As I mentioned in my post yesterday, Seeing Value From The Customer Perspective, if you think you need to deviate from a documented or understood process, rewrite or refine your process to account for the deviations. Merriam-Webster defines process as a series of actions or operations conducing to an end.  If you are unwilling to modify your process, the deviation is unworthy of being done.

I’ve had a vendor tell me they didn’t need to document their processes because they were agile.  (Notice the lack of an uppercase A in Agile).  Leveraging Agile concepts does not mean a lack of documented process.  IF the customer tells me they see the greatest value in delivering documentation, what is this vendor going to respond with?  Sorry, we won’t deliver value?  If you use Waterfall, you may be used to generating more paper.  You have to consider documentation on a case by case basis.  Some customers have legitimate needs for documentation and other have wants.  Now go back and read that last sentence again.  Needs…Wants…

I personally like to go light on documentation.  What I need and what the customer needs are usually two different things.  That being said, I like to understand the rules (governance) before I start anything.  The Microsoft Visio document I included in my last post was a good example of a high level governance (functional flowchart) document. After completing the flowchart, I then detail each activity in a separate document.  What is the input and output?  Is there a formal deliverable associated with the activity? The idea behind the separate document is you won’t need the flowchart to describe the process.  For those who have successfully navigated a SOX audit, you know what I’m talking about.  But I digress.  The flowchart activities I documented are not groundbreaking.  The process in this case is an Agile Scrum process with a few defined quality assurance decisions points.  You do not need to go into the Nth degree to understand this process.  Identify some touch points where the vendor and customer interface.  Identity some decision points.  That’s it!

I’ve done these flowcharts for several customers.  I’ve created them for both Waterfall and Agile development approaches.  If you’re looking for a free Microsoft Visio template, which you can edit at will, you can download it here. I zipped it to make downloading easier.  If you’re looking for other free templates or worksheets to use on your project or program, you can download them there.

What do you think?  To document or not document.  That is the question. I welcome your comments or feedback.

Regards,

Derek

Mike Cottmeyer of Pillar Technology wrote an excellent post, posing a question: Why wouldn’t a management team embrace a set of methodologies so focused on giving them what they need the most?

I took a few minutes to digest the question and then compared it to my prior experiences implementing Agile on a management level.  Though I have seen the desire of a management team to embrace Agile, allowing more value to be delivered, I also saw them take pause and throw up roadblocks. At the moment they believed the top-down command and control structure would be weakened by bottom-up empowered teams, delivering value suddenly didn’t appear to be as important. Though I appreciate the necessity of a management team to provide strategic vision, I believe tactical implementation should be left to those outside the group. The hierarchy of wants, not needs, for the management team differs from the implementation team, if we want to admit it or not.

The key question asked is why wouldn’t a management team embrace a set of methodologies so focused on giving them what they need the most? My answer is I believe it is because delivering value is NOT necessarily what they WANT, it is what they NEED.

Today I realized I’ve been supporting and advising a Federal Government PMO for a whole year.  Prior to that, I was the Manager of Software Engineering at an online company that had recently gone public.  I was the sole PMP (Project Management Professional) and  sole Agile Evangelist. Upon my leaving that company, I told my superiors they really needed a PMO if they wanted to offer consistent results, measurable improvements, and increase stakeholder satisfaction.  It was hard at first to shift gears, away from a private profit-driven organization, to Federal governance-driven organization.  At the private company, it was all “being creative” to meet unrealistic goals set by those not versed in best practices.  Since there were no other PMPs, I felt like the lone sheriff in the Wild West.  Now that I’m dealing with the government, I’m surrounded by other PMPs.  There is policy, process, and governance.  Everyone knows their jobs very well.  They know best practices.

So you can differentiate the type of PMO I work in compared to others, I’ve included the 3 basic types below with their definitions.

There are 3 basic types of Project Management Office (PMO) organizations are [1] supportive, [2] controlling, [3] directive.

1. Supportive PMO generally provides support in the form of on-demand expertise, templates, best practices, access the information and expertise on other projects, and the like. This can work in an organization where projects are done successfully in a loosely controlled manner and where additional control is deemed unnecessary. Also, if the objective is to have a sort of ‘clearinghouse’ of project management info across the enterprise to be used freely by PMs, then the Supportive PMO is the right type.

2. Controlling PMO has the desire to “reign in” the activities – processes, procedures, documentation, and more – a controlling PMO can accomplish that. Not only does the organization provide support, but it also REQUIRES that the support be used. Requirements might include adoption of specific methodologies, templates, forms, conformance to governance, and application of other PMO controlled sets of rules. In addition, project offices might need to pass regular reviews by the Controlling PMO, and this may represent a risk factor on the project. This works if a. there is a clear case that compliance with project management organization offerings will bring improvements in the organization and how it executes on projects, and b. the PMO has sufficient executive support to stand behind the controls the PMO puts in place.

3. Directive PMO goes beyond control and actually “takes over” the projects by providing the project management experience AND resources to manage the project. As organizations undertake projects, professional project managers from the PMO are assigned to the projects. This injects a great deal of professionalism into the projects, and, since each of the project managers originates and reports back to the Directive PMO, it guarantees a high level of consistency of practice across all projects. This is effective in larger organizations that often matrix out support in various areas, and where this setup would fit the culture.

Definition Source:  http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=John_Reiling

I once saw (via video podcast) a wise man (Jason Calacanis) say “starting is easy; finishing is hard.”

When he said that, it was a moment of absolute clarity for me.  I’m not saying he verbalized the meaning of life.  He did state, however, what I’ve often conceptualized but was never able to verbalize.

What Jason stated in 6 words is what I’ve seen many colleagues struggle with.  Who doesn’t have projects and tasks to complete and deadlines to meet?   I’ve tried multitasking, thinking it would make me more efficient.  I’ve tried using a productivity pyramid.   All I did was start more tasks, not finish more.  That’s the key right there.  It doesn’t matter how many things you start if you never finish them.

The solution to my past problems has been the use of kanbans, referring to them as information radiators.  These information radiators were large billboards strategically placed around the office so anyone could passively see the status of the current project.  You could see what the highest priority was, what was currently being completed, and what was being delayed.

I believe the key to those successes was in the ability to visualize our work.  Everyone knew exactly what they needed to complete and everyone else knew if it was getting done.  People were not allowed to go on to ancillary activities until their assigned tasks were completed.  Another important facet of the kanban, we limited our work-in-progress.  This forced-focus on limited tasks and constant feedback loop is very powerful and very productive.

If you would like to read my complete guest post at the Personal Kanban website, on how I visualize my work and FINISH it (don’t forget the comments), just follow the [link].

(Image courtesy of rkeohane on Flickr)

I just read a really good post at PM Hut titled Agile Myths Debunked.  Sanjeev Singh listed 12 reasons people say Agile won’t work on their projects and how they are misinformed.  His list included:
Indiscipline, lack of planning, no documentation, no QA involvement, not for fixed bid projects… and the list goes on.

From my experience, organizations commonly get caught up in their project management processes.  I think they fail to realize, when saying they can not use Agile, the goal is to deliver value to the customer. As professionals, we should focus more on how it can work and less on why it can not.  I do believe Sanjeev’s listed myths are the primary reasons Agile isn’t more broadly adopted in some markets.  I’ve sat in meetings and heard those same myths listed as though being read directly from his blog post. Only by educating clients and debunking these myths will we see more adoption.  I’m not saying Agile will work in every circumstance for every project.  What I am saying is you should never discount something unless you’ve at least tried.  Do your research and see where you can make it work.