Michael Lant

Software Archictecture, Development, Agile Methods and the Intersection of People Process and Technology

All Posts By:

Michael

Agile, Kanban, Project Management, Scrum, Scrumban, Software Development, Teams

Has Agile Lost Its Way?

Does anyone actually think that a Burn Down Chart contributes one iota to creating Better Software Sooner? In my view, it is one of the most anti-agile things that we can do and it provides absolutely no value to anyone other than perhaps the executive suite so that they can have a nice, warm fuzzy feeling that we have a pretty chart that has a nice slope to it and it looks like the one from last sprint.

Agile, Software Development

Occam’s Razor and the Art of Software Design

Occam’s Razor is a principle of simplicity that eliminates assumptions in support of a conclusion. The principle is valuable in virtually every aspect of life, but it essential to the success of software projects – in particular large complex ones. One of the guiding principles of Agile Methods it that we focus most on the things that provided the greatest value and Occam’s Razor is a valuable tool that helps maintain that focus.

Agile, Project Management, Scrum, Software Development, Technology

Estimate Story Size by Playing Agile Planning Poker

Over the years that I’ve been leading software development projects, I’ve used a number of methods including comparison of projects of similar size and complexity, Microsoft Project, Function Point Analysis or even simply guessing. There have been a few other trendy and perhaps oddball approaches thrown in for good measure. Curiously, regardless of method, the results have tended to be pretty much the same. There has, however, been one exception. I’ve gotten noticeably better results with Agile methods using Agile Planning Poker.