April 1, 2008

Just finished creating a brand new workshop that I ‘m teaching at the upcoming Cutter Summit conference. The cool thing will be “gestalt-ish” role playing – the exercises put attendees into simulated roles with difficult choices. (Unlike the real world, heh heh.) Seriously, the case study scenario is an amalgam of real company situations from recent clients (names changed to protect the innocent). It’s already about 3/4 full from advanced registrations.

It will be good therapy. Here’s the write-up; if any of you good folks want to join in on the fun, click here. For those of you already registered, get ready 🙂 Here are a few photos of our illustrious curator Tom DeMarco, Prof. Rogelio Oliva of (Mays Business School and before that Harvard Business School), and Ed Yourdon, from last year’s Innovation conference. For a look at our entire photo album, click here.

How to Collect and Use Metrics in Agile Software Development Environments

If you’re implementing or considering agile methods in your organization, how do compare productivity and quality against waterfall projects? Join Michael Mah to understand both agile and waterfall metrics, and how to communicate differences in the ways they behave to key decision makers.

In this tutorial you’ll learn how to move from a project whiteboard to create project trendlines on productivity, time-to-market, and defects using your own data. Get an inside look at agile measurement by seeing this in action using real case studies. Learn how to replicate these techniques to make your own comparisons on time, cost, and quality. And discover how to leverage these methods to make the case for change with your management teams at your company.

During this hands-on session, you’ll use your laptop to capture metrics and do productivity calculations. You’ll be paired two-by-two, and together learn to use metrics data capture templates provided by Michael. As an added benefit, you will also be offered an option for follow-up project collection after the Summit, including one-on-one metrics calculations via webinar with Michael.