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3.2.3. Common Methods and Techniques: Part 2

💡 First Principle: Effective project delivery relies on a set of collaborative methods for refining work, demonstrating progress, and ensuring technical excellence.

Scenario: An agile team is preparing for their next sprint. They use 'Backlog Refinement' to clarify upcoming user stories. During the sprint, they use 'TDD' and 'CI' to ensure high quality. At the end of the sprint, they hold a 'Review/Demo' to show stakeholders what they built and gather feedback.

Continuing with more methods and techniques used across different project activities.

  • Reviews/Demos: Meetings to demonstrate completed work to stakeholders and gather feedback.
  • Backlog Refinement: Ongoing activity to clarify, estimate, and prioritize backlog items.
  • User Story Creation (3Cs): Collaborative approach (Card, Conversation, Confirmation) for developing user stories.
  • TDD (Test Driven Development): Development practice where tests are written before the code.
  • BDD (Behavior Driven Development): Collaborative approach using examples (often Given/When/Then) to define requirements/acceptance criteria.
  • CI (Continuous Integration): Practice of frequently merging and automatically testing code changes.
  • Kanban (WIP Limits, Pull System): Method for managing workflow visually, limiting work-in-progress, and using a pull system.
  • Benchmarking: Comparing project practices or performance against standards or other organizations.
  • Bidder Conference: Meeting held with potential vendors to clarify procurement documents.

⚠️ Common Pitfall: Treating a 'Demo' as a one-way status report. The primary purpose of a demo is to elicit feedback from stakeholders to guide future development, making it a two-way conversation.

Key Trade-Offs:
  • Flow Efficiency (Kanban) vs. Time-boxed Iterations (Scrum): Kanban focuses on continuous flow and limiting WIP, while Scrum uses fixed-length iterations. The choice depends on the nature of the work (e.g., interrupt-driven support work vs. planned feature development).

Reflection Question: How does the 'User Story Creation (3Cs)' method emphasize the principle of 'Create a Collaborative Team Environment'?