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Test Plan and Test Strategy: Best Practices That Will Make Your Product Development a Success

Without a crystal clear understanding of the processes when a team works on a software product, it can be tempting to think that all the problems stem from under-qualified QA engineers who click around randomly and ruin the hard work of the whole team. However, the value and purpose of the quality assurance process are not transparent without documentation. That's where a test plan and test strategy can help.

Even for those who are well aware of the processes, there's still the problem of measuring the quality QAs provide. If you don't measure quality, you don't have any control over the testing process or any ability to anticipate the results. So how should you know what exactly you paid for?

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The Mindset of an Impactful Component Team in Agile

Component teams are a reality and they do exist for specific purposes. In the programs I worked on, there were some component teams that worked on specific layers of architecture such as mid-tier validations and generating the PDFs with a click to mirror the screens. 

They were formed because the intended solutions at these layers required enormous explorations of different tools, open sources, design approaches, etc before these layers could cater to vertical slicing of the application to produce an increment. So essentially these teams had SME’s, Architects, or senior engineers’ part of it for a focused effort on a layered solution which otherwise was not possible to achieve as part of the feature team who primarily focus on the functional increment.

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Microservice Architecture and Agile Teams

Let us glance into the below Principles of Agile

  • Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
  • Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.
  • Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference for the shorter timescale.
  • Working software is the primary measure of progress.
  • Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
  • Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.

When we would like to implement all the principles for the Agile team, how satisfied it would be when a team gets some natural technology booster?

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How to Game Dev Metrics

What leads teams to game metrics within their organization?

On a recent episode of Dev Interrupted, I talked with agile expert Ray Elenteny, Principal Owner at Solutech Consulting, about how people game dev metrics and the underlying issues in culture & leadership that lead to it.

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Top 10 Key Elements for Successful SAFe Implementation

The Scaled Agile Framework® (SAFe®) came into being to help modern enterprises implement Lean-Agile development at scale more effectively and smoothly. So, if an enterprise wants to implement this framework to reap the maximum benefits of the Lean-Agile Development at scale, it is essential for it to absorb Lean-Agile culture, Lean-Agile mindset, and Lean-Agile principles at the personal, intellectual, and leadership levels. This thorough absorption at all these levels forms the base on which SAFe can be implemented effectively.  

The successful SAFe implementation consists of these factors:

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What an Agile Software Development Team Structure Looks Like

Introduction

You’re convinced that outsourcing is the way forward as far as software development is concerned. After all, it’s branded as the quickest path to get your app to the market. However, you need to consider a few factors before hiring a dedicated team for your company. 

One important point that deserves your attention is the structure of the dedicated team. As software involves frequent revisions, you’ll need to engage a team that operates based on the Agile principle. 

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Best Ways to Track Time in Jira

Project management software plays a huge role in the majority of companies’ work process, and while project management products are many, Jira remains among the most popular ones.

Jira was originally designed in 2002 as an issue tracking tool for software developers. However, it has drastically evolved over the years and turned into a platform that easily meets a varying set of management needs in highly diverse teams and professional spheres.

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Remote Agile (Part 2): Virtual Liberating Structures

Last week, we addressed basic practices and tools of remote agile with distributed teams. Based on that article, I also ran a live virtual class, the recording of which will be made available soon on the Age-of-Product’s Youtube channel. This follow-up post now delves into virtual Liberating Structures, answering the question of how we can make use of the powerful toolbox of inclusive and collaborative practices in a remote setting.

Liberating Structures

Created by Keith McCandless and Henri Lipmanowicz, Liberating Structures cover a set of easy to learn, yet powerful ways to collaborate as a team — even as a (very) large team by Scrum standards, overcoming traditional communications approaches like presentations, managed discussions, or another disorganized brainstorming at which the loudest participants tend to prevail.

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Social Distancing, Spirit of Agility and the Rise of Super Distributed Teams

The COVID-19 outbreak has been declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization, causing an unprecedented impact on people’s lives, families and communities. Every government and organization usually has a business continuity plan; however, the magnitude of the current crisis, no one saw coming. We’re discovering new ways of responding at every level — be it governments, companies, communities, families or individuals.

The way the events unfolded, we all observed how various governments and organizations responded and handled the outbreak so far. The speed at which things are evolving on a daily basis demonstrates the spirit of agility. The response is coming in different shapes and at a different speed. 

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13 Effective Ways for Scrum Masters to Build Happy Teams

In 1986 Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka published The New New Product Development Game in Harvard Business Review. They described a groundbreaking approach to complex product development. In the article, they borrowed the word "Scrum" from the game of Rugby. The analogy of product development to a game is quite interesting here. A team can achieve full potential if they are enjoying their work, like players playing a game with fun.   

Scrum masters can facilitate the ways to create this fun element in their team’s day to day work. Following are some actionable techniques which can help in doing it:   

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Value Stream Management: Providing Visibility, Structure and Monitoring at Every Level

From the smallest start-ups to the biggest corporations, every company now has to consider itself a software company, and there’s no room in this for half-hearted attempts at DevOps. One way to increase efficiency and ensure that processes are running smoothly is the implementation of value stream management (VSM). Adopting this approach can make a significant impact at every level of a business, improving collaboration and visibility for the benefit of all.

The CIO: Visibility From the Highest Point

Leading IT organizations are no longer concentrating on simply how fast they can deliver software, but on how much business value they can deliver at speed, and how every customer product, service or application has its own value stream.

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How to Identify and Manage Risks at Software Project Planning Stage

Once upon a time, several blind sages groped an elephant in order to understand what it looks like. But everyone studied only the part of the animal that was closest to him. One said the elephant was like a snake, holding it by its trunk. Another held its leg and insisted that it looked like a tree. The third held a tail and said the elephant looked like liana. In the end, the wise men could not agree and understand how the elephant looks like.

An interesting fact is that each of them was right in his own way; each simply saw the situation only from his own side and refused to accept information from his peers. If they had put together their observations, then, most likely, they could compile complete information and see the whole picture.

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Making Multi-Speed IT Work for You

Every organization strives to be high-performing, and in today’s business landscape, it’s a goal that depends on digital transformation. The reality of the matter is that various parts of businesses grow and adapt their IT savviness at different times and at varying speeds. But in the quest to move faster, adapt more quickly and embrace being software-defined for success, what does digital transformation actually look like when IT is pulled in multiple directions?

In an ideal world, innovation calls for agility and speed; however, most enterprise organizations are cursed – or blessed – with legacy systems that still have a shelf life and need to operate alongside the introduction of other more modern components. Developers working in established sectors like banking or telecoms, for example, understand this situation well, being in industries that are embracing mobile banking and connected cars, yet are also still dealing with legacy systems of record. These systems have little interoperability, can be written in what’s tantamount to a foreign language for developers today and can be unpredictable due to their age.