Date post: | 15-Dec-2014 |
Category: |
Documents |
Upload: | paula-de-matos |
View: | 1,816 times |
Download: | 1 times |
Scrum: Physical or virtual walls?Paula de Matos
What is this talk about?
2
versus
About me
Paula de MatosGroup Coordinator and User Experience Analyst at the EBI
Previous incarnations: • Java Technical Lead • Java Developer• Broadcast Engineer• Electronic Engineer
About the European Bioinformatics Institute
• Based on the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus near Cambridge, UK
• Non-profit organisation
• Close to 500 employees
• Aims to provide comprehensive biological data to scientists
My work
5
Team A (6 people)Team B (4 people)
Team C (4 people)
We like a physical cards and walls
We like physical cards and wall
We like software tools to manage our process
How I became an Agile fan?
6
Picture attribution, Toby Bradbury (Flickr) – Creative Commons License
7
Our Scrum-like process
Tasks
What is this talk based on?
• My own experience
• Survey: 23 respondents
• Scientific publications
8
Picture attribution, Flickr, The Bees
Unscientific survey: 23 respondents• Open ended questions
• Aim to get as broad a view as possible
• 65 % of respondents had experience with physical and software tools
9
Picture attribution, Flickr, The Bees
Respondents agile experience
10
Picture attribution, Flickr, The Bees
43%
43%
13%
< 3 years 3-10 years > 10 years
The academic literature
11
Picture attribution, Flickr, The Bees
• Sharp et al. (2006). The Role of Story Cards and the Wall in XP teams: a distributed cognition perspective.
• Sharp et al. (2008). Collaboration and co-ordination in mature eXtreme programming teams.
• Whittaker et al. (1999) Board meetings: the impact of scheduling medium on long term group coordination in software development.
The academic literature
12
Picture attribution, Flickr, The Bees
• Methods: mainly observation and ethnography
• Distributed Cognition Analysis:• Physical theme• Physical artefacts• Information flow
What do I mean by user story and taskboard?
13
What do I mean by user story?
14Picture attribution, Flickr, J Beau
How are user stories stored?
15
Picture attribution, Flickr, Natalia Osiatynska
10/04/2023
16Picture attribution, Flickr,Mircea Turcan
17Picture attribution, Flickr, Drew Stephens
18
Photo attribution: Roger Greenhalgh (Flickr) – under the Creative Commons license
19
What does the “taskboard” look like?
20
TODO IN PROGRESS
DONE
BLOCKERS
21
22
Photo attribution: Levent Ali (Flickr)– Creative Commons license
What are the advantages of physical walls?
23
Visual
24
Photo attribution: C. Fraser (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Coordination of resources
25
26
Photo attribution: Logan Ingalls (Flickr)– Creative Commons license
It’s easy to update the board
27
Photo attribution: Ha! Designs (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Sense of achievement
10/04/2023
28
Photo attribution: Welsh government (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Encourages personal communication between members
10/04/2023
29
Photo attribution: David Cosand (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Encourages personal communication between members and managers
10/04/2023
30
Photo attribution: David Cosand (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Holding a card engenders feelings of task ownership and responsibility
31
Photo attribution: Victor1558(Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Encourages reflection
10/04/2023
32
Photo attribution: Mike Baid (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Size limit of cards promotes collaboration
33
Photo attribution: Roger Mateo Poquet (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
What are the drawbacks of using physical cards?
34
Ghost cards
35Photo attribution: Mosieur J (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
No burndown charts or tie into project management software
36Photo attribution: Jeff Covey (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Hours, points or estimates need to be tallied manually
37
Photo attribution: Yum9me (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Geographical location
38
Readability
39
Photo attribution: Jim Barter (Flickr) – under the Creative Commons license
Missing in action
40
Photo attribution: Brenderous (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Archiving
41
Photo attribution: Damien Oz (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Space constraints
42
• Title• Estimate• Description• Stack trace• Bug tracker info• Additional
comments• Etc….
No tie into bug trackers and existing documentation
43 Photo attribution: Ivan Walsh (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
44
Unwieldy for large teams
Photo attribution: avlxyz (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Advantages of software solutions to manage your tasks and wall
45
Geographical location
46
• Team members and management• Meeting rooms
Automatic features – burndown charts, velocity
10/04/2023
47
Information rich story cards
48
Access archived sprints
10/04/2023
49
Tie into existing software systems
50 Photo attribution: Paolo Valdemarin (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Disadvantages of software solutions to manage your tasks and wall
51
Can become microtasking hell
52
Task 1
Task 1.1
Task 1.1.1
Task 1.1.2
Task 1.2
Task 1.2.1
Keeping it upto date is difficult
53 Photo attribution: Yon Garin (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Visibility is lost
54 Photo attribution: AV-1 (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Cards are not distinctive enough
55
Computers are full of distractions
56
Case study: The best of both worlds
57
We maintained the backlog using an agile software tool
58
User stories were exported to Excel
59
Cards were generated using an Excel visual basic script
60
Cards printed and subtasks were assigned using post-it notes
61
Check mockupsusers
Implement design
Test cases
Cards and subtasks were placed on a mobile board
62
At the end of sprint: post-its were chucked out and new stories printed
63
Tips on maintaining physical walls
64
Use effective stationery
65 Photo attribution: Ivan Di Carlo (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Place your wall in a prominent position
66
Use a transportable board if you need your wall to be mobile
67
Treat your cards with the respect they deserve
68
Tips on choosing software solutions
69
Compile a checklist of what you want the software to do
70
Photo attribution: Mistersnappy (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Consider your existing software infrastructure
71
Ease of use
72
Photo attribution: Ha! Designs (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Consider how you will replicate the tactile nature of the taskboard
73
Check mockupsusers
Implement design
Test cases
In summary
74
1st Conclusion
Choose a solution that suits the team, organisation, culture and environment.
75
Photo attribution: Jace Cooke (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
2nd Conclusion
Trial and error.
76
Photo attribution: Everyones idle (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
3rd Conclusion
Don’t underestimate the sensory nature of physical walls… think carefully about how that can be replicated in a software only solution.
77
Photo attribution: Nikki Duggan (Flickr) – Creative Commons license
Thanks
• Cheminformatics and Metabolism team members
• Survey respondents
• The authors of the academic literature cited
78