Being Agile: Your Roadmap to Successful Adoption of Agile

by Mario E. Moreira

Released October 2013

Publisher(s): Apress

ISBN: 9781430258391

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Book description

Being Agile is your roadmap to successfully adopting Agile methods. Veteran Scrum Master and Agile Coach Mario Moreira teaches new adopters how to implement a robust Agile methodology for the first time.

Agile is a ubiquitous watchword in the corporate world, but only a minority of companies understand and practice what they pay lip service to. Too many content themselves with half-baked approximations such as Fragile (fragile Agile), ScrumBut (Scrum but not the practices), and ScrumFall (mini-waterfalls in the sprints). Moreira shows maturing early adopters how to bridge the chasm between going through the motions of doing Agile and genuinely being Agile.

After a high-level synopsis of Agile, its methodologies (including Scrum, Kanban, Scrum-ban, and XP), and its business benefits, Moreira plunges into the nitty-gritty of the Agile short release and iteration cycle. He parses the Agile cycle into four integrated aspects: readiness, deployment, support, and adaptation. Under the rubric of readiness, he considers such issues as how to determine the suitability, scalability, and readiness of a given product and team for Agile development and how to establish the scope, "done" criteria, sizing techniques, success metrics, and training needs for a given Agile project.

Deployment comprises such signature Agile practices as daily stand-ups and Scrums of Scrums, together with techniques for onboarding teams and coaching them through their initial sprints. Support involves such practices as iterative customer validation, the grooming of team members in assigned roles such as ScrumMaster, Product Owner, and Agile Champion, and the uses of tooling and automation to accelerate Agility. Adaptation focuses on various real-world Agile scenarios corresponding to common permutations of variables such as the size, number, dispersal, experience, and governance of teams

What you'll learn

Agile professionals, product managers, and middle, senior, and executive management in software engineering and development divisions and enterprises who read this book will learn how to:

Evaluate team candidates for traits, skills, behavior, and attitudes diagnostic of an Agile mindset

Set up Agile planning tools and framework

Map stakeholder engagement

Validate ongoing application of Agile best practices

Adapt Scrum teams and techniques for various needs and conditions

Who this book is for

The primary readership for this book comprises Agile professionals, product managers, and middle, senior, and executive management in software engineering and development divisions and enterprises. The secondary readership includes business analysts agile and software configuration managers.