What Patterns to Avoid in Agile Ceremonies?

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1 | 1/13/2020 © Copyright 2006-2018 Inflectra Corporation
What Patterns to Avoid in
Agile Ceremonies?
Journey into Agile with Inflectra
By: Sriram Rajagopalan
We will be starting the webinar shortly, please stand by…
All phones will be automatically on mute until the Q&A.
Webinar Starts at 2:00 PM Eastern Time Zone

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Meet the Speaker
Dr. Sriram Rajagopalan
Enterprise Agile Evangelist
Education
Work
Experience
Training &
Certification
Teaching
Experience
PhD, MBA, MS, BE
PfMP, PgMP, PMP, SP,
RMP, ACP, CSM, CSPO,
ACC, CSD, SCT, CSOXP,
SSBB, Instructional
Designer, Speaker,
Writer, and Author
Software Engineer,
Team Leader,
Business Analyst,
Project Manager,
Scrum Master, Agile
Coach, Director,
Vice President
Several
Colleges in the
US, India, &
Vietnam

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Introduction
 Today’s webinar is part of the 4-part series on the third
webinar series “Journey into Agile with Inflectra”
 Each webinar is 1-hour long. We will reserve time at the end
for questions
 The webinars may introduce the concept using a tool

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Journey into Agile with Inflectra - #3
AGILE ENGINEERING
PRACTICES FOR SOFTWARE
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT
WRITING GOOD USER
STORIES
PATTERNS TO AVOID IN
AGILE CEREMONIES
INCORPORATING LEAN AND
KANBAN IN PRODUCT
LIFECYCLE MANAGEMENT
Dec 5, 2019 Dec 17, 2019 Jan 9, 2020 Jan 23, 2020

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If “Waterfall” never worked and we embraced
agile, we need to also know the practices that
led to waterfall failure. If these practices
continued with agile implementation, then, agile
will fail too.
- Sriram Rajagopalan
Experience Speaks
If “Waterfall” never worked and we embraced
agile, we need to also know the practices that
led to waterfall failure. If these practices
continued with agile implementation, then, agile
will fail too.
- Sriram Rajagopalan

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Executive Vision
Team Fragility
Process Inflammation
Technical Myopia
Iteration is too long; so, we use sprints!
We do daily standup; it makes us agile!
We are lean; we all do product owner role!
Every SDLC stage is done in one sprint!
Working Software = # of closed Jira tickets
We had to choose wrong technology stack
Why Agile Fails?

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Agile Failure Patterns
Task-oriented & Overburdened Team
Failure to build Team ConsensusNeglect of Technical Excellence
Agile Practice without Principles
Inconsistent or Siloed Adoption
Weak Product StrategyCultural Conditioning
Lack of Executive Commitment

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Experience Speaks
Adaptive Organization with a
balance on strategy and execution!
Controlled ChaosChaos
Confused on why the
Organization exists!
Chaotic Control
Exploratory but defined structure
with leadership immaturity
Myopic vision, microscopic
management, and inflexible structure!
Control
How we do?
Whatwedo?

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Agile Ceremonies should Sow Success Seeds
Begin with a good
Product Backlog
Iteration Planning
Empower team to
self-organize faster
Daily Standup
Evaluate the
grooming backlog
Review
Use an operational
excellence mindset
Retrospective

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Process Fails
Too many meetings
Reviews don’t have stakeholders
Retrospectives become optional
Strategy Fails
No dedicated PO
Coach & PO are same
Priority stories not ready
Planning Fails
Planning selects stories only
Coach creates tasks
Estimation in hours
Team Fails
People not ready with updates
Metrics are not setup to succeed
Risks wait for next standup
Twelve Critical Patterns

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Be Strategic about
Requirements Gathering
StartinH
alf
Solved
Address Cultural Issues
Align Product with Business
Strategy
Agile Transformation Fails
This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA-NC

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Product vision is not aligned
with business strategy
No Dedicated Product Owner
1
2 No accountability for collecting
user’s feedback
3 Product Marketing stalls losing
customer base

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One FTE serves as Coach and Product Owner
Role
Clash
Cognitive & Motivational Bias
introduced to balance value with work
1
Business stakeholders not
consulted grooming backlog
with valuable features
2
Team is not coached
on agile principles and
practices
3

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Prioritized Backlog is not ready ahead
Product Backlog is not
ready and flushed with
Persona & user stories
No Hardening Iteration
(Iteration 0) considered
No value added user
stories or extreme
persona considered
Begins premature
discussion on velocity
commitments to deliver
Competitive Advantage

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Antidote to Strategy Failure
Get Senior
Management to
commit to
agile
Embrace agility
culture across
the
organization
Promote
“continuous
learning” over
“failure not an
option”
If customers
are important,
get a dedicated
Product Owner
If employees
are important,
get a dedicated
Coach
Enhance
transparency
to product
backlog

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Be Strategic about
Incorporate Risk in Planning
Get Team involved in Planning
Planning
Start with an End in Mind

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Planning spends 50% on story selection
and 50% on task breakdown
Iteration Planning is Timeboxed to start Iteration
1
2 Planning should not spend time on
prioritization of user stories for the iteration
3 Risks should be factored in user stories
committed

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Coach creates tasks
Micro
Focus
Coach should be a facilitator and not
continue to serve as a scribe
1
Coach should get the team to
become self-organized
enabling productivity
2
Coach should harness the
power of team for
collaborative value delivery
3

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Don’t estimate Story Point Hours
Idea
Epic 1
Theme A
Theme B
Epic 2
Theme C
Theme D
Feature I
Feature II
User Story a
Task I
Task ii
Task iiiUser Story b
User Story c
Not everything in backlog is estimable in Hours
T0 T50
Time
Dreams Castles
Granularity
Big House Duplex Home 2 BR, etc. Get loan preapproval
T-Shirt Sizes
Establish
Norms

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Antidote to Planning Failure
Avoid “we know
what to build”
syndrome
Promote
Product
Discovery
Invest in a
Coach
Promote self-
organization

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Be Strategic about
Startingt
Solved
Promote Team Commitment
Coach on the agile principles
Team
Empower the TEAM

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Daily standups start late and take long as
people are not ready with updates
People are not ready with updates
1
2 Daily standups becomes a monotonous status
check meeting
3 Blaming on Technology for inability to
connect, communicate, or collaborate

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Metrics setup for failure
KPI
Galore
Too many metrics
1
Incorrect metrics
2
Inaccurate metrics
3

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Risks wait for Next Daily Standup
Not enough
time for risk
resolution
Iteration Commitments slip
“We are agile; we can
catch up next iteration”
Team commitment is missing
Team is not self-organized
to focus on value
Lack of Quickly
Addressing Risks

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Antidote to Team Failure
Form cross-
functional Team
Address
resistance to
embracing agile
Train team on
agile practices
Avoid frequent
member
movements

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Be Strategic about
Don’t compromise on Non-Negotiables
Promote Learning Mindset
Process
Instill Operational Excellence
This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND

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Team’s time should not be taken up in
too many unnecessary meetings
Too Many Meetings mean Too little Work
1
2 Product Owner takes up team’s time away
from iteration for backlog grooming
3 Team members serve on multiple teams
including agile and support work

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Reviews are not open to Business Stakeholders
Review
Fails
Business Stakeholders are not present
to review and offer feedback
1
Reviews become surprising to
the product owner
2
Monopoly of Review time on
preferred user stories alone
3

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Retrospective is Compromised
Repeating Success Stops
Failing to Learn Creating Waste

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Antidote to Process Failure
Enhance
Process
Discipline
Resist the Urge
for Task
orientation
Engage
Stakeholders to
commit to agile
Technology is
not sidelined as
a value addition

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Process Fails
Too many meetings
Reviews don’t have stakeholders
Strategy Fails
No dedicated PO
Coach & PO are same
Priority stories not ready
Planning Fails
Planning selects stories only
Coach creates tasks
Estimation in hours
Team Fails
People not ready with updates
Metrics are not setup to succeed
Risks wait for next standup
Summary

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Q & A
 Please feel free to ask
questions
Course Administration
Ms. Thea Maisuradze
marketing@inflectra.com
Content
Dr. Sriram Rajagopalan
sriram@inflectra.com.

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Next Steps
1. Provide feedback to sriram@inflectra.com
2. Register for the 4th webinar of the series!
Thank you for watching!

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