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Some of the challenges and ideas for improving communication, testing practices that can help, and suggestions for adapting to the changes necessary to be successful in an agile world.
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Janet Gregory, DragonFire Inc. Copyright 2014
SQDG – Calgary
October 2014
With input from Lisa Crispin
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
Agile Testing - 2009 More Agile Testing
Oct. 2014 www.agiletester.ca
www.janetgregory.ca
@janetgregoryca
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
Let’s learn a bit about your experiences
- Different cities, same time zone (or 1 hr. apart) - Time zones more than 7 hrs difference - More than 3 remote teams - Less than 100 people - Larger than 1,000 employees - Larger than 5,000 - Others?
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc. 4
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
What are some issues implementing agile
large organizations or distributed teams?
• Cost savings
• Mergers & acquisitions
• Remote availability
• Lack of expertise
in-house
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• Able to hire the ‘right’ people ◦ Independent of where they live
• Leverage time zones to your advantage
• More diversity
• Extra communication efforts
• Time zone differences
• Dependencies
• Less productive
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• Organizational controls
• Working with third parties
• Involving customers
• Managing dependencies
• ERP system integration
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Distributed teams and large organizations mean cultural issues. Many teams just don’t
take it into consideration. 10
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
Norms & values Language
Infrastructure challenges
History, habits
Interactions
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
It’s relatively simple for a co-located team to adapt to agile, make the values’ their own,
and follow the principles.
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• Lack of trust
• Lack of face time
• Splitting work between teams
• Collaboration / Communication
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc. 14
Let’s talk about tools & practices for communication & collaboration 15
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Collaboration means ... ◦ Working together to find solutions, etc.
• Communication means ... sharing ◦ Ideas, information, decisions, solutions, etc.
◦ Understand the media
◦ Know the audience
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Set up communication channels so all team members have access to ◦ decisions made
◦ planning sessions
◦ meeting notes
• Lowest common denominator for communication
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Email ◦ Broadcast, individual, follow-up on
conversations
• Photos – task boards, smart boards
• Videos
Remember .....
• Emails do not show emotions and can be misinterpreted
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Telephone
• Chat rooms
• Wiki
• Collaborative automation tools
• Mind-mapping tools
• Remote pairing: VPN, Skype, instant messaging, desktop sharing
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Use video whenever possible ◦ Skype, Google phone, teleconferencing
• Put faces on stories and tasks ◦ Physical task boards
◦ On-line systems
◦ Use avatars
• Virtual tele-presence
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc. 21
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc. 22
• Tests provide feedback
• Tests show desired behaviour
• Developers think about testability
• Testers think about the big picture
• Multiple skill sets mean better solution
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• Keep the feedback cycle short
• Remove dependencies early
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Note: Feature teams are preferable with all team
members co-located
25 Picture by Augusta Evangelisti, based on diagram from Elisabeth Hendrickson
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Think in Levels of Detail
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Power of 3
• Pairing
• Question
• Draw pictures
• Repeat verbal conversations in writing
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Continuous integration
• Integrate testing and coding
• Use common tools ◦ Version control
◦ Test frameworks
◦ Defect tracking
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Consider operations / maintenance
teams for support of tests,
code
• Share information
• Share awareness of dependencies
• Keep everyone “in the loop”
• Same vision
• Same goal
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc. 33
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Common orientation
• Off –shore teams
• Acquired teams
• New remote team members
• Foster a learning culture ◦ Tolerate mistakes
◦ Personal safety
• Give time to experiment, to try
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Command and control
• Think – how to give confidence?
• Provide transparency
• Provide the right support ◦ For self-organizing teams
◦ Extra positions for liaison
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Schedules ◦ Overlapping times
◦ Meetings
◦ Share the pain
• Use retrospectives ◦ Identify problem areas
◦ Experiment with solutions
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Think constantly of other teams or team members
• Extend help to others
• Between management and development
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc. 38
Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Whole team
• Small chunks of work
• Use your diverse skills
• Respect culture: yours and others
• Give teams time to experiment, learn
• Maintain discipline
• Avoid silos – geographical or functional
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
Collaborate to innovate
or
Innovate to collaborate
Use retrospectives to improve!!
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
Agile Testing: A Practical Guide for Testers and Agile Teams
More Agile Testing: Learning Journeys for the Whole Team
By Janet Gregory and Lisa Crispin www.agiletester.ca
Contact info
www.janetgregory.ca Email: [email protected]
Twitter: janetgregoryca
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• Practices for Scaling Lean & Agile Development: Large, Multisite and Offshore Product Development with Large-Scale Scrum, Craig Larman and Bas Vodde, Addison-Wesley, 2010
• Agile Software Development in the Large: Diving into the Deep, Jutta Eckstein, Dorset House, 2004
• Fearless Change: Patterns for introducing new ideas, Linda Rising and Mary Lynn Manns
• Pictures taken on safari in Kenya and Tanzania with Nature Encounters Tours,
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Copyright 2014 DragonFire Inc.
• www.lisacrispin.com
• Rothman Consulting Group, Inc. Vol 9, #5: Building Trust in any Team
• http://leadingsoftwaretestinginanagileworld.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/distributed-agile-test-teams-making-it.html
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