Software Process and Measurement Cast

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 198! The Software Process and Measurement Cast 198 features my interview with Phillipe Back covering culture and organizational change. Philippe is another long time listener that is bringing his phenomenal intellect to the podcast! Philippe started his career in ‘92, designing, coding, and deploying interactive voice response systems. To exit the “one-man, one-project” syndrome that was the rule at the company, he moved the whole development team to an object oriented approach, leveraging C++ in the process. The need to explain the concepts properly to team mates, marketing, clients, and management kick started his journey into modeling and software engineering best practices. But software is only a bit of a success and that led him to investigate more areas of business. The best school being real practice where cold cash must change hands, he went solo in 2000. This led to exposure to interesting challenges, projects, and individuals. That’s also when he started teaching and coaching hundreds of others on how to model systems, design architectures that hold water, code, and manage requirements properly. After a while, he ended up convinced that technology was often not the key issue. The main hurdle appeared to be people-centric, namely moving away from compliance and lip service and towards commitment. Today, Philippe helps organizations establish a shared culture to foster success. With a shared culture, you are better armed to deal with change. You are able to integrate innovations much easier. And you are able to manage change in a flexible and coherent way. Standard trainings and buzzwords just don’t work. They are the equivalent of junk food: giving you a sugar rush but no solid energy stream in the long run. Philippe is married to his soul mate and wife Catherine. He is also active in the open source field, taking part in the Tiki Wiki CMS Groupware and Pharo Smalltalk projects. Web: philippeback.euBlog: philippeback.beTwitter: @philippebackYoutube: youtube.com/philippeback Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 199 will feature a discussion about the case against brainstorming (cue the thunder sound effects)!

The Software Process and Measurement Cast 197 has two parts! The first part of the Cast features my essay "What do you do when inertia wins?" The second part introduces a new column written by my friend and listener, Bill Fox. Bill is the creator of 5 Minutes to Process Improvement Success and will bring the lessons he has learned to the SPaMCAST! The SPaMCAST 197 is sponsored by LeanKit Kanban. By now, most of you in the Lean-Agile community have heard of LeanKit, recognized by community leaders and practitioners alike as the most flexible and powerful tool available for implementing visual management. Since their launch in 2009, LeanKit has helped hundreds of companies around the world to quickly and easily model even very complex processes as vertical and horizontal lanes on a virtual whiteboard with cards representing work flowing from step to step. Well, LeanKit has now announced the launch of groundbreaking new features that allow even the largest enterprise portfolio and projects to be managed using multiple levels of drill-down Kanban boards, detailed sub-taskboards, and roll-up Lean metrics - as well as a complete overhaul of their user interface that makes LeanKit more attractive, more intuitive, and easier to manage. If you haven't checked out LeanKit or haven't lately, check out the website to explore how they can help Lean-Agile scale within your organization. Visit LeanKit Kanban! (and say hello for the SPaMCAST!) Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Florida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement Cast Email: spamcastinfo@gmail.com Voicemail: +1-206-888-6111 Website: www.spamcast.net Twitter: www.twitter.com/tcagley Facebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 198 will feature a wonderful interview Philippe Back covering culture and organizational change. Philippe is another long-time listener that is bringing his phenomenal intellect to the podcast!

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 196! The Software Process and Measurement Cast 196 features my inteview with Jeff Anderson of Deloitte on topics that spanned lean, kanban and using the ideas from the work done on lean startups as a process improvement tool. Bio - Jeff started his professional life as your typical IT development geek, creating software delivery joy through the use of things like patterns, agile methods, and overall object oriented goodness. For the most part he was disappointed in the way IT delivery projects were managed, the reason they were started, and how they ended up. This dissatisfaction with the status quo led him to gradually embrace a new mission in life, to help IT knowledge workers to become awesome at what they do. To that end he has created the Deloitte LEAN service offering, providing advisory, coaching, and change management services to IT departments. Jeff has built this capability within Deloitte to help IT clients truly transform the way they operate their business. Over the last several years he has played a leadership role in some of the largest Kanban based enterprise transformations worldwide. Jeff keeps adding new tools to his transformation utility belt, including lean startup, gamification and others to define the next generation of work environments for knowledge professionals. Last, but definitely not least, Jeff is the proud father of a brand new daughter Mila, and husband of to his amazing wife Barbara. Blog: agileconsulting.blogspot.comTwitter: @thomasjeffrey (www.twitter.com/thomasjeffrey) The SPaMCAST 196 is sponsored by LeanKit Kanban. By now, most of you in the Lean-Agile community have heard of LeanKit, recognized by community leaders and practitioners alike as the most flexible and powerful tool available for implementing visual management. Since their launch in 2009, LeanKit has helped hundreds of companies around the world to quickly and easily model even very complex processes as vertical and horizontal lanes on a virtual whiteboard with cards representing work flowing from step to step. Well, LeanKit has now announced the launch of groundbreaking new features that allow even the largest enterprise portfolio and projects to be managed using multiple levels of drill-down Kanban boards, detailed sub-taskboards, and roll-up Lean metrics - as well as a complete overhaul of their user interface that makes LeanKit more attractive, more intuitive, and easier to manage. If you haven't checked out LeanKit or haven't lately, check out the website to explore how they can help Lean-Agile scale within your organization. Visit LeanKit Kanban! (and say hello for the SPaMCAST!) Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement Cast:Email: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 197 will feature an essay who's working title is What Happens After Interia Wins . . .

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 195! The SPaMCAST 195 features my essay, Routines: The Good and The Bad. Routines are an important part of how we work. Like many other things routines can givith and can taketh away. The SPaMCAST 195 is sponsored by LeanKit Kanban. By now, most of you in the Lean-Agile community have heard of LeanKit, recognized by community leaders and practitioners alike as the most flexible and powerful tool available for implementing visual management. Since their launch in 2009, LeanKit has helped hundreds of companies around the world to quickly and easily model even very complex processes as vertical and horizontal lanes on a virtual whiteboard with cards representing work flowing from step to step. Well, LeanKit has now announced the launch of groundbreaking new features that allow even the largest enterprise portfolio and projects to be managed using multiple levels of drill-down Kanban boards, detailed sub-taskboards, and roll-up Lean metrics - as well as a complete overhaul of their user interface that makes LeanKit more attractive, more intuitive, and easier to manage. If you haven't checked out LeanKit or haven't lately, check out the website to explore how they can help Lean-Agile scale within your organization. Visit LeanKit Kanban! (and say hello for the SPaMCAST!) Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 196 will feature my inteview with Jeff Anderson of Deloitte on topics that spanned lean, kanban and using the ideas from lean startups as a process improvement tool. Wow . . .

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 194! The SPaMCAST 194 features my interview with Peter Taylor. We discussed his new book, The Lazy Project Manager and The Project From Hell. We all have had one . . . Peter's book provides a path to avoid your next project from heck! Simply put: SPEAKER: AUTHOR: TRAINER: COACH: CONSULTANT In depth: Peter is a dynamic and commercially astute professional who has achieved notable success in business.His background is in project management and marketing across three major business areas over the last 28 years and with the last 8 years building and leading PMOs. He is an accomplished communicator, a professional speaker, workshop trainer and PM/PMO consultant. Peter is the author of ‘The Lazy Project Manager’, The Lazy Winner’ and ‘The Lazy Project Manager and the Project from Hell’ (Infinite Ideas), as well as ‘Leading Successful PMOs’ (Gower). More information can be found at www.thelazyprojectmanager.com and www.leadingsuccessfulpmos.com and www.thelazywinner.com – and through his free podcasts in iTunes. The SPaMCAST 194 is sponsored by LeanKit Kanban. By now, most of you in the Lean-Agile community have heard of LeanKit, recognized by community leaders and practitioners alike as the most flexible and powerful tool available for implementing visual management. Since their launch in 2009, LeanKit has helped hundreds of companies around the world to quickly and easily model even very complex processes as vertical and horizontal lanes on a virtual whiteboard with cards representing work flowing from step to step. Well, LeanKit has now announced the launch of groundbreaking new features that allow even the largest enterprise portfolio and projects to be managed using multiple levels of drill-down Kanban boards, detailed sub-taskboards, and roll-up Lean metrics - as well as a complete overhaul of their user interface that makes LeanKit more attractive, more intuitive, and easier to manage. If you haven't checked out LeanKit or haven't lately, check out the website to explore how they can help Lean-Agile scale within your organization. Visit LeanKit Kanban! (and say hello for the SPaMCAST!) Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV NextThe Software Process and Measurement Cast 195 will feature my essay on the impact of routine on change, innovaton and goals!

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 193! The SPaMCAST 193 features my essay tilled Hyper-Conectivity and Illusions. I sat in a meeting a few weeks ago and after about ten minutes I was brought up short. Everyone was paying attention; not one laptop was open nor was anyone reading an email or text under the table (by the way you really can't hide by texting under the table). People were taking notes "old school" on paper. The meeting ended on-time after 25 minutes meeting the objective and with the promise of minutes. I was shocked by the seeming efficiency and effectiveness so I lingered after the meeting to discuss my observations with my sponsor. The SPaMCAST 193 is sponsored by LeanKit Kanban. By now, most of you in the Lean-Agile community have heard of LeanKit, recognized by community leaders and practitioners alike as the most flexible and powerful tool available for implementing visual management. Since their launch in 2009, LeanKit has helped hundreds of companies around the world to quickly and easily model even very complex processes as vertical and horizontal lanes on a virtual whiteboard with cards representing work flowing from step to step. Well, LeanKit has now announced the launch of groundbreaking new features that allow even the largest enterprise portfolio and projects to be managed using multiple levels of drill-down Kanban boards, detailed sub-taskboards, and roll-up Lean metrics - as well as a complete overhaul of their user interface that makes LeanKit more attractive, more intuitive, and easier to manage. If you haven't checked out LeanKit or haven't lately, check out the website to explore how they can help Lean-Agile scale within your organization. Visit LeanKit Kanban! (and say hello for the SPaMCAST!) In the near future the essay componenent of the Software Process and Measurement Cast will be adding new contnent. The Cast will begin an evolution to a magazine format. Bill Fox will be the first of the SPaMCAST Magazine's contributors! Interested in participating? Contact me at spamcastinfo@gmail.com. Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement Cast Email: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 194 will my interview with Peter Taylor, The Lazy Project Manager, talking about his new book The Lazy Project Manager and The Project From Hell.

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 192! The SPaMCAST 192 features my interview with Mitch Lacey. We discuss his new book, The Scrum Field Guide. Mitch Lacey is an agile practitioner and consultant and is the founder of Mitch Lacey & Associates, Inc., a software consulting and training firm. Mitch specializes in helping companies realize gains in efficiency by adopting agile principles and practices such as Scrum and Extreme Programming. Mitch is a self-described “tech nerd” who started his technology career in 1991 at Accolade Software in San Jose, CA, a computer gaming company. After working as a software test engineer, a test manager, a developer, and a variety of other jobs in between, he settled on his true calling, project and program management. Mitch was a formally trained program manager before adding agile to his project tool belt. He began developing agile skills at Microsoft Corporation, where his team successfully released core enterprise services for Windows Live, where he has two patents pending. Mitch’s first agile team was coached by Ward Cunningham, Jim Newkirk, and David Anderson. Mitch cut his agile teeth working as a product owner or ScrumMaster on a variety of projects. He continued to grow his skills to the point where he was able to help other teams adopt agile practices. Today, with more than 16 years of experience under his belt, Mitch continues to develop his craft by experimenting and practicing with project teams at many different organizations. As a Certified Scrum Trainer (CST) and a PMI Project Management Professional (PMP), Mitch shares his experience in project and client management through Scrum Alliance Certified Scrum courses, agile coaching engagements, conference presentations, blogs, and white papers. Mitch works with companies across the world, from Austria to Colombia, California to Florida, Portugal to Turkey, and just about everywhere in between. Mitch has presented at a variety of conferences worldwide, is the conference chair for Agile 2012, on the board of directors for the Agile Alliance and was on the board of directors of the Scrum Alliance. Web: http://www.mitchlacey.com/ Twitter: mglacey Buy the Scrum Field Guide (dead tree) Kindle The SPaMCAST 182 is sponsored by LeanKit Kanban. LeanKit Kanban is a software tool for kanban that is as simple to use as physical kanban. If you put it up on a touchscreen in your team area, it practically IS physical kanban. But your boards are available from anywhere, and updated in real-time. A slew of colors, icons, and avatars take your visual signaling to the next level. And the system tracks the metrics for you, providing analytics on bottlenecks, lead time, work distribution, process efficiency, and variability - for a single board or a whole company. It's kanban for the Lean enterprise. FYI . . . something special is coming to LeanKit Kanban. Words like enterprise portfolio and groundbreaking, More to come soon! I am working on several projects with friends that we are using kanban to control flow. We are using LeanKit Kanban as a mechanism to keep the project on track and organized. LeanKit allows us to share the Kanban board across the miles with ease! Visit LeanKit Kanban! (and say hello for the SPaMCAST!) Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 193 will feature my essay on the impact of routine on change, innovaton and goals!

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 191! The SPaMCAST 191 features part 2 of my essay "Who Owns Estimation In Agile Projects?" Haven't listened to Part 1? Click the link! Part two begins: What does ownership mean in terms of accountability and responsibility? When something belongs to you or is directly related to your actions, accountability and responsibility are directly inferable. Unfortunately, even though we are quick to assign ownership, responsibility and accountability we fail to ask, who really should own an estimate or whether they can be accountable for the estimate if they can’t do the work or control those that do. In corporate environments, ownership is generally not about ensuring the best flow of information but rather who can be pilloried when an estimate is missed. Sound like hyperbole? I recently heard a C level executive say “whose neck can I wring if we miss the date and the budget” when talking about a project, therefore a quick tour of the why estimates are created and who “should” own them in an agile environment is in order if for no other reason than health and human safety. Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News! . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 192 features my interview with Mitch Lacey. We discuss his new book, The Scrum Field Guide. It was a great interview filled with useful advice.

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 190! The SPaMCAST 190 features my interview with Raja Bavani. We discussed distributed agile! Raja Bavani is Chief Architect of MindTree’s Product Engineering Services (PES) and IT Services (ITS) groups and plays the role of agile evangelist. He has more than 20 years of experience in the IT industry and has published papers at international conferences on topics related to Code Quality, Distributed Agile, Customer Value Management and Software Estimation. His IT experience started during the early 90s, when he was involved in porting a leading ERP product across various UNIX platforms. Later he moved onto products that involved data mining and master data management. During early 2000, he worked with some of the niche independent software vendors in the hospitality and finance domains. At MindTree, he has worked with some of the top vendors of virtualization platforms, business service management solutions and health care products. His areas of interests include Global Delivery Model, Agile Software Development, Requirements Engineering, Software Architecture, Software Reuse, Customer Value Management, Knowledge Management, and IT Outsourcing. He is a member of IEEE and IEEE Computer Society. He regularly interfaces with educational institutions to offer guest lectures and writes for technical conferences. Also, he writes for magazines such as Agile Record, Cutter IT Journal and SD Times. He blogs on Distributed Agile at http://www.mindtree.com/blogs/author/raja-bavani Raja's blog on Software Engineering and his articles and white papers are available at http://se-thoughtograph.blogspot.com He can be reached at raja_bavani@mindtree.com Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." News just in . . . We also just got word that the SPM book has been adopted for a class at the University of West Flroida for the Fall. Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV Next The Software Process and Measurement Cast 191 will return to my essay "Who Owns Agile Estimation."

Welcome to the Software Process and Measurement Cast 189! The Software Process and Measurement Cast 189 features my essay on the use of experiments to support process improvement programs. The essay begins: Is the use of experiments part of your process improvement culture? When I’m at conferences or networking events, I get asked whether or not an idea or technique will work in a specific organization or situation. In many cases the answer I give is that in reality, it depends. I know that sounds like common consultant speak but what “it depends” means is that to really understand if something could work, you need to determine how to balance organizational culture, people, skills and the assets that can be deployed (not all tools are good). The only way to increase the knowledge needed to forecast success of any specific change is through experimentation in a real world environment. Shameless Ad for my book! Mastering Software Project Management: Best Practices, Tools and Techniques co-authored by Murali Chematuri and myself and published by J. Ross Publishing. We have received unsolicited reviews like the following: "This book will prove that software projects should not be a tedious process, neither for you or your team." Have you bought your copy? Contact information for the Software Process and Measurement CastEmail: spamcastinfo@gmail.comVoicemail: +1-206-888-6111Website: www.spamcast.netTwitter: www.twitter.com/tcagleyFacebook: http://bit.ly/16fBWV NextIn the SPaMCAST 190 we have a return visit by Raja Bavani of Mindtree. We discussed distributed agile. Is was a great interview and a VERY pertinent topic for anyone practicing agile, methodologists or those who manage agile organizations.