We all know that Agile is has been around for a while now. You have probably heard about it a thousand times already over the past few years. But even today there are organizations (e.g. Utilities – that prefer CapEx) that rely heavily on the waterfall model for software development – whereby all the project and implementations details are agreed to by the stakeholders upfront. In the past, this practice has proved to be risky, inflexible, too time consuming and costly at the beginning of the project. When starting any new project, even when applying all possible game theory outcomes to determine the risk and estimated effort, at some point you don’t know what you don’t know. The methodology of Agile helps alleviate some of these issues. Using various methodologies, the process of Agile allows for the requirements to evolve and change, and a team comprised of developers and experts from various organizational areas work together to address the tasks as they evolve. This type of a setup is typically led by a Scrum Master that leads regular checkpoint meetings with the stakeholders, helps break down the work into smaller chunks to be picked up by the developers, and sets up timelines for completion and accountability.
There are several methodologies and frameworks that you can follow to be more Agile – for example, you can use Scrum methodology, Test-Driven Development, DevOps, Continuous Integration, Continuous Delivery, Kanban, Extreme Programming, and more. The idea is to be able to provide flexibility and avoiding lock-in to a set process or tools, and have regular checkpoints with the stakeholders so that any shifts in directly can be accommodated earlier in the cycle.
The Manifesto for Agile Software Development outlines the following four values:
- Individuals and Interactions over processes and tools
- Working Software over comprehensive documentation
- Customer Collaboration over contract negotiation
- Responding to Change over following a plan
It also follows the following twelve principles:
- Customer satisfaction by early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
- Welcome changing requirements, even in late development.
- Deliver working software frequently (weeks rather than months)
- Close, daily cooperation between business people and developers
- Projects are built around motivated individuals, who should be trusted
- Face-to-face conversation is the best form of communication (co-location)
- Working software is the primary measure of progress
- Sustainable development, able to maintain a constant pace
- Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design
- Simplicity—the art of maximizing the amount of work not done—is essential
- Best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams
- Regularly, the team reflects on how to become more effective, and adjusts accordingly
The Product Owner is one of the most important stakeholders in the Agile process. Product Owner is responsible for setting the overall strategy and direction for the deliverable that is being worked. It is quite easy to miss the big picture of what is being delivered and why, because the Scrum tasks are at a very low level. The Product Owner’s role is to help make sense of all the small unrelated tasks, to deliver a product that provides business value to the organization.
Keyva has offerings available to help you with your Agile journey. You can find more information here. Please contact us if you’d like to have us review your environment and provide suggestions on what might work for you. Simply drop us a line here: [email protected]
Chief Technology Officer
Anuj Tuli is the chief technology officer at Keyva. In this role, he specializes in developing and delivering vendor-agnostic solutions that avoid the “rip-and-replace” of existing IT investments. Tuli helps customers chart a prescriptive strategy for Application Containerization, CI/CD Pipeline Implementations, API abstraction, Application Modernization, and Cloud Automation integrations. He leads the development and management of Cloud Automation IP and related professional services. With an application developer background, he provides a hands-on perspective towards various technologies.
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