Chasingwindmills agile success

Chasing Windmills?

Getting Agile Success in Government

Paul M. Boos

Which do we see?

Why should we care?

Value

Speed

Transparency

Why doesn’t

the Gov’t

use Agile?

Understanding

Software Engineering

Ahhh…

Software EngineeingWhat’s your Success Rate?

75% of Software Projects: DOOMED from Start

78% feel biz reqmts out of sync with project reqmts

Source: 2011 Geneca Survey

≅55% of projects have clear biz objectives

% Application Features Used

64%

16%

13%

7%

Rarely/Never

Occasionally

Often

Always Only 20%!!

Source: 2002 Standish Report

Business Software is a Craft

It takes skill……and

Creativity

So…

Certainly SOMEONE has created a better way

Yep, some really,really, really

Smart Peoplegathered in Snowbird, Utah

and created the …

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

We are uncovering better ways of developingsoftware by doing it and helping others do it.Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over

processes and toolsWorking software over

comprehensive documentationCustomer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items onthe right, we value the items on the left more.

Understanding Of Problem

Understanding Of Solution

>

><

<

Waterfallor

Agile Agile

Agileand

Where does Agile fit?

Challenges

Bureaucracy?

Gov’t Organizations

This model courtesy of Jurgen Appelo; please visit his blog at http://noop.nl

Tend to be here! (almost by sheer size)

Policy?

Brings Order?

Gov’t Policies

This model courtesy of Jurgen Appelo; please visit his blog at http://noop.nl

Tend to be here! (in theory)

Complexity or Complication?

Teams

This model courtesy of Jurgen Appelo; please visit his blog at http://noop.nl

Tend to be here! (in reality)

Complicated + ComplexOverrides Ordered + Simple

+ =Process Team Result

…

1

2

3

n Worse Case

Best Case

We don’t take time to read (or write) our policies…

We let others tell us what the policies mean…

What about…

EA

VME

B

EDGU

PRAS

SDLC

T

Simplify

Simple Process = Easy Auditing

Focus on Delivering Business Value

Align Milestones w/Releasable Software

Systems Development Life-Cycle (SDLC)

Grass Roots Motivation

Top Down Support

Agile Success

Strive to decomplicate…

This model courtesy of Jurgen Appelo; please visit his blog at http://noop.nl

Help teams operate as simple and ordered as possible.

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Apply the pants principle…Simple process adopted by the team doing the work.

+Process Team

“…reducing costs requires a better way to organize work, not better cost information.”

- H. Thomas Johnson (paraphrased)

Hesitate Δing for 1 problem

Enterprise Architecture

Graft and Prune EA Components

The Iron Triangle Agilified

Est

imat

e

Scope

Budget

Work to…

Schedule

Scope

Budget Schedule

Prioritized EpicsEpic 1Epic 2Epic 3Epic 4Epic 5

…

Budget/Schedule + Mgmt Reserve

>

An Approach for Executing Projects w/Agility

Execute on small slices!

Classic EVM

Design

Analyze

Develop

Deploy

$010011011110100010010010

Scrum Process

Release

Release Plan

Release

$Scrum-based EVM

Personnel Annual Review System

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

We are uncovering better ways of developingsoftware by doing it and helping others do it.Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over

processes and toolsWorking software over

comprehensive documentationCustomer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items onthe right, we value the items on the left more.

Reward those building the product in working together

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

We are uncovering better ways of developingsoftware by doing it and helping others do it.Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over

processes and toolsWorking software over

comprehensive documentationCustomer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items onthe right, we value the items on the left more.

Reward risk-taking/innovation; penalize only non-contained failures

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

We are uncovering better ways of developingsoftware by doing it and helping others do it.Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over

processes and toolsWorking software over

comprehensive documentationCustomer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items onthe right, we value the items on the left more.

Reward product meeting needs over on-time/on-schedule

Manifesto for Agile Software Development

We are uncovering better ways of developingsoftware by doing it and helping others do it.Through this work we have come to value:

Individuals and interactions over

processes and toolsWorking software over

comprehensive documentationCustomer collaboration over contract negotiation

Responding to change over following a plan

That is, while there is value in the items onthe right, we value the items on the left more.

Reward working product

Set a vision…

and

help your teams see it!

There’s nothing to fear.

http://coactivate.org/projects/agile-influencers-of-dc

Paul Boos@paul_boos

paul.boos@santeon.com