That Sinking Feeling When a project starts to go wrong, you know it well before you admit it to yourself or your customer. You know that feeling when you start to realize you don't have enough budget, time, or the scope is unachievable?...
Have you ever heard that oil and water don’t mix? It’s pretty common knowledge that oil will float on top of water and the substances will not mix together. This simple chemistry is easy to demonstrate, and most of us learned it in...
If you are a consultant, even on an Agile team, you probably have to track your hours. I used to hate tracking my hours - and I've seen first hand how it can demoralize people. I once worked at a company where they decided to build an...
Over the last year or so, I've been considering all the various lessons that I've learned throughout my IT career, and in particular during the last few years as I've really embraced Agile methodologies. I realized that there is a...
You may have heard it said that the best Agile teams are cross-functional in nature. That means that each person on the team is capable of working in multiple functional silos (database, service layer, presentation layer, testing, etc). A...
If I could promise you returns of 6:1 on a project in a single year, would you take it? That is a pretty impressive return for a project, and most businesses would be happy to run a project that will yield that sort of return....
I'm pleased to announce the official launch of AgilityFeat Inc. I've started this business so that I can apply my years of experience as an IT leader, entrepreneur, developer to coach your team to deliver more value to your customers. I...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. A couple weeks ago I went to the Agile2010 conference in Orlando, and it was a really great experience. I really enjoyed giving my talk on...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Recently I wrote a blog post on why software developers are typically so bad at estimation. I also gave a preview of the presentation that I...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. I know it's a bit harsh to insult you in the title of this post, but the odds are, you really stink at estimation. Even if you know you're bad...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Recently I had a chance to speak about Agile with experienced IT professionals from the 2011 class of the UVa McIntire School of Commerce's MS...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Agile teams should be based on talented development staff with multi disclipinary skill sets. This allows team members to easily trade tasks...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Everybody loves employees and consultants who can get stuff done. Especially if you've made a commitment to a client or your boss, it can be...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Earlier this year in my MSMIT classes at UVa, we talked about software estimation techniques, which was a very interesting topic. One thing we...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Why do we need to sell Agile? For those of us who know and love Agile, the benefits of Agile seem obvious. It can be frustrating when someone...
Note: This blog post was originally written when I was a consultant for OpenSource Connections. Scott Ambler wrote a very interesting article for Dr Dobbs Journal recently entitled "RFPs the Agile Way -- or -- Fear and Loathing in the...