Explore posts on Agile, Lean, Rapid Learning Cycles, queueing theory, and other topics.
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All my publications on Agile, Rapid Learning Cycles, and software quality, and other topics, plus etc.
Publications plus white papers and short articles. Many of these are linked from blog posts.
Agile, Queueing Theory, Lean, and How They Are Related
- When Agile Gets Physical: How to Use Agile Principles to Accelerate Hardware Development. With Katherine Radeka. Chesapeake Press, 2022.
- When Agile Gets Physical: video presentation 2021 with Katherine Radeka, courtesy of Agile Oxfordshire Meetup.
- What is Queueing Theory and Why Should I Care? 2020.
- A Short History of Queueing Theory. 2020.
- What Makes Agile Software Development Work. 2020.
- Velocity – A Squishy Measure. Online article. June 2017.
- Fix Your Agile Project by Taking A Systems View. Agile Connection. July 23, 2013.
- Cadence: Increase Efficiency with a Rhythm. Online article How cadence can speed up your projects and simplify your life. 2013.
- Cadence in Agile Projects: Sprint Length, Integration Frequency, and Other Matters of Rhythm. What Lean can tell us about ideal sprint length. Rose City SPIN March 2013.
- Cadence for Rapid Learning Cycles. Published in the Lean Product Development Resource Center in 2013. The concepts of cadence applied to Lean Product Development.
- Cadence: The Trade-off Between Holding Cost and Transaction Cost.
This white paper shows you how to calculate the best cadence for a recurring activity. If you want to see the actual math behind the rules-of-thumb for cadence, this is the paper to read. - How Lean Sees Agile. Lean explains why agile works – and how agile can be adapted to large multi-team projects.
- Lean vs Agile: Friend or Foe?. Lightning Talk at PNSQC Meetup April 2014.
- Lean in The Test Lab. Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2013.
- Introducing Fast Flexible Flow at HP. Lean Product and Process Development Exchange 2012.
- Kanban: What is It and Why Should I Care?. With Landon Reese. Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2011.
- Lean System Integration at HP. Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2010.
- Evolution of Software Lifecycles. Panel on Evolutionary Delivery. Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2005.
Quality and Throughput Improvement Techniques
- Causal Map Fishbone Diagrams – A Better Way to Find Root Causes. Online article November 2020.
- The Improvement Kata: Lean Meets Annual Planning. Invited Speaker Talk at Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference. October 2015. Slides
- Success Cards – Making Improvements Visible: Online article 2014.
- The One-Hour Retrospective. Process improvement for sprints and other short cycles. 2013.
- Five Whys Cause and Effect Analysis: Finding a Solution Quickly. 2013.
Visual Planning Boards and Kanban Boards
- Simplify Your Management with Visual Planning Boards. A Visual Planning Board can help your small business, nonprofit, or just you manage your work more easily.
- Visual Planning Boards for Small Groups. Techniques for using Visual Planning Boards with a work team or small group.
- More Techniques for Visual Planning Boards. Use your Planning Board to balance workload across your staff.
- Kanban and Visual Planning Boards. Improve capacity of a small team.
- Visualizing Workflow in Your Organization. A Planning Board can help you get work done faster.
- Planning Boards for Rapidly Changing Work. Using a Visual Planning Board to cope with rapidly changing work during an eldercare crisis.
Improvement Kata
- The Improvement Kata: Lean Meets Annual Planning. Invited Speaker Talk at Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference. October 2015. Slides
- “Success Cards – Making Improvements Visible”: An Improvement Kata topic.
Software Quality and Testing
- Talking About Quality. Ensure quality with your skills involving non-functional requirements. Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2018.
- Build Quality In – Don’t Test It In. How to customize your quality strategy for peak effectiveness and efficiency.
- Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2018..
- Lean in The Test Lab. Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2013.
- Building in Quality. Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2007.
- Ten Tips for Home-Baked Tools. Rose City Software Process Improvement Network. June 14, 2007
- New Tricks with Old Tools: Using Data Flow Diagrams in Test Design. Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2005.
- But Will It Work For Me?. Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2002.
- Tester to Developer Ratios. With Sue Bartlett. Proceedings of the Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2001.
- Step by Step Test Design. Software Testing and Quality Engineering. September/October. 2000
- Divide and Conquer – Making Sense Out of Test Planning. Proceedings of STAR West. 1999.
- Rework Statistics for Several Projects. Proceedings of the Annual Oregon Workshop on Software Metrics. 1992.
Other Useful Sites
- Rapid Learning Cycles Institute
- Definition of SAFe
- Mike Rother’s Improvement Kata.
Agile software methods aren’t a perfect fit for hardware development. My colleague Katherine Radeka and I explain why in our new book. Join us to learn agile methods which do work in the challenging world of physical products!