In our previous episode, we talked about the importance of visualizing your current work-in-progress to uncover bottlenecks, enhance decision-making, and provide clarity on your team's workload. Now, let's tackle what often comes next: realizing you have too much work in progress. Why does this happen so often to development teams, and what can we do about it? In this episode, we're diving into strategies to manage and prevent this overload. We’ll cover setting WIP limits, staying responsive, an...
Jul 01, 2024•26 min•Season 2Ep. 93
When the kind of work we do is invisible (like software development), it can be a challenge to keep track of what work is going on at any given time. That's where visualization can be a great tool for understanding your team's work in progress. Building on last episode's discussion on creating workflow visualizations, in this episode, host Phil Ledgerwood explores the importance of visualizing work in progress to uncover current projects in flight and find hidden bottlenecks and inefficiencies. ...
Jun 24, 2024•24 min•Season 2Ep. 92
A lot of what we do in software development is invisible. If someone is typing furiously on their keyboard, you don't know if they're about to finish that new feature or if they're complaining to their state representative. One of the things that tends to be invisible is the actual process of getting something from “request” to “deliverable.” Everybody kind of knows what that process is, but they typically only know their piece of it, and they probably haven't thought critically about it in year...
Jun 17, 2024•18 min•Season 2Ep. 91
When managing a new team, it's tempting to come in guns blazing with new ideas and changes. Not only can this cause resistance, however, but you might be heading the wrong direction to begin with. Start with Fact-Finding and Reason-Finding before Recommendation-Making. In other words, one of your first moves should be to ask a lot of questions—"why" being one of the most prominent of them. This sets you up for success with your team because: You may discover there are good reasons for their curr...
Jun 10, 2024•26 min•Season 2Ep. 90
Many of us who were thrown into management positions over development teams had to learn on the job. And when that happens, it can be easy to fall into the role of what you THINK a manager should do—be the rule enforcer and hold the team accountable. But as a dev team manager, your primary role should be to enable your team to deliver value effectively and efficiently. In other words, get out of your team's way and empower them to do their best work. How does this actually play out, though? In t...
Jun 03, 2024•21 min•Season 2Ep. 89
If you're a CTO, manager, or team lead looking to develop software faster, this episode is for you! If someone has told you that you shouldn't -want- to shorten time to delivery, this episode is also for you. Because they're wrong. Wanting speed isn't a bad thing—assuming you are building the right thing (which is the main problem Agile addresses). As teams do grow in their agility, they do tend to become faster for all kinds of reasons—but it's not directly because of Agile. Speed isn't the goa...
May 27, 2024•25 min•Season 2Ep. 88
Have you stopped and asked yourself and your organization, “Why are we doing this?” You may or may not be surprised to find out that a lot of organizations make decisions, choose frameworks, and prioritize projects simply because of inertia and not because there's a real reason behind it. Why would you put time and resources into maintaining structures whose reasons have been lost to antiquity or never existed in the first place? It seems like common sense to individuals, but that often doesn't ...
May 20, 2024•21 min•Season 2Ep. 87
Hey managers, let's talk straight: Is Agile a scam? In your context, it just might be. Agile has become the default for teams, but do you truly understand WHY you're using it or if you even need it? In this episode, we're stripping away the Agile buzzwords, getting back to basics, and exploring the essence of Agile from a manager's perspective. Forget sprints and user stories—Agile is all about responsiveness to change. By starting with this fundamental principle, you can avoid getting tangled i...
May 13, 2024•22 min•Season 2Ep. 86
Should we be slicing stories vertically or horizontally? Does it even matter? Should we organize the requirements in our user stories by architectural layers or by small units of functionality? Both approaches divide the work up into smaller batches, but what good are pieces of software if they're not actually usable? That's what happens when we slice stories horizontally (e.g. a user story to build a non-functional screen). Horizontal slicing brings on risks to the organization, like: Premature...
May 06, 2024•18 min•Ep. 85
Wondering what scaled Agile framework is right for your organization? If this is your question, this episode is not going to answer it for you because we don't think that's going to bring you the most value. Instead, we're going to challenge you to take a step back and ask why you need to scale and why you're Agile in the first place. Just because your organization is “big" and your current framework is causing friction, that does not mean finding the right scaled Agile framework is the answer (...
Apr 29, 2024•20 min•Ep. 84
Traditionally confined to creating hefty upfront requirements documents, BAs find themselves at a crossroads in the Agile world. However, we believe BAs hold the key to promoting agility and delivering maximum value to organizations. In this episode, we challenge the notion that BAs are mere translators of requirements into user stories. Instead, we highlight the rich business knowledge and questioning skills that BAs possess. By delving deep into business processes and understanding the "why" b...
Apr 22, 2024•26 min•Ep. 83
In the year and a half that the Agile Bites podcast has been around, we've covered a lot of topics—from story points to stand-ups to MVPs and a whole lot more. And we hope it's been a helpful resource in our listeners' Agile journeys. Now, we're taking a look at the future and asking ourselves, "What's next?" Listen to this episode to hear from Host Phil Ledgerwood about the new direction of Agile Bites, and we'd love for you to be a part of it by leaving your feedback! Leave a comment on this p...
Apr 15, 2024•19 min•Ep. 82
If we had a dollar for every piece of “authoritative Agile advice” out there, let's just say that we'd have a lot of money. Sharing the successes, failures, and lessons learned is so valuable to all of us on an Agile journey. But it's important to keep your filter up for not only false information, but also true information that doesn't fit your situation. In this episode, Host Phil Ledgerwood dissects some “authoritative” facts and figures about so-called “full Scrum” vs. “lightweight Scrum” to...
Apr 08, 2024•22 min•Ep. 81
Traditionally, QA has been synonymous with manual testing and has been established as its own post-development phase. But in an agile landscape, that setup can lead to bottlenecks and silos. That's why we advocate for making QA a strategic player throughout the entire development journey—not just at the end of development. Tune in to gain insights on reshaping QA practices and maximizing its impact on the entire value stream of software development.
Apr 01, 2024•23 min•Ep. 80
We all know we should get user stories as small as they can be, but can we go too far? Yes, user stories should be as small as we can get them, but they also need to be a valuable delivery (e.g. a user story should not just be a technical task). Tune into this episode for actionable tips on what to do (and what not to do) to keep your user stories both small and valuable.
Mar 25, 2024•20 min•Ep. 79
Have you or someone you know ever been stuck with pages of requirements notes having to turn those into user story format (As a [persona], I [want to], [so that])? If so, first of all, we're sorry. Secondly, we want to help you know that there are other—and better—ways to dealing with this situation, and that's what this episode is all about. User stories should be user STORIES—pigeonholing them into a one-size-fits-all format takes away from the value they were meant to provide. Tune into this ...
Mar 18, 2024•22 min•Ep. 78
You might be wondering what this controversial subject has to do with agility, but people in the agile community are already trying to figure out how this topic works in an agile environment. How do we reconcile with the work-from-home debate when one of the principles of the Agile Manifesto is that “the most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation?” Ultimately, just like anything else, this is something that is heavil...
Mar 11, 2024•22 min•Ep. 77
When you ask how long a project is going to take, do you ever feel like your developer team is telling you what you want to hear rather than reality? Unfortunately, this problem is all too common in software development when it comes to estimating deadlines and giving progress updates. We're not claiming it's anything nefarious—humans are just bad at predicting how long things are going to take (especially when building a huge project for the first time) and they probably just want to keep you h...
Mar 04, 2024•23 min•Ep. 76
So you've defined success for your MVP. But have you thought about how you're going to measure whether it's successful or not? It sounds simple, but it's often not. Some measurements are black-and-white and easier to extract information from. But others (like sentiment) have a lot more gray areas and can be tricky to make decisions based on. In this last episode of our MVP series, learn about different types of measurements (financial, technical, operational, and psychological) and how to extrac...
Feb 26, 2024•23 min•Ep. 75
Next in line on MVP series, we're talking about defining success for your MVP. The point of an MVP is not to create a small version of the product—it's to get meaningful information that will inform your decisions about the product going forward.Because of this, how you define success plays a vital role in whether your MVP reveals valuable information about your product's viability. What things, if they turned out to be true or false, would cause you to rethink this product or would convince you...
Feb 19, 2024•18 min•Ep. 74
Next up in our MVP series, we're talking about schedule and cost—two related elements that can trigger essential pivots in your project. In this episode, host Phil Ledgerwood shares practical insights on estimating timelines, development costs, and additional considerations such as infrastructure and promotional expenses. Learn how these factors play a pivotal role in making informed decisions about your MVP.
Feb 12, 2024•22 min•Ep. 73
How do you decide which features should make it into your MVP? When people first think about MVPs, usually this is the point they jump to (side note: if you haven't listened to our previous episodes in our MVP series yet, go back and listen to those first!) With countless feature options and probably many strong opinions, it can be challenging to narrow down what features you should invest in for your first MVP. In this episode, Host Phil Ledgerwood shares the framework and exercises he uses to ...
Feb 05, 2024•20 min•Ep. 72
Forget about software for a second and think about what your user actually wants to accomplish. Why would they want your software in the first place? What are you helping them to get done more easily than they could without your software? Those questions are what you should be thinking about when it comes to user journey—not screens or features. Because your users don't inherently care about those things. They just want to accomplish whatever they need to get done in a way that makes sense to th...
Jan 29, 2024•20 min•Ep. 71
Next up in our series about MVPs, we're talking about personas. To know if people are going to use your product, you first have to understand the people you would be building the product for—because no product can be built for “everyone.” In this episode, Host Phil Ledgerwood breaks down MVP personas into three parts: identifying potential users, understanding them, and empathizing with them. When you truly understand your potential users, that knowledge helps you build a product that serves you...
Jan 22, 2024•23 min•Ep. 70
In the next episode in our series about MVPs, we're talking about the vision: the thing that guides, outlines the scope, and captures the value of the MVP. Everything we do in the MVP needs to be geared towards the vision—not towards your idea of the final product. If it’s extraneous to the vision, it’s extraneous to the MVP. Sticking to the vision will keep you from wasting time and money on features that aren't necessary to validate the core of your product.
Jan 15, 2024•17 min•Ep. 69
After 67 episodes, it's about time we talk about the MVP—Minimum Viable Product. There are a whole lot of conversations online about what an MVP is and what it isn't. We're not setting out to define it once and for all. Instead, we're taking you through the same process we go through with our clients in this special series about MVPs. And this first episode is all about the “what” and the “why” behind this framework that can help you validate a product idea before putting a full investment into ...
Jan 08, 2024•20 min•Ep. 68
We're covering the last assumption of Little's Law in this series, and this time we're looking at why consistent units must be used for all measures This one seems obvious and trivial, but that doesn't always translate on a practical level when we're thinking about how we want our work items and the planning around them to look. This assumption comes down to deciding what unit of measurement is valuable for planning and communicating, and then only using those units—not transferring them to othe...
Jan 01, 2024•17 min•Ep. 67
It's time to unpack another assumption of Little's Law, and this time we're looking at how and why the average age of WIP must not be meaningfully changing. This is probably one of the most misunderstood assumptions because people think everything must be the same size. But the key to remember here is the word "average." Little’s Law needs the average age to stay level— not each individual age to stay level. In this episode, Host Phil Ledgerwood talks through this assumption and its upsides/down...
Dec 25, 2023•18 min•Ep. 66
We've been working our way through a series on the assumptions of Little's Law, and this episode is about the importance of keeping your WIP constant in your system as a whole. Little’s Law doesn’t tell you the right amount of WIP—it just wants it to be stable so that you're pulling work at the same rate that work is completed. This way, your system stays flowing and is neither underworked nor overworked. In this episode, Host Phil Ledgerwood illustrates how this assumption of Little's Law works...
Dec 18, 2023•17 min•Ep. 65
When a card gets pulled to work on, that should mean that the team is committing to not only starting it but also (and more importantly) finishing it. Now, we all know that it's not always that simple. Blockers happen, new priorities come down the management pipeline, and, unfortunately, cards in progress are forgotten or pushed backward into the backlog. But at the end of the day, your team is judged on the work they finish—not the work they start. And that's why the commitment to finishing sho...
Dec 11, 2023•22 min•Ep. 64
