Agile in Washington - A Decade in the Making?

Around the time the Agile Manifesto was created in 2001, there were some of us in the DC Metro area who very quickly became passionate agilists. Flavio Diomede, my boss at that time introduced many of us, including Bob Payne, Kuryan Obi Thomas and others to Agile. We met "Uncle" Bob Martin, Ron Jeffries, Chet Hendrickson, Michael Feathers and other eXtreme Programing luminaries, and absorbed the beauty of technical discipline from them. Some years later I met Ken Schwaber when both of us were presenting at Software Education's Agile conference in New Zealand and Australia.

Over the next several years, as the agile movement continued to expand and grow all around the world, the DC region with its heavy bureaucracy remained an unexplored agile hinterland. There were many who despaired that agile would ever come to Washington in a big way. However one person with a positive counter vision was Fred Sencindiver, a fellow agile enthusiast and co-collaborator with Bob Payne and myself. A professor at George Washington University, Fred adamantly maintained it was simply a matter of time until Washington, DC ended up adopting agile methods in a big way.

Now, as we gear up for the 2011 Agile DC Conference, it seems that Washington's time has come. At this year's Agile DC conference, Ken Schwaber and I will keynote, and I'm sure we will meet with agile enthusiasts of all stripes and persuasions. Many local companies like The Motley Fool, The Chronicle of Higher Education, CarFax and AgileX have become strong practitioners of agile methods. Momentum has also built on initiatives such as the Federal CIO's 25-point program to reform federal IT management and Agile in the DoD, and federal agencies like the US Patent and Trademark Office and FFRDC's like MITRE have gotten into the agile act.

So, it turns out that Fred Sencindiver was quite right. It's clear that agile methods did indeed come to Washington. Fred was indeed a visionary, and continued to believe in an agile future even as he passed away in July, 2004. Thank you, Fred for your friendship, partnership and vision. We are now living in the future you imagined.

Visit us at AgileDC 2011 - Discount Below!

Come visit us at AgileDC!

We are excited here at LitheSpeed to be involved in the AgileDC 2011 conference. We are a platinum sponsor of the event and three of us will be at the podium at one point or another throughout the day. Sanjiv Augustine is one of the keynote speakers along with Ken Schwaber. Derek Huether will be speaking on the new PMI ACP certification and the process that brought it to the Agile community. I (Bob Payne) work with a great group of volunteer organizers as chair of the AgileDC 2011 conference.

The conference is organized into 6 tracks and offers something for everyone, including our friends and clients in the government sector. These tracks include:

• Introduction to Agile
• Agile Engineering Practices
• Agile in Government
• Enterprise Agile
• Agile & Business
• Open Track for advanced and self organized sessions

The conference is happening on Wednesday October 26th, 2011, at the Kellogg Conference Hotel, Washington DC. Visit http://agiledc.org for information and registration.

LitheSpeed is happy to be able to offer a discount code to get you in for 15% off the regular ticket price; just use this code: AgileDCSponsorLSpeedGuest

I look forward to seeing you there and don't forget to say Hi!

Bob Payne

Vice President

LitheSpeed

Organizer AgileDC 2011

Theory X and Theory Y

Do you lead or do you manage? Do you believe in command-and-control or do you believe in team empowerment? Recently, while presenting an Agile Enterprise Workshop, we discussed Theory X and Theory Y with our workshop attendees.

Theory X and Theory Y are two extremes introduced by Harvard Professor Douglas McGregor in his book “The Human Side of Enterprise”, over 50 years ago. Still, you can find both theories in practice today.

Though the theory of x and y are not absolute in how human nature plays out in our places of work, there will always be those among us who are polarizing and think of life as a side of a coin.

So, which do you believe?

Attitude: Do you believe we all dislike work, find it boring, and will avoid it if we can? Or, do you believe we need to work and want to take an interest in it? Under the right conditions, do you believe we can enjoy it?

Direction: Do you believe we must be forced or coerced to make the right effort? Or, do you believe we will direct ourselves towards a target that we accept?

Responsibility: Do you believe we would rather be directed than take responsibility for our own actions? Or, do you believe we seek and accept responsibility under the right circumstances?

Motivation: Do you believe we are intrinsically motivated by money and fears about our job security? Or, do you believe, under the right conditions, we are extrinsically motivated by the desire to realize our own potential?

Creativity: Do you believe most of us have little creativity? Or, do you believe we are actually highly creative, waiting for the opportunity to express it?

Again I ask, which do you believe?

HT: Dan Pink

HT: Sanjiv Augutine

HT: Wikipedia

LeanKit Kanban

When the Agile Manifesto for Agile Software Development was written 10 years ago, it stated "We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it."

The very first of four values listed within the Manifesto was "Individuals and interactions over processes and tools"

The Manifesto goes on to state "...while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more."

Well, I am compelled to write about one of the items on the right. I still believe the tool should be good enough that it helps you reach your goals. But after that, it should not become a big process onto itself. What I want to do is finish tasks and get some actual closure on them.

I recently read in the book Personal Kanban by Jim Benson and Tonianne DeMaria Barry, a phenomenon known as the "Zeigarnik Effect". It states that 90% of people remember uncompleted or interrupted tasks better than completed tasks. Soviet psychologist Bluma Zeigarnic found that the human brain becomes preoccupied with things that are not closed.

Though I have leveraged Kanban with teams, it took me a while to realize that Visual Control Systems could be used to visualize and manage both personal and professional work. I then found myself using a physical board at the office and an electronic version (web-based tool) at home.

What is visual control, exactly?

A visual control is a technique employed in many places where information is communicated by using visual signals instead of texts or other written instructions. The design is deliberate in allowing quick recognition of the information being communicated, in order to increase efficiency and clarity.

The real question is, can a process tool take the place of individuals and interactions? Perhaps we need to stop and think about the reality of our world. Is everyone in your company physically located in the same office space or are you geographically dispersed? If you're not all sitting there together in an open workspace, you need to find a tool that will bridge that physical gap and then stay out of the way. Bandit Software's LeanKit Kanban does that. Let me tell you what puts LeanKit in the lead of the Kanban tool race. It's called mobile computing.



I seem to carry my iPad with me everywhere. (I'll be getting an iPhone as soon as my contract is up). Though the LeanKit iPhone/iPod interface could use a little work, the iPad interface is completely awesome. The image above is actually a screen print from my iPad. The design is simple; it's lightweight; it's functional. It helps me visualize my work and it helps control my work in process. Merge LeanKit Kanban and an iPad and you will have an amazing user experience, as it allows individuals to interact wherever they see fit. I'm happy because I can access half a dozen different boards with tap of my finger and my wife is happy because I didn't cover the walls of my home office with whiteboards and sticky notes.

If you're thinking about using a web-based Kanban tool for yourself, your team, or your organization, all of the vendors out there have relatively similar features. See which one fits your budget. If you or your teams are using mobile devices like iPhones, iPods, or iPads (in addition to desktops or laptops), you need to go to iTunes and download this app. Though you need to have an existing LeanKit account to make the Apple App versions work, you can get a personal account for free!

After you see how well it works for your personal life, I don't doubt you'll be using it in the office in the not-too-distant future.


HT: Wikipedia
HT: LeanKit
HT: Personal Kanban

The Joy of Agile Work - See you at Agile 2011?

So, this is the 10th anniversary year of the Manifesto for Agile Software Development, and the registration for next week's Agile 2011 conference is the highest ever. This year, like others, we at LitheSpeed will be active and enthusiastic participants in the conference. Since this is an anniversary year, I thought some reminiscing would be appropriate.

My initial encounter with the agile community was in 2002, when my boss at that time took us to XP Universe. To someone new to the community, it was quite awe inspiring to meet luminaries like "Uncle Bob" Martin and Michael Feathers. I remain impressed by Uncle Bob and Michael to this day. Then, the next year's Agile conference brought a chance to meet none other than Alistair Cockburn in Salt Lake City. I have to say that that year's conference changed my professional life. I made so many friends, many of who have remained in close community. Alistair Cockburn, Sid Pinney from Thoughtworks, our own Bob Payne, Michael Hamman -- I met them all that year. Bob, Michael and I hung out at a taco truck and spoke excitedly about our shared interest in an Open Space session on Complex Adaptive Systems. We were excited because we felt in our bones that we were on the cusp of something new and big. We didn't quite know where the whole movement was headed; but when we met magnetic personalities like Diana Larsen and Ellen Gottesdiener, we knew that we had mentors and friends on that journey.

Over the years, every agile conference has grown, but I know others are having that first-time experience of discovering something new and wonderful (or maybe just exotic: few can forget the belly dancers at Agile 2004). Things have grown busier, the conference tracks are more packed, the speakers more advanced, but there remains an air of something new and different with every conference. Also nowadays, the conference certainly carries itself with a well heeled air. The taco stands have been replaced with vendor receptions and other generous spreads. Agile has both grown up and is bringing in the bacon/tofu. So, what keeps us coming back together?

Some years ago, I had a wonderful vacation in Sedona, Arizona and learned about its energy vortexes. Okay, so maybe I'm just not that into the vortexes (vortices?), but I think that the Agile Alliance has created a sort of energy vortex around the conference.

I think, every year, this wonderful vortex draws us all in – experienced and novices alike – and gives a uniquely uplifting experience. In this year's vortex, I don't doubt that I will meet old friends and make new ones, and learn tons more. But what draws me back this year, is exactly what has drawn me back in past years: the opportunity to learn and share more about what is ostensibly a development and/or project management process, but what has become for me and many others, a joyful way of work.

This year, we're excited that LitheSpeed's presence at the conference will include:

1. The Live Aid Lab/Agile Philanthropy led by Bob Payne, Tuesday 8/9 through Friday 8/12
2. 10 Minutes to Testable Specifications led by David Bulkin and Bob Payne, Tuesday 8/9
3. 10 Minutes to a Better Standup led by David Bulkin and Bob Payne, Tuesday 8/9
4. The Joy of Work: Managing Performance, Innovation and Organizational Maturity, led by Arlen Bankston and Sanjiv Augustine, Wednesday 8/10 at 1:30 PM
5. Three Months for Idea to Implementation: Jumpstarting Agile in Nuclear Power, led by Srini Gopalan and Eric Pitschke from Westinghouse Nuclear, and Sanjiv Augustine
6. Visual Portfolio Management - Putting the 'Big' in Big Visible Tracking led by Bob Payne and MIchael Kaiser
7. Interviews of Agile Thought Leaders for InfoQ, led by David Bulkin

To our many friends and associates with whom we've consulted and trained, I hope that this event will give us a few moments to catch up, and to connect yet again.

Hope to see you there in less than a week!