Agile Offshore

Can agile methodologies work in outsourced software development? I’ve tried them, and they do—but some of the classic agile principles need adjustments for colocated teams. For example, Extreme Programming’s principles of “pair programming” and “moving people around” need to be taken with a grain of salt, considering that the people could literally be thousands of miles apart.

Starting with an agile evangelist’s take on the subject is always a good idea. Martin Fowler, in what is now a classic article (“Using an Agile Software Process with Offshore Development”[12]) covers fourteen major lessons learned:

  1. Use continuous integration to avoid integration headaches.

  2. Have each site send ambassadors to the other sites.

  3. Use contact ...

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