Re: Agile Baby Steps

[My response from the XP list]

Mike,

> Wow. I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed reading this.

I'm glad.

> On my current project I've been trying to introduce agile practices such as
> coding standards, unit testing, continuous integration, iterative
> development, and refactoring. I haven't been able to convince the
> management in my company to support any of these practices so I've mostly
> gone it alone, but I'm amazed at how closely the problems you described 
> mirror the ones that I've been having.

Getting management buy-in was extremely helpful in getting our own 
workspace, along with getting us started off on the right foot. In the day-to-day 
stuff, though, it's really up to the team how they're going to work. Without a full-
time Coach, it is difficult to maintain discipline unless the team is gung-ho on 
XP. This hurt us.

> One of the things I've struggled most with is convincing the developers that
> they can think for themselves rather than look to an authority figure (or
> design document) for absolute direction.

This was my highest priority for the project.

> I'll admit, I've been uncertain at
> many many points in the development with regard to my ability to walk the
> line between telling developers exactly what to do, as opposed to hanging
> them out with no support whatsoever.

This was a different situation on our project, where at least at the beginning
I was not the one people turned to for help with Java or ATG questions. The 
challenge for me was to work with our architect to help him resist the urge to 
dictate to the team, even when they were asking for it. I wanted to develop a 
team that thinks and collaborates, not follows blueprints.

> Most seem to crave the former, some
> to the point of openly criticizing me for not providing it, which tends to make
> me think that I lean too far toward the latter. Courage is, I find, a
> difficult value for me to hold on to.

When I felt this pressure, I usually tried to start by infuriating them a bit
and asking them how they would approach it. I suppose it is the therapist in 
me. We typically would pull a few other people into the conversation and it 
very rarely took on the tone of expert-to-novice.

> I wish I had thought to keep a similar diary for my current project. I've
> certainly learned a lot, and a couple of the developers have responded
> positively to the new practices. However, the team entire hasn't come
> together well, and I've completely botched up some interactions (like, for
> instance, with our QA department when they wouldn't test the app until it
> was "feature complete," or use the acceptance testing script language
> because they hadn't scheduled for writing scripts).

Having a co-located team working in short iterations was a huge advantage 
for us.

> Anyway, it's good to know that I'm not the only one for whom this isn't a
> slam dunk.

You can say that again. We still have a ways to go, but our progress has 
been encouraging.

--Dave


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