[AM] AM and Project Mangement

[l***@marinedata.co.za]

Hi

I have been through the entire AM web site and read every single
essay(twice). I am an ardent supporter and practioner of AM methods.
However no where is anytning mentioned about Project Management
principles an how its supported by AM. e.g. what are the PM artifacts in
AM and how are tasks, resources, time schedules managed in an Agile
project.

I still find myself hauling out MS Project to get the project scope
documented and to report back to stakeholders on project schedules. Do
other Agile modelers find themesleves in the same situation.

Thanks
Lester

For more information about AM, visit the Agile Modeling Home Page at www.agilemodeling.com
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[Paul Oldfield]

(responding to Lester)

Post by l***@marinedata.co.za
I have been through the entire AM web site and read every
single essay(twice). I am an ardent supporter and practioner
of AM methods. However no where is anytning mentioned
about Project Management principles an how its supported
by AM. e.g. what are the PM artifacts in AM and how are
tasks, resources, time schedules managed in an Agile
project.

Agile Modeling is not a full methodology, and does not deal
directly with Project Management aspects, it specialises
in Modelling. Similarly "Appropriate Process" specialises
in Process and practices, XP specialises in programming
with some strong overlap into analysis and design, weak
overlap into management (IMHO).

You might find Scrum interesting, it's an agile approach
centred around software development project management.

Consider investigating the online forums:
http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/scrumdevelopment
http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/agilemanagement
http://groups.yahoo.com/groups/agileprojectmanagement

However, all these groups seem to interpret their remit
rather broadly, and we do just occasionally touch on
management issues on this forum.

Post by l***@marinedata.co.za
I still find myself hauling out MS Project to get the project
scope documented and to report back to stakeholders on
project schedules. Do other Agile modelers find
themesleves in the same situation.

The trouble with using such a tool for planning is that
somebody may believe what it says. Beyond the
first few weeks, I wouldn't want to say very much about
what I expected to happen.

A common agile approach is to capture 'Implied
Requirements' - some sort of placeholder to say there
are more details to come on the topic. These are arranged
into a prioritised list (not too much detail on the priority of
low-priority requirements) and at least the higher priority
requirements have enough detail to allow estimates of effort
to be made. By ordering the requirements in order of
priority, and adding the effort estimates, you get a rough
idea of when each requirement will be worked on.

The advantage of this approach is that it's reasonably
flexible in case the customer adds new requirements or
changes priority on existing ones.

The XP practice "The Planning Game" goes into this in
detail, as does Scrum with its "Product Backlog".

For a starter on some of these topics, try following
links starting from
www.aptprocess.com/whitepapers/risk/RiskToPatternTable_files/FeatureCreep.h
tm


Paul Oldfield

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
www.aptprocess.com

any opinions expressed herein are not necessarily those of
Mentors of Cally or the Appropriate Process Movement
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

For more information about AM, visit the Agile Modeling Home Page at www.agilemodeling.com
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[Scott Ambler]

Responding to two of Paul's postings at once.

- Scott

Post by Paul Oldfield
(responding to Lester)

Post by l***@marinedata.co.za
I have been through the entire AM web site and read every
single essay(twice). I am an ardent supporter and practioner
of AM methods. However no where is anytning mentioned
about Project Management principles an how its supported
by AM. e.g. what are the PM artifacts in AM and how are
tasks, resources, time schedules managed in an Agile
project.

Agile Modeling is not a full methodology, and does not deal
directly with Project Management aspects, it specialises
in Modelling. Similarly "Appropriate Process" specialises
in Process and practices, XP specialises in programming
with some strong overlap into analysis and design, weak
overlap into management (IMHO).

On the home page (www.agilemodeling.com) I hope that it's clear that the
scope of AM is modeling and documentation only. The assumption is that
there is an underlying process which takes into account other issues such
as project management, implementation, ...


<snip>

Post by Paul Oldfield

Post by l***@marinedata.co.za
I still find myself hauling out MS Project to get the project
scope documented and to report back to stakeholders on
project schedules. Do other Agile modelers find
themesleves in the same situation.

The trouble with using such a tool for planning is that
somebody may believe what it says. Beyond the
first few weeks, I wouldn't want to say very much about
what I expected to happen.

I've found that I can do significant amounts of planning using simple tools
such as whiteboards, paper, and string.

I will sometimes transcribe a high-level Gantt chart into MS project if the
client requires it, and is willing to pay for it, but for the most part I
find MS project to be a waste of time. The secret is to use about 5% of
its features.
<snip>

Post by Paul Oldfield
(responding to Lester)

Post by l***@marinedata.co.za
My main concern with AM without PM comes with task
commitment and the timing thereof. When a developer
is given free reign of his/her time they tend to be overly
agile with timely deliverables. So something that could
have taken a week could end up taking two weeks,
because there is a sense of "what the heck" its agile,
we can change schedules without too much fuss. The
deliverable artifact is going to change anyway so why
must it be delivered this week. This attitude can then
add "time wasted" creep into software project schedules
which are almost always already under estimated.

'Agile' doesn't have to imply 'Undisciplined'. You still
need appropriate management practices. Agile
Modeling doesn't say what those practices should be.

Exactly. They're out of scope.

Post by Paul Oldfield
I'd be concerned about AM without PM, so I wouldn't
do AM without PM, I'd add in some PM and any other
aspects of development that need addressing - some
coding and testing, perhaps?

Sounds like a good idea to me.

Post by Paul Oldfield
<snip>
There are all sorts of techniques and practices in the
bag of agile 'tricks', but you will need to look elsewhere
than Agile Modeling to find them, unless they are about
modelling.

Or documentation!

Post by Paul Oldfield
There's a lot of useful information about
practices under the Risk Management section on
www.aptprocess.com but this isn't arranged into a
methodology, it's really designed as an 'add-on' to
what you get in a methodology, for where specific
risks are covered inadequately. One could build a
process from scratch from the practices, but it's surely
better to start from one of the 'off-the-peg' starting
points such as XP, Crystal, FDD or Scrum. Agile
Modeling, Agile Database, Appropriate Process
and Agile Project Management are all dealing with
specific aspects of development, rather than being
full methodologies.

Yes. Check out
http://www.sdmagazine.com/documents/s=8958/sdm0312h/sdm0312h.html for an
interesting discussion of methods.

<snip>
- Scott

For more information about AM, visit the Agile Modeling Home Page at www.agilemodeling.com
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