Agile 101: Tools

Tom Mochal, PgMP, PMP, TSPM is the president of TenStep, Inc., a methodology development, consulting and training company. Tom won the Distinguished Contribution Award from the Project Management Institute for his work spreading knowledge of project management around the world. He is a speaker, lecturer, instructor and consultant to companies and organizations around the world.

  Agile   ProjectsAtWork  

Agile teams strive to use the simplest tool that will do the job. For communication and reporting, manual tools are often sufficient. For testing and implementation, however, more sophisticated, automated tools are needed to support the complexities and short cycles of Agile projects.

Many aspects of the Agile model make use of tools. Most of the time Agile teams use the simplest tool that will perform the job. In the testing and implementation processes, however, the focus is on more rigorous and sophisticated tools.

Most Agile projects do not have a formal project manager, but there is still work that falls within the project management realm. For instance, creating simple schedules, communicating and managing risk are all examples of project management work that successful Agile teams do well.

Agile teams approach project management in a way that is simple, collaborative and visual. For example, Agile teams typically do not create formal status reports, but that does not mean they don't communicate what is going on. A common approach is to have a central bulletin board with visual content that described the current sprint, status of user stories, any problems encountered, defects discovered, etc. This is often referred to as an Information Radiator.

Similarly, the Agile Team can identify the risks associated with the product backlog and the other aspects …

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