Agile Development
ARKANSAS BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD
RSFOX@ARKBLUECROSS.COM
(501) 396-4160
Tuesday 9/25, 8:40 - 9:20
Biography
Robert Fox - Data Architect, Arkansas Blue Cross Blue Shield
•17 years of data architecture and warehousing
experience in the finance, telecom, and health
insurance industries.
•Installed over 50 data warehouses worldwide, some
loading more than 4.5 terabytes of new transactional
data per day.
•Guest lecturer in information management masters
degree programs at 3 universities.
•Speaker at national conferences for Oracle, Fidelity,
and MDM-CDI.
Abstract - Agile IT is about finding balance
The term “Agile Development” is used in several ways. Most commonly, the
phrase is used in a narrow sense to refer strictly to the development phase of a
software development project. In this presentation, I will be using the phrase in a
much larger sense: creating an IT organization that is agile in ALL of its parts.
I think the term “Agile” itself is misleading. According to the dictionary, “agile”
means “nimble, quick, and flexible”. This definition makes it appear that this
“agile” thing we are seeking is an extreme, the opposite of “rigid.” Many of the
proponents of agile development take this view. I believe, however, that agility is
not an extreme, but a balancing act between extremes:
 balancing the desire for continual user feedback with the need to let
developers remain focused
 balancing the need for predictability with the need for flexibility
 balance the development of strategic, technical infrastructure with the
need to respond to immediate business requests
 balancing the need to provide self-service interfaces with the need for
controlling the quality of data and processes
All too often, organizations adopting “agile development” completely abandon
their existing processes (which were unbalanced in one direction) in order to
adopt an unbalanced polar opposite process.
Ideally, mature agile development is about finding the correct balance across the
entire organization.
Agenda
Balancing the Building Blocks of an Agile IT Organization
Organization
Structure
Agile Development Methodology
Balancing the need for continuous feedback with the
need to keep developers focused
Organization
Structure
Traditional Development
a.k.a. “waterfall,” or “release”
PRO’s
Analysis
•
Design
•
Develop
Test
Implement
Works well for:
•
Large, complex projects involving many
inter-related components or
departments
•
Projects which are foundational to
future projects
•
Supported by most project
management software
Very clear, up-front understanding
of entire timeline
Clear lines of responsibility
CON’s
•
•
•
•
Sequential
Not iterative
Requestor not involved in most of
the process
Long time between request and
delivery
“Agile” Development
Time-boxed scope
Cross-functional
development
Works well for:
•
Small projects which can be completed
in isolation from other resources and
projects
•
Projects which, while perhaps critical
on their own, are not critical to future
projects
•
Small development shops where
everyone is working on the same
project
PRO’s
•
•
Very rapid response to changing
needs
Requestor involved throughout
process
CON’s
•
•
•
•
No clear insight into long-term
timeline, resource needs, cost, etc.
Not well suited to most project
management tools
Difficult to coordinate strategy and
architecture across sprints and
projects
Responsibilities less clear
This Is Really Two Issues
• Finding the right balance of interaction between
requestor and developer
• Finding the right balance of administrative effort
necessary for management insight
Lets think about them separately…
Balancing Levels of Interaction
During Software Development
Working in teams
• Can keep work from
being done wrong, but
can also keep any work
from being done at all.
Working in isolation
• Can keep people
focused, but they can
be focused on the
wrong things
Finding the Balance
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
We need isolation to focus, but we need to come
together for vision.
We need to get together as soon as there is a
question, not at the next weekly meeting.
We need to develop an environment where
people are not reluctant to get out of their cubes
and go sit down with someone else to work
things out.
Identify your best communicators
Give them a title that recognizes and encourages
this skill
Make sure they are assigned to critical projects
Use them to mentor other members of the team
Agile Project Management
Balancing the need for management insight with the need
to minimize project overhead
Organization
Structure
Why do YOU need PM?
The questions isn’t as simple as you
might think.
PM is absolutely necessary for
management insight, but in many
cases it has become a tool for
looking over peoples shoulders
because you don’t trust them to do
their jobs.
Ask yourself, “If we backed off on
project management, what’s the
worst that could happen?”
Is Oversight Needed Because of
Cowboy Developers?
Will the developers play
with technical toys if you
don’t have PM oversight?
Ask yourself it they are they
willfully violating standards,
or is the problem that there
are no standards?
Maybe you told them “what” the standards are, but never told
them “why” these standards are needed
Most people will do the right thing if they know what it is, and
agree that it’s right in the long run, and it’s not too much harder in
the short term.
“Doctor Fun” by David Farley, October 2002
Business Goals versus Natural Desires
“Do what I tell you to
do, or else…”
Job Security
“If you do things this way,
here’s what will happen…”
Recognition
Business
Goal
Social/Fun
Weak
Commitment
Strong
Commitment
Business
Goal
Family
Creativity
It could be that the reason your organization needs so much PM Oversight is that your people
haven’t bought into the vision. Most people will do the right thing, if they understand what and
why in terms that are personally meaningful
Finding the Balance
• Clearly document standards and processes
• Communicate the vision of the future made
possible by these standards, and put in terms
relevant to the target audience
• Invest in the tools and
infrastructure necessary
to make following the
standards easier than
violating them
Oversight Needed Because of
Weak Supervisors?
Are the supervisors:
• Incapable of adapting to changing
conditions, and you need PM oversight to
steer their projects for them?
• Incapable of locking down scope creep?
• Incapable of enforcing standards?
In many cases, this is due to the same
problem of communication of standards and
vision.
In some cases, however, it is not.
Agile Organization Structure
Balancing the need for creative thinking with the need for
well-defined, repeatable process
Organization
Structure
Predictabilty vs Flexability
Two Approaches to Project Management
• The Factory Floor
• Research and Development
Balancing Lessons From Jack
• Understand which processes are
“cookie-cutter” and which are not,
and manage them differently
• Put the right people in the right roles
Jack Welch – CEO of GE
Fortune Magazine “Manager of the Century”
Maybe it’s not weak supervisors,
but a weak organization chart
Creative Roles
• Development
• Strategic Planning
• User Interface Design
• Training
• Documentation
• Tool Selection
•
Solution Oriented
Quality Roles
• QA/Testing
• Change Management
• Security
• Operations
• Audit
• Compliance
•
Process Oriented
Agile Development Can Be an
Organizational Issue
Project Flow
Often, development is not agile because the same resources are asked to focus
on too many things. Organization should reflect functional responsibility.
We know better than to let developers test their own code. But do you know to
separate creative development from rigid operations? To separate tactical
development from strategic architecture?
Know when to hold ‘em, and
know when to fold ‘em…
• Was it an issue with
communication of
standards or vision?
• Was it an example of
misplaced skillset?
• Or was it a case where the
person needs to be let go?
Adding permanent project
management overhead should
be a last resort, not a first.
Agile Architecture
Balancing the need to invest in tomorrow’s infrastructure
with the need to meet the demands of the business today
Organization
Structure
Today versus Tomorrow
Strategic
Determining long range destination
and planning a path to it
Tactical
Keeping the lights on. Meeting day to
day business demands
These should be
different roles
Navigating
Piloting
Finding the balance
How do you balance the need to get things done
quickly and cheaply with the need to prepare for
the future?
• Dedicate resources to developing and maintaining a 3-5
year strategy for ALL the functional areas of your
organization. Include both what the future looks like,
and a tentative roadmap to get there.
• During budgeting process each year, make sure to ask for
funds for any IT-sponsored, strategic projects.
• When tactical business requests come in, analyze each to
see how it can be implemented in a way that aligns with
the long term strategy.
Agile Business Intelligence
Balancing the need to remove development bottleneck
with the need to ensure data is used appropriately
Organization
Structure
Agile Means “IT is Not a Bottleneck”
“Enterprises where IT addresses more than 20% of BI
requirements will continue to see the snowball effect of an evergrowing BI requests backlog”
Boris Evelson - Forrester Research
“BI requirements change faster than an IT-centric model can keep
up”
Jim Ericson - Editorial director of Information Management
Maybe what we should be looking at isn’t
turning around IT projects faster,
but instead architecting a managed platform
where the business is able to self-serve their
information needs using “safe” information.
Finding the balance
• Implement business rules in the database, not in
business reports
• Build specialized data marts for specific data domains
• Provide awesome meta data
• Use tools that can explore prebuilt dimensional
cubes, and drill through to prebuilt detail reports
• Clean up your data
• Make it easier for your users to user your vetted data
than to try to pull it themselves
• Stamp out private copies of data
Summary – Agile IT Organizations
Balancing the need to remove development bottleneck
with the need to ensure data is used appropriately
Organization
Structure