managing-agile-development-projects (2).pdf

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Managing Agile Development Projects withHP PPM Center and HP Quality CenterWhite paper


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Executive summary Agile frameworks are rapidly gaining popularity amongsoftware developers in organisations of all types andsizes. But with the promise of faster development andbetter software quality comes an still greater challenge supporting dozens of fast-paced projects withoutlosingtrack of the big picture aligning IT with businessobjectives to increase business outcomes.

With multiple development projects both Agile andwaterfall underway or under consideration at anygiven time, how do you keep your IT team from gettingovercommitted, over budget and overwhelmed?Step one is to gain complete visibility into all youroperational and strategic activities, and determinewhich ones will deliver the best business results.

Whether your organisation is predominantly Agileor is working in a hybrid mode of both Agile andtraditional life-cycle methods, IT managementneeds to implement effective and flexible controlsthroughout the whole organisation. Understanding

project milestones, deliverables, resource andbudget requirements and keeping track of theproject health and quality indicators allow ITmanagement to bring order to chaos. Without suchcontrols and visibility, it is impossible to reduceproject schedule and budget overruns, reduce therisks and achieve true business agility.

This paper discusses how HP Project and PortfolioManagement (PPM) Center and HP Quality Center(QC) software can give you the information youneed to make better business decisions, lower thecost of running both your Agile and traditionaldevelopment projects, increase collaborationbetween business and IT and improve applicationquality. We will highlight the core elements of Agiledevelopment methodologies and explore how

Agile development can be aligned with the basicprinciples of project and portfolio management tomake sure that IT objectives meet the companysbusiness goals.

The HP Solution for Managing Agile ProjectsHP Software provides an integrated platform forplanning, staffing and monitoring Agile developmentprojects, as well as managing application quality.HP PPM Center offers a consolidated view of all ITactivities so that management has better visibilityinto the portfolio, more effective controls, greaterflexibility in applying automated processes andbetter-defined quality standards. With the HPsolution, your project and portfolio management

system can give your organisation visibility intoeverything that is being worked on includingproject health data, non-project work, resourceallocations and cost information. This integratedsolution gives you the unique ability to aggregateboth Agile and waterfall projects and see the criticalinterdependencies among projects for examplewhether the resource demands of an operationalproject or other activity might prevent you fromundertaking a proposed project. This capability

enables you to manage and prioritise the collectedwork so you can ensure that the right people areworking on the right tasks at the right time. Youcan capture all the details about all current work soevery decision is supported by hard data.

Once an Agile project is underway, the high-levelkey project information is passed to HP QualityCenter which can help break down the Product

Vision and Epic-level requirements into morespecific deliverables the User Stories. HP QualityCenter which is tightly integrated with HP PPM

Center combines the elements of requirementsmanagement, release planning and qualitymanagement into one scalable, Web-based solutionthat is ideally suited to manage the process ofcreating, organising and prioritising the User Stories.HP Quality Center helps capture User Stories andstores them in a centralised global repository thatis accessible to all team members. Any changes tothe User Stories are immediately known to the wholeteam, making iteration planning easier and moreaccurate. HP Quality Center then helps trace theUser Stories throughout the testing process to make

sure that teams are focusing their effort on the rightareas and are fixing the defects that affect the mostcritical business functionality.

Software engineering with Agile methodologyis a team effort, and HP PPM Center and HPQuality Center are specifically designed forcollaborative engineering throughout the developmentcycle planning, design, testing, editing, change management and ongoing maintenance. They areclosely integrated to allow data to flow seamlesslybetween stages and to enable control points andreporting at any point in the life-cycle. Together,these solutions are exceptionally capable ofsupporting both Agile and traditional IT projects.They enable you to align business goals withtechnical resources, help you enhance the businessoutcomes of IT projects, and are comprehensiveand flexible enough to deliver true business agilitywithout the added weight of rigid, bureaucraticprocesses project teams will object to adopting.


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Figure 1: Agile methods focus on delivering working software features with acceptable quality in short iterations, each containing steps forproject planning, requirements analysis, design, coding, testing and documentation

1234

5678910111213

Product OwnerThe Team Sprint Review

Daily ScrumMeeting

Scrum Master

PotentiallyShippable

Product

Sprint Retrospective

SprintSprint Planning Meeting

Product Backlog

No Changes(in Duration or Deliverable)

Diagram Source: GoodAgileIntroduction to Scrum for Managers and Executives

Main Principles of Agile

DevelopmentThere is no single Agile method, but rather aset of at least 14 broadly recognised methodscentered around a number of common principles:rapid release cycles, value-driven development,team collaboration, continuous planning andimprovement, and customer involvement. Instead ofextensive upfront investment and planning, Agilemethods focus on delivering working software featureswith acceptable quality in short time-boxes oriterations that typically last one to six weeks. Eachiteration includes all of the tasks necessary to release

the mini-increment of new functionality planning,requirements analysis, design, coding,testing anddocumentation. At the end of each iteration, theteam re-evaluates project priorities.

Agile methods emphasise real-time communicationand empower people to collaborate and makedecisions together quickly and effectively. Most

Agile teams are cross-functional and include allthe people necessary to build the software. All

Agile methods value continuous evolution of boththe project and the software, are lightweight and

inherently adaptable.

Scrum: Overview, Basic Conceptsand JargonFor the purpose of this paper, we will use theexample, concepts and jargon of a single, andperhaps the most popular Agile developmentmethod Scrum. Scrum is a simple but powerfulframework for development teams and customers tocontinuously monitor project progress and qualityand use the feedback to surface problems, adapt

the processes and adjust the project scope. Scrumis deeply rooted in collaboration and provides

a high degree of clarity and transparency for allstakeholders the development team, customers,

product owners, management and others.Despite its rebellious nature, the basic phases of aScrum development process are not that dissimilarfrom those used in any other type of project. Projectmanagers, product managers and project sponsorsplan, define and initiate the development project, thedevelopment team executes the plan, and togetherthey monitor and control the results. However,traditional development methods define a singlesequence of initiation, investigation, design, codingand testing for each project, while Agile development

projects rely on multiple fixed-length iterations, eachincluding planning, development and assessmentphases.

In the Scrum development method, theProductOwner owns the Vision a high-level strategic ideafor the product, its intended uses and the value thatit would provide for a specific customer base. The

Vision contains input from customers, end-users,executives, sales, support, and other external andinternal stakeholders. The Product Owner organisesthe Vision into a single list of project proposals thatneeds to be evaluated and prioritised based onthe business value and risk. This prioritised list ofrequested features and functionality is referred toas the Product Backlog. The next step is to breakdown the large ambiguous features orEpics intosmaller, well-definedUser Stories that can be easilyconsumed by the development teams in the nextiteration, or Sprint.

Sprint is a fixed period of development time whichtypically takes between one and four weeks. Beforeeach Sprint, the team selects which User Stories fromthe Product Backlog it will commit to, and creates a

Task-level plan for how they will deliver the results.


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For each Task, the team estimates the required timecommitment and compares it with the total availabledevelopment hours to make sure that they do notover-commit for this Sprint. The commitment leveland the due dates do not change during the Sprint.The team meets daily to discuss Sprint progress,list tasks that have been completed and need tobe accomplished in the next day, and report anyroadblocks. TheScrumMaster keeps track of thesemeetings and monitors the daily progress.

The team also updates several simple charts:The Sprint Backlog lists all current tasks and thehours remaining for completing each oneThe Burndown Chart totals the number of hoursremaining for all tasksThe Task Board shows all tasks that arein-progress.

The goal for each Sprint is to deliver all thefunctionality the team has promised to deliver andto produce a complete piece of product functionalitythat has been designed, developed and testedwith acceptable level of quality. At the end ofeach Sprint, the Product Owner, ScrumMaster andthe team review the finished product, discuss thedevelopment process, and incorporate the feedbackinto the Product Backlog and future Sprints.

Strategic Planning for Your AgileProjects with HP PPM Centersoftware

Agile frameworks emerged as an alternative toextensive project planning. However, before anynew Agile project can begin, or still be considered,IT management needs to gain a complete viewof everything that is going on in IT proposedprojects, application changes, strategic initiatives,services provided and all relevant operationalactivities in order to make realistic resource andtime commitments and to select the projects that bestalign with the companys business objectives. Youalso need to continuously monitor project health torespond to fast-changing portfolio needs quickly.

Unlike approaches that offer only time-reportingsystems and project scheduling tools, HP PPM Centeroffers top-down planning capabilities that aretightly coupled with bottom-up details of the projectexecution. HP PPM Center integrates project andportfolio management, programme managementand other key functions with all relevant operationalactivities, to enable that you have up-to-the minutevisibility into your total IT workload.

To help make strategic decisions on which Agileprojects will be given the green light, HP PPM Centergives you the portfolio or investment planning toolsto analyse the trade-offs among various investmentalternatives. This creates virtually unlimited scenario-based planning capabilities and gives you the abilityto forecast the financial and technical impacts ofchanges. With HP PPM Center you can clearly see whatresources and capabilities are available at any giventime for your fast-paced Agile development projects.

Building a Product Vision: Initiatinga Project ProposalTo initiate an Agile project, the Product/ApplicationOwner creates the high-level Project Vision andsubmits it as a project proposal within HP PPMCenter. Based on the project details and supportingbusiness case that are included in the proposal,the Portfolio Manager can begin the process ofevaluating it against other initiatives proposedor in-flight and make a decisions on whether the

project will be funded.HP PPM Center lets business and IT stakeholderscollaboratively govern the whole IT portfolio withmultiple levels of input, review and approval. Fromproposal initiation, justification and review to projectinitiation, execution, deployment and benefitsrealisation, HP PPM Center uses automatic, real-timeupdates and a clear and flexible process to keep allstakeholders involved.

To streamline the process of submitting the projectproposal, the Product/Application Owner candraw on the powerful and flexible workflow enginewithin HP PPM Center. HP PPM Center facilitates theprocess of gathering input from all stakeholders,routes the proposal through required approvalstages and consolidates all supporting materials in acentral location, transforming the high-level Product

Vision into a detailed project proposal.

Creating a Product Roadmap:Managing Agile IT ProjectsOnce the proposal is approved, it becomes an IT

project. At this stage, a high-level Product Vision isbroken down into several Epics specific definitionsof the products features and functionality that spanmultiple releases.

An Epic is a big enough slice of productfunctionality to have its own plan, resource estimatesand milestones. The Product/Application Owner caninitiate an IT project for each Epic, in order to planand track its phases, deliverables and tasks. Only asmultiple Epics stem from a single vision, multiple ITprojects can be linked to the same proposal, which

contains all the supporting information, backgroundand value propositions.


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Figure 2:HP PPM Center acts as the central point of control for managing and continuously assessing the health of the project

The HP PPM Center Project Managementmodule provides a Web-based platform for

project collaboration among team members andstakeholders with real-time visibility into resources,processes, status and inter-project dependencies.

Agile Product/Application Owners and teammembers can plan and schedule Sprints, createpreliminary staffing plans and track project status,health and deliverables through the HP PPM CenterProject Management dashboards. Throughout theduration of the project, the Project Managementmodule can act as the central location for managingand continuously assessing the health of the project.HP PPM Center also offers bi-directional integration

with Microsoft Project.

Managing User Stories with HPQuality CenterOne of the most important concepts in all Agiledevelopment methodologies is the notion ofvalue-driven User Stories. Instead of trying tofind a product idea that will satisfy many kindsof different customers, Agile Product/ApplicationOwners attempt to connect each product featurewith its intended user and focus on the value that

it provides for this user. A User Story could be aproduct requirement, an internal deliverable, or anyother type of a container for related tasks. All UserStories must be small enough to be completed withina single Sprint.

The integrated solution from HP allows for UserStories to be derived directly from the Product Visionand Epic details that were captured during theplanning phase of the Agile project.

HP Quality Center is a collaborative, Web-basedsolution that can help Agile teams organise and

manage the User Stories in a central repository.The HP Quality Center Requirements Managementmodule contains customisable hierarchical fields forcapturing the User Story and its attributes: name,description, fit criteria, owner, estimated efforts andall related tasks.

All User Stories are typically stored in order ofpriority and referred to as Product Backlog. To planthe next Sprint, the development team selects thetop User Stories from the Product Backlog and addsthem to the next cycle. HP Quality Center supports

the concepts of release and cycle managementas integrated parts of the Application QualityManagement process. With HP Quality Center,you can see not only detailed descriptions of eachSprint, but also complete statistics on the UserStories that are included in this Sprint, test plansassociated with it, and detailed quality information.

In most Agile methods, User Stories are furtherbroken down into Tasks the actionable work itemsthat get assigned to individual team members. HPQuality Center allows for tracking and managingof Tasks as part of its Requirements Managementmodule. Tasks are defined as a requirement type,and the process of creating, refining and completingthe Tasks is governed by the customisable workflowwithin HP Quality Center. For example, when theTask is first added, it is assigned a draft status.

After the definition has been completed andthe ScrumMaster has added the effort estimate, theTask status changes to defined. As soon asthe Task is assigned an owner, its status changes toin progress, and finally when the Task is finished,its status is set to completed.


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Figure 3:Through tight integration between HP PPM Center and HP Quality Center, key Agile project information is accessible to all teammembers, allowing for greater visibility and control at every stage of the development process

CreateProposal

EvaluateProposal

Approve Proposalfunding Create Project Define Project WBS

Summary resourceassignment atSprint level

HP PPM Center

Epic-levelrequirements

HP Quality Center

Total Story pointsadded in QC

Break Epic-levelrequirementsinto User Storiesand Tasks

Manage theBacklog of UserStories and Tasks

Assign UserStories andTasks to Sprints

Execute andupdate Tasksduring Sprints

BurndownCharts andother reporting

Each User Story typically includes the high-levelpreliminary estimate of engineering hours required

to complete it. After the Sprint has started, thesenumbers can be refined based on the moreaccurate, Task-level estimates. All time estimates inHP Quality Center can be aggregated to the Sprintor release level, enabling the Agile developmentteams to make more accurate commitments foreach cycle.

The same aggregated view can be used by theScrumMaster to monitor the progress of Sprintsand releases. Integrated, customisable graphs andreports in HP Quality Center allow the Agile teams

to quickly view the essential graphs, such as theBacklog and the Burndown charts.

Managing quality in Agile projectswith HP Quality CenterHP Quality Center provides a Web-based,integrated system for automated software qualitytesting and management throughout a wide rangeof application environments. It provides the visibilityneeded to validate both functionality and automatedbusiness processes and identifies bottlenecks inproduction that hamper business outcomes.

HP Quality Center enables Agile teams to engage inapplication testing still before the development processis complete, thereby providing the ability to acceleraterelease schedules while maintaining a high-level ofquality. HP Quality Center is an effective tool for AgileQA because it is specifically designed to facilitate thetype of collaboration and cross-pollination that is keyto Agile software engineering.

To learn more about HP Quality Center and itssupport for Agile quality methods, download the

Managing Quality in Agile Projects with HP Quality Centerwhite paper.

Building a Quality Center of

ExcellenceThe idea of establishing a Center of Excellence(CoE) for managing the quality of Agile applicationsmay first sound illogical to an organisation focusedon quick and nimble development. The truth howeveris that managing quality as a shared service canactually help you achieve better business resultsfaster and with less process overhead. HP CenterManagement for Quality Center is built on HP PPMand Quality Center software and providespre-packaged content and workflows to automatekey processes for quality management and enables

best practices for project collaboration as well asproject and resource management.

HP Center Management for Quality Center providesa single dashboard view for application owners tocreate, manage and track both Agile and traditionaldevelopment projects. This view improves the projectdelivery process and helps you properly assignresources to tasks and manage them efficientlybased on the business criticality of each project.

HP Center Management for Quality Center alsohelps enforce best practices by enabling the sharedCoE to define a QA project template that can bereused by different Agile projects.

With a Quality Center CoE, you can simultaneouslytrack the quality of multiple Agile projects, gainreal-time visibility into requirements, tests anddefects, aggregate results and reporting throughoutmultiple HP Quality Center instances and projectsand improve your organisations quality practices.
https://h10078.www1.hp.com/cda/hpdc/navigation.do?action=downloadPDF&zn=bto&cp=54_4012_100__&caid=22912https://h10078.www1.hp.com/cda/hpdc/navigation.do?action=downloadPDF&zn=bto&cp=54_4012_100__&caid=22912https://h10078.www1.hp.com/cda/hpdc/navigation.do?action=downloadPDF&zn=bto&cp=54_4012_100__&caid=22912https://h10078.www1.hp.com/cda/hpdc/navigation.do?action=downloadPDF&zn=bto&cp=54_4012_100__&caid=22912


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Figure 4:HP Quality Center allows for tracking and managing of Agile project Tasks as part of its Requirements Management module

First Level containsBacklogs andCycles

Multi-Backlog

handling forenablingScrum-of-Scrum

All items areassigned to aspecific targetRelease and Cycle

Aggregated Effort perlevel for Estimates, Actualsand Remaining andPercentage Completed

SummaryThere is no question that Agile methodologies arehere to stay. They are gaining traction in largebusiness development organisations and are beingsuccessfully used to build mission-critical financial,healthcare and government software systems.

But it would be a mistake to assume thatimplementing Agile techniques removes the needfor organisation portfolio management, demand,resource and budget planning and projectmanagement. On the contrary, with so many Agiledevelopment projects being proposed and alreadyunderway in any organisation, IT managementneeds still greater visibility into all IT projects, a wayto manage and prioritise IT investments, flexiblecontrols over the release processes and solidcompliance objectives.

The strength of HP PPM Center is in enablingcollaborative decision making that complements thebasic Agile principle of individuals and interactionsover processes and tools. It works especiallywell throughout geographies, with Web-basedcollaboration and the free flow of information amongproject stakeholders and different teams. This helps

support the offshore outsourcing models for ITdevelopment projects.

Together, HP PPM Center and HP Quality Centerhelp you focus on optimising business outcomes

instead of only running individual Agile projects.Using the integrated HP solution, companies canachieve the true alignment between business and ITthat leads to a transformation in business results.

Sources:Focus on Value: How to create value-driven userstories by Chris Sterlinghttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/89-focus-on-valueGlossary of Scrum Terms by Victor Szalvayhttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/39-

glossary-of-scrum-termsGoodAgile Introduction to Scrum for Managersand Executives www.goodagile.com
http://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/89-focus-on-valuehttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/89-focus-on-valuehttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/39-glossary-of-scrum-termshttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/39-glossary-of-scrum-termshttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/39-glossary-of-scrum-termshttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/39-glossary-of-scrum-termshttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/89-focus-on-valuehttp://www.scrumalliance.org/articles/89-focus-on-value


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Technology for better business outcomesTo learn more, visit www.hp.com/go/ppm Copyright 2009 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subjectto change without notice. The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the expresswarranty statements accompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed asconstituting an additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissionscontained herein.

4AA2-4193EEW January 2009

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