5 C's of Agile Management

by Holler, Robert (2003-10-01)
Rating 4.1 out of 5 (14 ratings) read comments

Leading agile projects can be difficult. In order to capitalize on the evolving nature of agile development, today’s leadership community must embrace and direct five key aspects of agile development – Courage, Context, Course, Cadence, and Cost.

Extreme Project Management

by Ludwig, Charles (2003-09-11)
Rating 2.8 out of 5 (4 ratings) read comments

Article that describes “Extreme Project Management,” and concludes that it is a useful technique for some projects. Also presents the opinion that the PMI PMBOK supports Extreme Project Management.

Observations on Balancing Discipline and Agility

by Boehm, Barry; Turner, Richard (2003-06-25)
Rating 5.0 out of 5 (1 rating) read comments

Outstanding paper on the two major directions for software development – agile or plan driven (disciplined) – and how to determine what is the best fit for your organization. Some interesting points include: there are some ‘lead’ bullets but no ‘silver’ bullets in any approach, much consideration should be given to people and communication and what works today may not work with future projects or technologies. A must read.

Project Expectations: The Boundaries for Agile Development

by Mekelburg, Diana (2003-04-01)
Rating 3.5 out of 5 (2 ratings) read comments

This article argues that by committing to feasible business outcome expectations, development teams can manage the scope of agile projects successfully – to the satisfaction of sponsors, executives and users.

Something's Gotta Give

by Ambler, Scott W. (2003-03-01)
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This article discusses the idea that agile project managers need an “elastic triangle”. If you rigidly define the product’s schedule, budget and the scope to be delivered, you’ve left no room for your team to maneuver, and are headed for failure.

Right Game, Wrong Team

by Kerievsky, Joshua; III (2003-03-01)
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Advocates an approach called “Test-Driven Management” for aligning programmers, customers and managers.

The Uses of Chaos Theory in Project Management

by Bardyn, Janet; Fitzgerald, Donna; (2003-01-01)
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Project review focussing on controlling a chaotic start of a project with a potential overrun of deadlines and budgets.

Keep Your Options Open: Extreme Programming and the Economics of Flexibility

by Erdogmus, Hakan and Favaro, John (2002-12-31)
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In the financial industry options are used as an insurance against uncertainties or risks, e.g. lossses. The article discusses how similar principles are used in agile approaches to hedge risks, e.g. technology risks. Extreme Programming is looked at as an ‘Options-Driven’ process. Starting with a simple discounted cash flow example, the article moves on to explaining the short comings of an approach that is based solely on a cash flow analysis. Instead the authors suggest applying option pricing models, including the famous Black-Scholes model, to Extreme Programming. In particular YAGNI, small investments, frequents releases are looked at in the new context. The article also includes a brief introduction into the necessary mathematical formulas, which in some cases are non-trivial.

The Leadership Paradox

by Poppendieck, Mary and Tom (2002-11-13)
Rating 4.0 out of 5 (1 rating) read comments

What is the difference between managers and leaders? How do other industries create/develop leaders? This article begins to discuss these topics.

Extending Agile Methods: Postmortem Reviews as Extended Feedback

by Torgeir Dingsøyr, Geir Kjetil Hanssen (2002-10-25)
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Agile software development methods, such as Extreme Programming, focus on informal learning mechanisms like pair programming. Yet powerful methods, new knowledge that is gained in a project will not spread rapidly in an organisation if knowledge and experience is not externalised. We propose to combine a lightweight externalisation method: postmortem reviews with agile methods to strengthen the overall learning, and suggest how this can be done. We use practical experience from an Extreme Programming development project, and from conducting postmortem analysis in several companies in our discussion.

Keywords: Agile Development Methods, Extreme Programming, Postmortem reviews, Knowledge Management, Experience Elicitation.