Executive Level Trackingfor Agile Projects

(Theory and Execution)

Elliot Susel, Agile Project Manager

Flexibility from agile is great…

But how the heck do I track and plan through uncertainty?

Conflicting Interests

What Executives Want vs. Agile Methodology

Big picture understandingof features

Smallest possibledecomposition of features

Set deadlines andrelease dates

Select content only at thestart of a sprint

The Solution?

Map the details back to thebig picture

Story Maps

Visual representation of the big picture (content and timeframes)

Display costs of features

Nice theory…

But how exactly do we execute on this?

Building a Story Map

Add tracking in your backlog for “Epic” and “Feature Group”

Trace all User Stories up to Epics Trace all Epics up to Feature Groups

Use velocity to determine feature completion dates

Prioritize the backlog Calculate the total point cost per epic and feature group Use prioritization, point costs, and velocity to calculate completion

Questions?

elliot.susel@gmail.com

online presence:about.me/ElliotSusel