Results-Based Software Management: Achieve Better Outcomes with Finite Resources   Effective software development is no longer merely an IT concern: today, it is crucial to the entire enterprise. However, most businesspeople are not ready to make informed decisions about software initiatives. The Economics of Iterative Software Development: Steering Toward Better Business Results wil...

About a year ago, we published the Cloud Academy primer "Shedding Light on Cloud Computing". Since then, interest in cloud computing has blossomed and I have had the opportunity to present our Cloud Academy content at cloud computing events around the world. This new book encapsulates the insights and knowledge gathered from the conversations at these events. That includes the dialogue with cloud practitioners, vendors, customers and the considerable number of cloud computing gurus this in...

Be a Better Developer and Deliver Better CodeDespite advanced tools and methodologies, software projects continue to fail. Why? Too many organizations still view software development as just another production line. Too many developers feel that way, too—and they behave accordingly.In The Software Craftsman: Professionalism, Pragmatism, Pride, Sandro Mancuso offers a better and more fulfilling path. If you want to develop software ...

Best practices for managing projects in agile environments—now updated with new techniques for larger projectsToday, the pace of project management moves faster. Project management needs to become more flexible and far more responsive to customers. Using Agile Project Management (APM), project managers can achieve all these goals without compromising value, quality, or business discipline. In Agile Project Management, Second Edition, renowned agile pioneer Jim Highsmith thoroughly ...

Organizations are constantly struggling with complex development projects and are in search for a few, straightforward, and easy to learn methods to help deal with their problems. For this reason, more and more software companies are rapidly turning to Agile development to cope with fast changing markets, unknown or changing product requirements, borderless competition, and to solve complex problems. Yet little has been written to guide product managers through the transition in working wi...

Excellence doesn't just happen. It needs to be designed, and even the best designs can be improved upon.That's something that Angelo Baratta, who spent more than thirty years leading more than a hundred projects for more than fifty organizations, discovered the hard way. While most of these projects succeeded, success rates were never as high as they should have been. This, he determined, was the direct result of the design of the business processes.By mastering process des...

PRINCE2 (PRojects IN Controlled Environments) is a widely used method for managing projects, particularly in the United Kingdom as well as in other countries. I wrote this book to develop the reader’s working knowledge of all aspects of PRINCE2, with the goal of providing a truly useful self-study manual for the PRINCE2 Foundation qualification. The book is based on the most recent revisions to the method made in 2009, so it's as current as any other resource on the market today.I ...

This is the eBook version of the printed book.This digtial Short Cut provides a concise and supremely useful guide to the emerging trend of User Acceptance Testing (UAT). The ultimate goal of UAT is to validate that a system of products is of sufficient quality to be accepted by the users and, ultimately, the sponsors. This Short Cut is unique in that it views UAT through the concept that the user should be represented in every step of the software delivery lifecycle--including req...

Scale collaboration, not process.If you’re trying to use agile and lean at the program level, you’ve heard of several approaches, all about scaling processes. If you duplicate what one team does for several teams, you get bloat, not delivery. Instead of scaling the process, scale everyone's collaboration.With autonomy, collaboration, and exploration, teams and program level people can decide how to apply agile and lean to their work.Learn to collaborate around deliv...

With technology continuing to invade the business world and the convergence of complexity, uncertainty, and constant change, a whole new class of projects has emerged for which traditional project management models such as Waterfall are totally insufficient. These are called complex projects. Extreme Project Management models and a variety of Agile Project Management models such as Scrum, Rational Unified Process, Feature-Driven Development, and Dynamic Systems Development Method have emer...

The book explains how business analysts and information technology professionals can work together to create innovative business solutions using the agile approaches now emerging in practice. It explains the methods used by such cross disciplinary teams to create business value based on the use of information technology. These methods combine concepts now found in agile system development, such as stories, features, roles and business activities, into collaborative processes that lead to i...

Is your IT system an asset or a hindrance to your organization's success?More important, can you tell the difference?Unlike other well-recognized professions, information technology is still in its infancy. Organizations have little hesitation in paying attorneys, accountants, or business strategists for their expertise. As individuals, we don't blink an eye while paying for a physician's opinion of our health. Yet business executives rarely think to request a professional ...