Archive for category agile
Welcome to the Certification Bubble
Posted by David Bland in agile, certification on July 5, 2011
“A true bubble is when something is overvalued and intensely believed” – Peter Thiel
I’ve been mulling over this quote ever since Sarah Lacy included it in her article about our current perceived higher education bubble a few months ago.
It was in the back of my mind as I wrote a recent piece on how adding PMP to your title nets you a 12% raise.
It’s on the tip of my tongue ever time I read “CSM Required” and “CSP Preferred” on a job posting.
Let’s face it, our higher education bubble extends beyond the ivy league establishments and into the way we test, and yes, the way we certify.
… [Read More]
AgileTechDC Conference Recap
Posted by David Bland in agile, conferences on May 14, 2011
AgileTechDC is a wrap, and I wanted to take a moment to share my experiences there today. First off, a big thanks to the folks at The College Board for hosting the event. This open, collaborative space was ideal for such an event. It had the ergonomics of a BMW and the color palette of [...]
CSM or PMP, Which Cert Earns You More Money?
Posted by David Bland in agile, jobs, project management, scrum on May 12, 2011
Let’s put aside the ethical arguments about certifications for a moment and look at the salary data behind Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) and Project Management Professional (PMP).
A Certified ScrumMaster earns 3% more money than a ScrumMaster.
How to Create a Burndown Chart in Google Docs
Posted by David Bland in agile, scrum, tools on May 3, 2011
A burndown chart can be used by an agile team to track their progress against a release plan. In its simplest form, the chart consists of time on the X axis and the amount of work on the Y axis.
You can choose to burn down on whatever metrics that are relevant to your team. Since I prefer burning down on story points against iterations, that is what we’ll use for this tutorial.
It only takes a Google Account, a few minutes of your spare time and best of all it’s free!
Create a Google Spreadsheet
No Points for You! Come Back 1 Sprint!
Posted by David Bland in agile on April 20, 2011
It is the end of the iteration, and your team notices that a user story is only partially completed. This could have happened for a variety of reasons such as:
- the story was under estimated
- we ran into an impediment we could not remove
- the Product Owner changed the scope of the story
- we opened too many stories and could not finish this one
- a team member became ill
- and so forth and so on…
The team members begin to converse about whether or not they should get credit for the work they have completed on this user story. Ultimately the eyes land on you Mr. Agile Coach / ScrumMaster / Defacto Answerer of Such Things… [Read More]
