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Anyone serious about implementing agile in their organization needs to read this book and draw up a realistic game plan which must involve executive commitment and excellent team leadership skills. It is true that agile is really a simple idea but very hard to do well because it really blows everything around it to bits.
This books prepares you for this scenario if at all possible. Mike's list of references at the end of his book is extensive and alone is worth the price of the book. I am relatively new to intense management of an integrated IT department. Having spent the bulk of my career in general and financial management, I recently found myself in an interim leadership capacity in an IT department where Scrum was the development management methodology, and IT was the backbone of the organization. Cohn's book provides extremely useful insights into the use and strengths as well as objections of Scrum methodology.
Particularly useful and interesting to this reader was his chapter on the Balanced Scorecard and how to integrate Scrum into a BSC environment. The book is long, but a relativele easy read. You will need a modicum of knwledge of the process before fully being able to appreciate Cohn's insights, but that should be easy to get OTJ or with other resources. A must have on the exec's bookshelf if you are managing general managing or IT managing in an Agile environment. Doing my part of testing and coaching in agile context I found this book the best in making it all work.
I mean with this that you can get lots of theory on the iconic books but this one goes to the meat and grit of everyday life in an Agile team. While most Agile books are targeted at the manager who has to make the transition, this one is for the team, the people. Long-time readers of Cohn's blog will see common themes raised but here they are expanded and integrated into a coherent package.
Recommended to all who find the old "colors" book or similar to fall short in practical terms. You will find in this book the friendly, down-to-earth voice of Mike Cohn that one has met already in his blog. Not bad, but a little too conversational and wordy for me at times. I'm struggling to pull much practical advice from the content. I believe there are nuggets of truth in here, and seasoned advice from the right author, but it's not wowing me.
I think the right editor would turn it into a gem. My other recommendation would be to focus more on agile principles and less on anecdotal dialog. It's hard to keep my attention when so much of the content is hard to apply. That said, I don't know of a better book on the content. It's a tougher topic to write on than a technology. If you don't see another option, give this a shot. Feedback Als je hulp nodig hebt of een vraag hebt voor de klantenservice, neem dan contact met ons op. Wil je de slechte kwaliteit of opmaak van dit boek doorgeven?
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Schrijf als eerste een recensie over dit item Plaats op Amazon-bestsellerlijst: Wil je deze content als ongepast rapporteren? Denk je dat dit item auteursrechten schendt? Aug 28, Rogelio rated it really liked it. Good guide to start applying the concepts of agility in the organization. Although this is not a "full implementation guide" it shows the bottom line and the starting points that you can use in your journey.
I would have liked a more comprehensive list of resources to dig deeper, specially in the second part of the book regarding team work, one of the main challenges in scrum. Summing up, this is a excellent starting point to implement scrum. Apr 14, Steve Fenton rated it it was amazing. The first two parts of this book were a bit too familiar, perhaps I have over-read this subject. This entire part was golden and immediately relevant. So for the scattered brilliant bits, I have overlooked the slower moments. Sep 21, Srdjan rated it really liked it.
Great starting book for agile transition.
May 07, Graham Lee rated it it was ok Shelves: I can't believe how verbose the exhortation to value working software over comprehensive documentation is. Dec 28, Charles rated it it was amazing. One of the easiest things to do in print is to praise a strategy or set of tactics used to perform difficult tasks. When all you are doing is simply expounding the stated virtues of a methodology, you are somewhat free to use hype, anecdotal information and instance proofs of success. Implementation details and explanations of logical and frequent difficulties encountered by practitioners of the methodology are ignored or minimized.
That is not the case in this book, Cohn describes the agile soft One of the easiest things to do in print is to praise a strategy or set of tactics used to perform difficult tasks. That is not the case in this book, Cohn describes the agile software development process and he provides extensive examples of the use of the Scrum methodology and the difficulties commonly encountered.
It is easy to understand the hesitation that development teams will have when considering the adoption of Scrum. The development of large software projects is the most complex task that humans have ever undertaken; even a single wrong character out of millions can break a program. The appearance of the relaxation of controls of the process can appear counterintuitive, as it seems that would allow for additional errors to slip through the weakened defenses.
Cohn goes to great lengths to demonstrate how Scrum will strengthen those defenses by reducing the likelihood that errors will survive for very long. Splitting the process into short spurts means that all minds can be on deck and their focus will be on a small set of parameters. This is a way to make minds smarter without actually having to be smarter. Cohn also joins the collective clamor against the extensive use of overtime as a way to compress the time to completion.
Evidence going back decades is completely convincing that when it is brainwork, overtime can only increase productivity for a short time. Intellectual fatigue rapidly sets in and after approximately three weeks, the productivity level begins to drop down to less that what is achieved in a standard forty-hour week. Charts, graphs and tables are used to support the arguments made for the adoption and intelligent use of Scrum.
Convincing a team to adopt Scrum is essentially using facts and demonstrated rewards to overcome emotional barriers and the natural unwillingness to execute change. This cannot be done in any way other than by starting with the reality of current problems, giving multiple demonstrations that it can work and then detailed explanations of how to overcome common obstacles that are encountered.
Cohn does all of this very well; this book is an excellent point to begin the study and adoption of Scrum. Published in the online Journal of Object Technology, reprinted with permission. Feb 23, Juan rated it really liked it. This is a book for pragmatics. Advice for the harder stuff - how to introduce and spread Scrum, how to get people to let go of doing by design at the start of the project, how to deliver software that works by the end of each sprint, what managers do, and more.
Apr 17, Danien rated it really liked it. We have been implementing agile practices in the studio for a few months and seen some successes and some obstacles. Most of the problems have been with exactly which aspects of agile were right for us. We did not want overly formal adherence to agile standards, but rather something more organic that suited our team. On the other hand, this "looseness" meant that there were many grey areas without easy answers. Many of the situations we encountered are discussed in this book - an indication of h We have been implementing agile practices in the studio for a few months and seen some successes and some obstacles.
Many of the situations we encountered are discussed in this book - an indication of how practical it is. That said, it leans towards larger organizations in terms of more formal committees and certain higher level roles, but these can be easily extrapolated for smaller companies like ours. The solutions presented are generally clear and do not claim to be silver bullets. The author provided a good balance between formal and informal solutions that fit our goals well. Definitely a useful read for everyone involved in transition from traditional development to more agile methods, even those on the periphery of actual development having to support the team s.
Jul 30, David Workman marked it as to-read. Preliminary reading shows that this book is definitely not an introduction to scrum and expects a reader to already have quite a good level of scrum comprehension. It also shows that this book is targeted at people who are looking to migrate a company's practices over to scrum or are in the process of a transition and gives a lot of advice and techniques that the author has used to perform such transitions in the past. I've put this back to my 'to-read' pile so I can pick it up again once I've got Preliminary reading shows that this book is definitely not an introduction to scrum and expects a reader to already have quite a good level of scrum comprehension.
I've put this back to my 'to-read' pile so I can pick it up again once I've gotten a better basic comprehension of scrum principles and practices Really great book on Scrum, from one of the biggest names in Scrum. There are lots of examples for organisations of any size including entire chapters on adapting Scrum to massive projects, dealing with non-colocated teams, etc.
Jan 19, Caroline Gordon rated it it was amazing Shelves: I really like Mike Cohn 's style, his books are very practical and make sense for how to really get things done. This book focuses on how to proceed with an Agile transformation. There are many approaches that can be taken and he lays them all out, how to do them and what the advantages and disadvantages of each may be.
I added many more books to my to read list from all his referenced books. I will be referring back to this book for many years, it's a classic. Nov 22, Pascal Mestdach rated it it was amazing Shelves: Do you really want agile software development to stick within your company? Than this is the book to read! Understanding the mechanics of an agile process is just not enough. The quest of transitioning a company to agile is hard, full of mysteries, and also never ending: This book is a distillation of everything Mike Cohn has learned over the years working with many many companies that are trying to become more agile.
Nov 24, June Ding rated it really liked it Shelves: Not a book if you are new to Agile. This is a book about managing change. A must read to understand challenges when an organisation transitions to Agile. Lots of useful practical guide, and pretty much every issue you run into during transformation, you can find some discussions and useful tips. A book that should be used as a reference book for Agile change management. Dec 01, Ahmed Salem rated it liked it Shelves: Feb 19, Glyn Matthews rated it it was amazing. This is a top class introduction to Scrum and Agile.
It contains a broad range of insights and I have applied many lessons from the book. If you're looking to take it to the next level, this book lacks depth. However this hasn't diminished the rating I've given it as there are already other excellent resources on this subject that will complement what you will learn from this book. May 06, Peter Sellars rated it really liked it. Enjoyed rediscovering forgotten gems in this book.
Many great insights into Scrum team success criteria taking into consideration the environment and organization at the same time. Dec 19, gramakri rated it really liked it. For more details about this book, visit http: Mike Cohn is so fluent with his writing style and the way he builds up on the agile model.
This book explores in detail about different roles played in Scrum, challenges faced and how to tackle them, etc.. So one would benefit more from this book if they already have an idea Sep 19, Valentina Tkachenko rated it it was amazing. Great overview of agile implementation strategies, goes far beyond the surface level.
Highly recommended to anyone undergoing a transformation and looking to learn about best practices without the dogma which sometimes accompanies agile. Currently the best Scrum book for non-beginners this means, that you should have had read a introductory Scrum book before. Really good tipps and tricks for nearly all things you can encounter during a Scrum implementation. I think I'll keep this on my desk for quite a while Mar 17, Lora Kostova rated it it was amazing.
An excellent and a very detailed book, I guess it is no coincidence that so many call it the Agile Bible. Mike Cohn goes trough the whole scrum process discussing different perspectives and possible outcomes. Mar 02, Mark Wheeler rated it it was amazing.
A core foundation book of Agile software development.