roles followed in South Africa,Austria and UK including Coca Cola, and South African Airways.
• He was then PM at Serco and Divisional Head of IT in the City.
• Now Agile Programme Manager at Leeds’ rapidly growingCallcredit, a key part of their move to Agile since late 2011.
• PRINCE2 and MSP Practitioner also trained in RAD and DSDM.
About Callcredit
• Callcredit Information Group (CIG)
• Expert in the fields of credit referencing, marketing services, consumer information, interactive solutions and consultative analytics
• Based in Leeds
• Serve UK’s leading businesses - financial services, utilities, retail, gaming and public sector
• Increased profits year on year
• 219 staff in 2004
• 900 in 2012
• About Noddle
• Most of our activity is B2B but......
• Noddle is our new consumer offering that you may recognise.........
Today we will...
• Overview Callcredit’s agile journey so far
• Demonstrate a simple but effective format for a retrospective
• Show how we have continually reviewed our teams’ views on the method
• Revisit our original hypothesis using actual data
• Share the key lessons from our first year of agile
• Questions
Background /Callcredit Agile Maturity
• Jan 2008 – Various ‘informal’ agile activities within IT
• Nov 2011 – Formalised agile using two DSDM Atern pilots
• Dec 2011 - External DSDM training commenced for all team members
• Feb 2012 – PMO setup to help projects follow the methodology
• Jun 2012 – CIG opens Lithuania office including development
• Sep 2012 – Two of four programmes (>20 projects) using DSDM
• Oct 2012 – Ready to share findings using real outputs of retrospectives
What is a retrospective?
• A regular session for the whole team to review progress together
• At the end of each 2 week time box (sprint)
• Feeds immediately into planning the next time box
Why we have been doing retrospectives
• Share everybody’s thoughts, both positive and negative• About the latest time box
• About the success of the method
• To make us share and react to concerns regularly
• Helps us to make the next time box better than the last
• Encourages open discussion across our team
• Because open discussion has proved good for morale
• People tell us they like it
• To provide one place for moaning!
• Asking staff about the effectiveness of agile helps them to adopt it
How we do retrospectives
• At the end of every time box
• Quick and simple (45 minutes)
• Ask everybody• What went well (need to do more of next time)
• What did not go well (need to avoid next time)
• Each individual writes 2 positive points first (Closed)
• Thoughts then shared with whole group (Open)
• Group similar items – identify common themes
• Repeat with 2 negative points • order is deliberate, reduces overrun
• Agree which items we can attribute to the method to give us metrics• (Is it solving more problems than it is creating?)
• Agree what we will feed into the next time box
Olympic retrospective.....(will not include a retro of the method).....
Olympic lessons
• Key themes from our Olympic retro?
• Lessons for our next time box – or advice for Rio?
• But what have Callcredit’s retrospectives shown
• And what did our continual retro of the method uncover?...
Common themes in our retros
Positive
• Method encourages teamwork
• The Kanban boards provide clear progress updates
• Method highlights blockers earlier in the process
• Morale in the project teams has increased (shown in a survey)
• Continuous delivery drives up quality
Negative
• Velocity not on track
• Difficulties with estimating
• Communicating offsite• Complicates or lengthens stand ups
• Not delivering full user stories
• Building on weak foundations• Blockers that were outside the control
of the agile team
• Environment availability
• Deployment complexity• Numerous products and platforms
• People blame the method in error!• Misinterpreting the method often the
problem e.g. “Stand ups too big”
Findings – what we attribute to agile
•Of the feedback attributed to the method, significantly more was positive
•Often none of the negative feedback was attributed to the method
Trends – Within Callcredit
•Both positive and negative feedback on the method are reducing
•After 2 years both may be zero?
Explaining our findings
• Why is most of the feedback that was attributed to the method positive?
• Why on many occasions was none of the negative feedback attributed to the method?
• Overriding response to the method was positive
• Most blockers were traditional (environmental – not ‘firm foundations’)
• Why is feedback (both positive and negative) on the method reducing?
• After 2 years both (positive and negative) may be zero?• As people become more comfortable they gradually attribute less items to method
• As the method and teams mature they know how to best use DSDM
• After 2 years the method may feel furniture so wont be blamed for anything!?
Revisit the original hypothesis
• The hypotheses:
• Project teams (mostly new to the method) consistently rate the positive effect of the method as 2-3 times stronger than any negative effects.
• Our hypothesis was that as our agile teams align and mature the positive effects will continue to increase
• There has always been far more positive DSDM feedback than negative
• In a significant number of retrospectives teams gave no negative feedback regarding the method
• Several negative items are not due to the method
• Morale in the project teams has been enhanced by Agile
Summary & Questions
• We explained what a retro is
• Shown a simple but effective way of running a retro
• Shared our key findings
• Explained how we also did a retro of the method
• Used real evidence to confirm our original hypothesis:
• Yes, Agile is solving more problems than it is creating!
• Questions...
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