The Dream Team Nightmare - Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques
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The Dream Team Nightmare
Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques
This PDF file contains pages extracted from The Dream Team Nightmare,
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Copyright © 2013 The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or
transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording, or otherwise, without the prior consent of the publisher.
The Pragmatic Bookshelf
Dallas, Texas • Raleigh, North CarolinaThe Dream Team Nightmare
Boost Team Productivity Using Agile Techniques
Portia Tung
The Pragmatic Bookshelf
Dallas, Texas • Raleigh, North CarolinaMany of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book, and The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC was aware of a trademark claim, the desig- nations have been printed in initial capital letters or in all capitals. The Pragmatic Starter Kit, The Pragmatic Programmer, Pragmatic Programming, Pragmatic Bookshelf, PragProg and the linking g device are trademarks of The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC. Every precaution was taken in the preparation of this book. However, the publisher assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages that may result from the use of information (including program listings) contained herein. Our Pragmatic courses, workshops, and other products can help you and your team create better software and have more fun. For more information, as well as the latest Pragmatic titles, please visit us at http://pragprog.com. The team that produced this book includes: Lynn Beighley (editor) Molly McBeath (copyeditor) David J Kelly (typesetter) Janet Furlow (producer) Juliet Benda (rights) Ellie Callahan (support) Copyright © 2013 The Pragmatic Programmers, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior consent of the publisher. Printed in the United States of America. ISBN-13: 978-1-937785-71-0 Encoded using the finest acid-free high-entropy binary digits. Book version: P1.0—December 2013
To Snow Dragon For making dreams come true
6
About You
Your name is Jim Hopper. You’ve worked with a dozen agile
teams in the past three years. You’ve typically worked as an
agile coach-consultant hired by companies at the start of
their agile journey. Of the teams you’ve coached, six have
continued to flourish long after you left, while others have
stagnated. You found out last week that the most recent of
the teams you’ve coached has abandoned agile altogether
and returned to waterfall in order to meet a deadline.
Your background is diverse. You began working as a soft-
ware developer in the dot-com boom coding in Java. Then
you moved on to coding in .NET. You came across agile
through XP (which is short for extreme programming). After
five years as a software developer, you became a develop-
ment manager and tried to introduce Scrum into an
organization with limited success.
Eventually, you learned how to increase business agility by
implementing a hybrid of agile methods (such as XP, Scrum,
and Kanban) and lean.
You haven’t written production code for almost a decade,
so you can’t claim to be a developer anymore. However,
having been a software developer has given you practical
insight into the complex nature of software development.
Specializing in organizational change through people and
process improvement is hard work. Given the ups and
downs of your agile coaching track record, your reputation
is now at stake. The outcome of your latest engagement will
determine if you stick with agile coaching or give up doing
what you love.
Your CV is available on LinkedIn on page 269.
Continue with the adventure on page 7.
• Click HERE to purchase this book now. discuss7
Meet Your Team
Today is your first day at Love Inc., an award-winning online
dating business. You’ve just been introduced to your new
team as their agile coach.
“We call ourselves the ‘Dream Team,’” begins Ben, the team
lead, as he shakes your hand. “Most of us come from a
waterfall background. We’ve been experimenting with the
agile methodology for the past eighteen months and things
just don’t seem to be working out.”
“What specific challenges is the team facing?” you ask the
group.
“We’ve been wasting our time on getting the team to collab-
orate instead of building our product,” blurts out Jason, one
of the developers.
“We run around like headless chickens,” says Matt, another
developer. “I’ve been with the company since it started and
I’ve never seen so little progress in such a long time.”
“Does anyone actually know where we are on the project
plan?” asks William, another developer. “By my count, we
haven’t shipped any software for at least the past three
months.”
Most people shake their heads, while others groan and shift
in their chairs.
“One of our biggest problems is the large number of issues
raised by the business,” says Nancy, the tester. “We spend
a lot of time debating if an issue is a defect or a change in
requirement.”
“Discussions about issues with the business always end in
an argument,” adds William.
“The result is that we now have a reputation for producing
the worst-quality software the business has ever seen,” says
Ben.
“What would the business people say if they were here?”
you ask.
• Click HERE to purchase this book now. discuss8
Another developer, Roger, replies. “I know exactly what
Cassandra, our product owner, would say.” Roger does what
can only be an impression of Cassandra as he places both
hands on his hips and says in a suddenly high-pitched voice,
“The team makes up requirements that nobody wants.”
Roger relaxes, then mutters, “Personally, I can’t believe that
customers wouldn’t find that funky widget we came up with
useful. It uses the latest front-to-back web technology stack.”
Ben continues. “Our reply to the business would be, ‘If only
you can tell us exactly what you want, we would build it
for you.’” Ben shakes his head. “All we need is for the busi-
ness people to stop changing their minds every five seconds,”
he adds.
“So how long have you got to help us sort out our prob-
lems?” asks Matt as everyone turns toward you.
You remain silent for a moment. “The management has
given us five days to come up with an action plan to get
things moving forward again,” you say.
Do you:
• continue with the adventure on page 9,
• first review a confidential company report compiled by
an external consultant on page 234, or
• review the email describing the goals of your mission
at Love Inc. on page 240?
• Click HERE to purchase this book now. discuss269
APPENDIX 2
LinkedIn: Jim Hopper
Agile consultant-coach with a passion for people, process,
and continuous improvement, in search of projects and teams
that want to challenge themselves to do better. Assists teams
in delivering more business value faster for less cost. Special-
izes in the pragmatic application of agile methods and lean.
EXPERIENCE
Hopper Consulting—Agile Consultant-Coach
• The Big Cookie Company: Coached one team as part of
a pilot project to try agile
• Griffiths & Bond Private Banking: Created and delivered
intermediate agile training to teams with 5+ years of
agile; trained trainers to deliver training, as well as
coached 6 individual delivery teams (3 in UK, 1 in US,
1 in APAC)
• Skymiles: Coached 2 teams as part of a company-wide
initiative to adopt agile
• World Airlines: Coached 3 teams as part of a company-
wide initiative to adopt agile
Independent Broadcasting Corporation
• Development Manager: Introduced Scrum into the IT
department as part of a continuous improvement
initiative
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