Herding Cats

Thought of the Day

The notion that Agile Development can be successful without Project Planning and Controls is only true when the project is de minimis. A de minimis project, means any variance in the cost, schedule, and technical performance of the deliverables has... Read more →

What We Knew in the 1940's About Managing Projects

In Bent Flybjerg's book there is a chapter by Sylvain Lenfle and Christoph Loch (Google both for good solid papers and books on project management) describing how projects were managed in the 1940's. The Manhattan Project, Atlas launch vehicle, Polaris... Read more →

Capabilities-Based Planning is Foundation of All Project Success

The foundation of all project success starts with a Capabilities‒Based Plan. What Capabilities does the project need to produce to accomplish the Mission or Fulfill the business strategy for those paying for the work? Without knowing that, along with the... Read more →

Eliciting Capabilities

All project success starts with knowing what done looks like in unitys of measure meaningful to the decision makers. These units start with effectiveness and performance. These Capabilities are the foundation of defining the technical and operational requirements of the... Read more →

Seven Critical Success Factors of Project Success

Agilely managing projects start with 7 Critical Success Factors. These are based on Seven Drivers Transforming Government, IBM Center for The Business of Government and used in the course I'm teaching Agilely Managing Projects in the Federal Environment, for Stafford... Read more →

Applying Project Control Processes to Agile Development Projects

Known Success Factors From Government Research For Aerospace And Defense Programs Are Augmented With Agile Development Good Practices And The Enablers Of These Good Practices. Good Practices and Enablers of Good Practices, based on a report from Comptroller and Auditor... Read more →

The Practitioner's Handbook of Project Performance

Our two chapters in The Practioner's Handbook of Project Performance: Agile, Waterfall and Beyond, edited by Mark Phillip's Routledge, 2019 is now out. Chapter 9 and Chapter 10 are principles and practices of risk management contributed by me, Tom Coonce,... Read more →

Quote of the Day

The Mastery of Risk distinguishes modern times from the past: By understanding and measuring risks and their consequences, modern humans no longer perceive the further as a whim of the Gods and thereby have been empowered to transform their world... Read more →

Function Points and Software Development Estimating

The ISO/IEC 141143-6:2012 Standard for functional size measurement Productivity Measurement of software projects. There are five functional size measurement methods in compliance with ISO/IEC standards. NESMA function points (ISO/IEC 24570) IFPUG function points (ISO/IEC 20926); COSMIC function points (ISO/IEC 19761)... Read more →

Quote of the Day

Our conventional modernization programs seek a 99% solution in years. Stability and counterinsurgency missions - the wars we are in - requires 75% solutions in months. The challenge is whether in our bureaucracy and in our minds these two different... Read more →

Why Would You NEVER Apply Agile Software Development Processes?

In 2018, the notion of Agile Software Development has become the norm where we work. Here's a small sample of the guidance Update 2016: Considerations for Using Agile in DOD Acquisition Handbook for Implementing Agile in Department of Defense Information... Read more →

DDSTOP The Saga Continues

There's been a rash of conjectures about all kinds of bad business, project, and software development (agile and traditional) management ideas of late. Time to update the Don't Do Stupid Things on Purpose (DDSTOP) post. “There’s nothing more dangerous than... Read more →

Quote of the Day

When unimpeded by outside forces, we rapidly adapt to circumstances and succeed, but his perfect independence rarely exists - from Agility Language Read more →

What Are Story Points and How Can They Be Used on Agile Projects?

The development of software, using other peoples money (OPM) means - or should mean - that those providing the money have an expectation to know How Much Money, along with When well you be done spending that money and provide... Read more →

Any Effective Process Must ...

Any effective process must provide the following when searching for the Root Cause of the problem the process is trying to fix OR the Beneficial Outcomes the process is trying to maintain. The process must ... Clearly define the problem... Read more →

Velocity in Agile

Velocity is a term used on agile development to assess How Fast are we producing software. Here's one definition from agile glossary Velocity is a measure of the amount of work a Team can tackle during a single Sprint and... Read more →

Agile Development and Safety Critical Software

I grew up writing software for embedded real-time control system software world, out of graduate school working on Radar Systems, Flight Systems, Safety Systems, and Process Control Systems. I moved to enterprise business systems, then to product development, then to... Read more →

Agile Stories are Actually Requirements

It's popular in the agile community to speak about User Stories and how they are Not requirements. As a System Engineer, here's some background on Systems Architecture and Requirements Engineering. Let's start with some background about Systems and their engineering.... Read more →

Deconstructing the Hertz and Accenture Debacle

A recent lawsuit by Hertz Rental Car against Accenture has turned into a rallying cry by Agilest and No Estimates advocates. Of course, No Root Cause analysis has been performed by these advocates, but it makes good click bait for... Read more →

Compendium of Works to Increase Probability of Project Success

This collection of presentations, briefings, journal and conference papers, essays, book content has been used to increase the Probability of Project Success (PoPS) written and applied over my career in the software-intensive system of systems and other business and technical... Read more →