Hard to Read Handwriting Is Best for User Stories
I've always been envious of those with nice handwriting or even distinctive printing. I've always been in too much of a rush to do be better than barely legible at either. My handwriting ranks...
Succeeding with Agile - Mike Cohn's Blog
What Topics Would You Like Mike Cohn to Cover?
I’ve learned a lot about the challenges people face over the years across varying organizations when it comes to agile development and Scrum. But I’m always looking to help people solve their toughest or most nagging problems – and sometimes it’s easier to find out what those are just by asking.
So today, I’m asking you to take a moment to fill in a one-question survey for…
Mike Cohn Speaking at Agile 2013 in Nashville, TN
I'm going to be speaking at Agile 2013 in Nashville this summer. My 75-minute session will be part of an Agile Boot Camp track that is targeted mostly at people new to agile to help them understand the basic concepts, terminology, methodologies, and practices of agile development. My session will be
Breaking the Daily Scrum Time Box
The following was originally published in Mike Cohn's monthly newsletter. If you like what you're reading, sign up to have this content delivered to your inbox weeks before it's posted here.
Standard Scrum advice is that the daily scrum is strictly time boxed to fifteen minutes. Don’t dare let it go any longer than that. I want to share an example of how I sometimes have…
Learn Agile Estimating Online with Mike Cohn for Half Price
We’ve decided to run a spring sale of our popular eLearning course: Agile Estimating and Planning. Until May 19, you can access the entire course , worth 4PDUs, for half off. Some of the things we cover include:
- The problem and the goal.
- Story points and ideal days.
- Estimating the product backlog.
- Release planning.
- Multi-team projects.
Here’s a sneak…
Avoid Taking Notes During the Daily Scrum
The following was originally published in Mike Cohn's monthly newsletter. If you like what you're reading, sign up to have this content delivered to your inbox weeks before it's posted here.
On a consulting engagement a few years ago, the VP who had brought me had me start the day observing a few daily scrums. In each meeting I noticed the different ScrumMasters appeared…
Estimating with Tee Shirt Sizes
I occasionally encounter the use of t-shirt sizes (Small, Medium, Large, or so on) in use as estimating units by teams. T-shirt sizes are an OK approach to getting started with relative estimating, but they suffer from two severe weaknesses:...
Be Quick but Don’t Hurry
It’s one of my favorite times of the year: March Madness. (For non-Americans: That means college basketball playoffs.)
I grew up in Los Angeles during a time when UCLA (University of California Los Angeles) was the dominant college basketball team. As a kid, I would have wanted nothing more than...
Using Scrum on an Analysis Project
Last week I wrote about "Sprint Zero" and made the point that on the rare occasion when this might be a good idea, Scrum teams would be better off thinking of that time as a "project before the project." Projects do not spring to life fully formed--that is, staffed and ready to be worked on. The vast majority of projects can, though, be instantly started and things like…
When Action Leads to the Wrong Result
The following was originally published in Mike Cohn's monthly newsletter. If you like what you're reading, sign up to have this content delivered to your inbox weeks before it's posted here.
I started a new project last month for which I'm the product owner. (You'll read more about it here soon.) This has got me thinking about product owners and wondering which one of…
