On my first job, I was part of a two

developers team maintaining a

system to manage work done in

an airplane maintenance depot

We were working on an AS/400

system, on software that was

written in the 70s (20th century).

Yes, that was a long time ago.

During our breaks we used to

play with the dinosaurs roaming

the Jurassic fields around us.

Our boss had other important

things to do than bothering us.

He was building a house.

And nursing a baby

1.Add option to comment a person’s absence (talk with Shabtai) (12)

2.Fix medium defects (5) 3.Setup for the new depot (6) 4.New configuration screen (10) 5.Install the new printer (1) 6.Monthly utilization reports (work

with Roni) (2) 7.Enhance Work Order screen with

priority indication (Shabtai) (7)

So each month he came to us with

a list of things that needed to be

done. With initial estimations.

1.Add option to comment a person’s absence (talk with Shabtai) (12) 15

2.Fix medium defects (5) 3.Setup for the new depot (6) 4.New configuration screen (10)8 5.Install the new printer (1)3 6.Monthly utilization reports (work

with Roni) (2) 7.Enhance Work Order screen with

priority indication (Shabtai) (7)

Albert (that’s the other developer)

and I reviewed the estimations

and changed where needed.

Period: 1/9/94 – 28/9/94 (20 days) Vacations: Yaki - 2 Albert – 1 Total: 2*20 – 2 - 1 = 37 Days Must: Production defects – 2 days Project NewGen Discussions – 3 Days Left Overs: Revised Hour calculation - 4 days Urgent Refactoring for AW321 (12 days) Remaining Capacity: 37-2-3-4 = 26 Days

Then we would sit down to see

what is our capacity

1.Add option to comment a person’s absence (talk with Shabtai) (12) 15

2.Fix medium defects (5) 3.Setup for the new depot (6) 4.New configuration screen (10)8 5.Install the new printer (1)3 6.Monthly utilization reports (work

with Roni) (2) 7.Enhance Work Order screen with

priority indication (Shabtai) (7)

Capacity: 26 days + AW321 Refactoring

…and came up with what we can

do

Our boss was not happy about it.

He would rather have us do more.

But then he would get a phone call from his

contractor or wife and forget all about us

And so we happily got back to our RPG

programs and our users sitting right next to

us. Sitting next to users is great – you can

get their constant feedback for what you’re

developing so they get exactly what they

want.

At the end of the month our boss was

happy. We made our commitments and got

many compliments from our users.

At the next planning session he was

unhappy. Again.

What can I say.

Scrum

a sustainable method

for a team to iteratively

develop high quality

software with value to

the users.

Many years later I realized we were doing

something very similar to Scrum

Scrum

A 4 acts play

Scrum

The Characters

The Scrum Team

Self Organized

Cross Functional

Focused

Committed

Respect

The Scrum Master

Servant Leader

Coach

Monitoring and Tracking

Reporting, Communications

Resolve Impediments

Protect the team

Handle Conflicts

The Product Owner

Represents the customer’s needs

Prioritizes scope Available for feedback

Decision Maker Manages the

backlog

Time

Sustainability

Iterations Time over Scope

Ceremonies

Act 1: Backlog Grooming

Iteration Output

The Plan The Commitment

Act 2: Planning

Act 3: Development

I’m working on

this I need help today

What do you

think? Let’s coordinate

with them

What did you

mean exactly?

Act 4: Demo, Feedback

Nice job!

Let’s make this

little fix

Let’s make

another change,

in the next

iteration

Look at what we

did!

Yaki.koren@gmail.com

@yaki_koren