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April 07, 2009: A Well-Formed Job Ticket

It’s common place to use some sort of ticket system to log work, whether it is a new project or supporting an existing system. I’ve come to the conclusion that writing and commenting a ticket is a special skill that requires thoughtful deliberation on the audiences involved. I’ve decomposed a ticket into what I consider essential elements.

January 26, 2009: Agile Meeting Practices: Visible Indicators, Retrospectives, Time Boxed Work, and Ice Cream

A lot was riding on a recent planning and estimating meeting. The big launch is coming up, and we needed to plan out several enhancements to a client’s custom application – refine business logic, create tasks and estimate hours for those tasks. Once again, Agile practices gave us the tools to do the work at hand.

January 14, 2009: Exploring Agile Teams

It’s my privilege to be on the Client Services team at Sundog. Recently we’ve had personality training (called “Insights”) as a way of fostering an even stronger team environment. This has got me thinking about what I’ve learned from Agile project management methods regarding creating and building cohesive and healthy teams. 

December 02, 2008: I iterate, therefore I am.

When talking with the head of our Customer Experience initiative, he made a passing comment about the results of a recent Sundog customer satisfaction survey. Those with the lower scores were stakeholders who were not involved in an iterative meeting process. As we move from adopting Agile into having an evaluated and mature model, we see measurable indicators of its value (to both the client and the service agency).

November 26, 2008: Agile, not just another corporate buzzword…

Agile is one of those corporate buzzwords that has been used to the point where it is almost meaningless. IBM did a great television commercial about ”Corporate Buzzword Bingo”, acknowledging the way words lose their meaning when overused. In my world, “agile” isn’t something you are, it is something you DO and also HOW you do it. Agile is a project approach that places value on the client’s role in the team, in getting product to market sooner, and team efficiency. It’s simple, it’s effective, and most of all, it’s creative and I have fun doing it. If you’re not familiar with Agile or Scrum methodologies, I’d like to introduce you to them.