Scott RollinsSr. Agile Consultant| AccenturePleasanton, Ca, United States
I try to teach my scrum teams about the value of the 3 C's of a user story. Card, Conversation, and Confirmation. My team tends to be hooked on tools like Rally and Jira and want to skip the card piece and go right to the tool to create a user story. We continue to struggle with our velocity and shipping working software and I'm sure it's because we fail to hit the basics. How do other Agile Coaches communicate the basics like the 3 C's and using the card to write your user stories? Saving Changes...
Peter MorrisPM Consultant, Author| INDUS TechnologySan Antonio Texas, United States
The most successful Agile projects use Kanban boards to track WIP. JIRA & Rally are fine for historic documentation, but you can't beat a board you can bump into for fostering communication. The card is essential because what else would you use to nail the User Story to the Kanban Board with?
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1 reply by Suhail Iqbal
Jan 09, 2016 3:06 AM
Suhail Iqbal
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I agree that these attest tools are more IN these days but if you like you can start with introducing the cards.
Saving Changes...
Alistair DuguidTechnical Delivery Manager| Informatica CorporationShelton, Ct, United States
Peter, can you quote a source, or even a basis, for your assertion that "the most successful Agile projects use Kanban boards to track WIP"?
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1 reply by Al Shalloway
Mar 31, 2016 1:45 PM
Al Shalloway
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I am not sure there is a source for it, but as a long time Scrum coach (dating back to 1999) and a founder (no longer affiliated with) Lean Kanban University, I can say that when Scrum borrows from Kanban the Scrum improves. Visibility (explicit policies) and managing WIP, greatly improve Scrum. The biggest issue, however, is using Lean-Thinking (remove delays) to improve Scrum. We've actually formulated what we call Leanban that is founded on Lean but incorporates the best practices of Scrum and Kanban when appropriate.
The conversation shouldn't be about whether to use Scrum or Kanban but about what practices should we use here? To do that one must make sure one has the right mindset. Our experience has shown that systems thinking, respect for people, having management improve the eco-system of the organization so that teams can function well and driving from business value realization (actually the most critical piece) are what makes scrum (and/or Kanban) teams work better.
Saving Changes...
Alistair DuguidTechnical Delivery Manager| Informatica CorporationShelton, Ct, United States
Scott, are you saying that to keep the focus on the three C's, you have to use a physical index card and no other tool? That entering the same information in Jira or Rally couldn't produce the same effect?
I prefer the physical immediacy of index cards or Post-It notes myself, but what I like most about the physical medium is that it has very limited real estate. There just isn't room to write on a Post-It a full-blwon descritpion of a story. This abbreviation is good, and has the effect of making it really obvious that a conversation still has to take place.
Still, it seems to me the problem with your team isn't the tool they are using to record stories, but the fact that they seem to skip the conversation and the confirmation parts. If they refuse to use cards, do they at least acknowledge they aren't doing the other two C's very well? Hasn't it come up in retrospectives? Saving Changes...
Peter MorrisPM Consultant, Author| INDUS TechnologySan Antonio Texas, United States
Alistair,
The only basis I have for my quote, "the most successful Agile projects use Kanban boards to track WIP" is the 25 Agile Scrum teams I've either managed or created processes for. Information radiators are key to knowledge distribution, and a JIRA list of stories tends to get lost in the shuffle. The simple act of seeing the board every day and physically moving cards (or whatever) to show progress has had a productive effect on every team I've worked with. Saving Changes...
Scott RollinsSr. Agile Consultant| AccenturePleasanton, Ca, United States
Alister, I agree with your advice that it's really about conversation and followup more then anything else at the end of the day.
Peter, First off, I couldn't agree with you more. Great advice. My client is BIG and loves to buy tools because they really don't know what we're doing (yet to be fair) and rely on buzz words from vendors that say, "we're a magic bullet for you and can save your agile transformation." I still struggle to see a Rally/Jira screen and know at a glance what's going on like I can with a whiteboard. Especially in the stand ups. With out the card in hand, the team would just start telling the team, "I accomplished this task yesterday and will work on this task today." Was hard to tie everything back to stories and our WIP increased.
What I'd like to see is some metric around teams that hit the basics, like whiteboards, and those that get fancier with tools. I wounder if that's why when Ken and Jeff created the Agile Manifesto they stated, individuals and interactions over tools as the first lesson we truly learned to value? Saving Changes...
Steven ZacharyDirector| Alberta Health ServicesCalgary, Alberta, Canada
Joy Beaty from Seilevel always rages about sticky notes. Particularly that they are always falling down. I think the point is mute though. Focusing on the tool completely misses the point.
What works for you, your team and your company. Simplicity is king, but it doesn't always pay. I like tools because they are versatile. They notify, they adapt easier, they provide automated analysis. I don't think they make you a better team per se, but they do help to offload admin tasks so you can focus more on the work. Saving Changes...
Daniel DienstAgile Coach and Scrum Master| IndependentStow, Ma, United States
All valid points. We learned to prefer Individuals and interactions over processes and tools. Sometimes the simplest tools do help teams fail faster at capturing the essense of user value. This in turn helps teams grow efficient collaboration techniques. More versatile tools like jira and Rally can have complicated workflows that distract us from focusing on those essentials.
Paper tools on the other hand are simple and direct but are difficult or cumbersome to share across our increasingly distributed workplace.
Whatever your tools, identify in your retrospectives whatever problems you encounter. Propose solutions to address those problems before changing to new tools. Saving Changes...
Steven ZacharyDirector| Alberta Health ServicesCalgary, Alberta, Canada
Daniel,
Great points from a scrum master who obviously has combined practical experience with "pure scrum". It's great to see, truly. I just finished a particular job with a full on kool aid scrum master. It was a challenge.
With that said, I love the fail fast idea. As long as failure is within reason and you learn as an organization. The idea of lessons learned must be institutionalized to gain momentum from fail fast, fail often. And failing for the sake of failing is different then failing through trial and error.
Thank you so much for your inputs. Saving Changes...
The most successful Agile projects use Kanban boards to track WIP. JIRA & Rally are fine for historic documentation, but you can't beat a board you can bump into for fostering communication. The card is essential because what else would you use to nail the User Story to the Kanban Board with?
I agree that these attest tools are more IN these days but if you like you can start with introducing the cards. Saving Changes...
Al ShallowayFounder and CEO| Success EngineeringEdmonds, Wa, United States
Sep 25, 2015 10:58 PM
Replying to Alistair Duguid
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Peter, can you quote a source, or even a basis, for your assertion that "the most successful Agile projects use Kanban boards to track WIP"?
I am not sure there is a source for it, but as a long time Scrum coach (dating back to 1999) and a founder (no longer affiliated with) Lean Kanban University, I can say that when Scrum borrows from Kanban the Scrum improves. Visibility (explicit policies) and managing WIP, greatly improve Scrum. The biggest issue, however, is using Lean-Thinking (remove delays) to improve Scrum. We've actually formulated what we call Leanban that is founded on Lean but incorporates the best practices of Scrum and Kanban when appropriate.
The conversation shouldn't be about whether to use Scrum or Kanban but about what practices should we use here? To do that one must make sure one has the right mindset. Our experience has shown that systems thinking, respect for people, having management improve the eco-system of the organization so that teams can function well and driving from business value realization (actually the most critical piece) are what makes scrum (and/or Kanban) teams work better. Saving Changes...
