Do you use schedule or tracking tools to predict the future? None of them can predict the future. Worse, too many of them hide the past, especially the recent past. A schedule or tracking tool can only predict one thing: the first possible date you cannot prove you cannot finish the project/story by. Let me […]
So far, I’ve addressed how a project charter can help a team start a project fast and well. That’s why the project charter must clarify product vision, the various project risks, and product risks. And, it’s equally important to know what done means. If the team does not know how little they can do to
In Project Charter Part 2: Clarify the Project Driver, Boundaries, and Constraints for This Project, I explained how project risks can affect the team’s approach to the work. But project risks are not the same as product risks. Product risks are about the need for product innovation. The more innovation this product needs, the more
Let me set the context for this post about the project charter: By now, the team knows what it has to accomplish because they have a product vision. The next question is: How will the team manage their risks to achieve those outcomes? That’s where I recommend a team define its project driver, up to
Does your team have an overarching goal for its work—a product vision? Too many teams do not. The whole point of a project is to deliver a useful product that satisfies its customers. I like to think about projects as a container of some product value. That means that a given release does not need
Does your team have a project charter so they know what to do for this project? I see too many teams try to start work without one. That leads to feature factories, apparently random work that does not add value, or worse, a product that’s partly done in too many areas. Teams start without project
In a recent conversation, an unemployed agile coach asked, “What’s the point of a project manager, anyway?” Here’s what effective project managers do: They create the environment for the team to succeed. Here’s how effective project managers start: If the team does not yet have a project charter with the product goal, they facilitate or
A colleague recently asked me how a team can deliver something useful in the next four to five weeks. “That’s all? Just four to five weeks?” I asked. Yes, that was all the time they had remaining. They’d worked on this product for a while, but that was the time they had left. This problem
I’m a huge fan of team-based collaboration to complete small stories through the architecture. (The image above shows three small stories implemented through the architecture.) More collaboration means lower WIP (Work in Progress). That lower WIP allows the team to increase their throughput (finished features) and lower cycle time (release something useful faster). (See how
Do you feel as if you are always behind on your project? That someone—or several someones—started before you or your team started this project? It’s not your imagination. They did. At the very least, a product leader or someone on the portfolio team said, “If we created a project to do A thing for B