Is Your "Agile" Backlog REALLY a Waterfall Project?

Thriving Technologist

Many software development teams use an agile backlog but have NO business agility - and are actually using scrum with a waterfall mindset! When the product backlog is used on a scrum project and the business doesn't really understand agile, it wastes money and makes most programmers feel miserable!

In this episode, I share what I've learned about using agile methods with software teams that actually produces business agility. Business agility is the ability for a company building a software product to adapt to feedback and data gathered about how customers are using it. Since software development is such an unpredictable engineering activity, a business can choose to put their hopes in estimates, or deliver releases more often and let data be their guide.

I hope this episode helps you understand how programmers, product owners, scrum masters, and everyone else who works together to build and release software can do it in a healthy way - where less stress is placed on everyone trying to predict the future through estimates. Instead, we can use the insights gathered through feedback and recording data in production about how customers are using the software to product the RIGHT features - and at a sustainable pace!

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Chapter markers / timelinks:

(00:00) Introduction(00:57) 1. The Purpose of a Backlog(01:19) 2. 7 Waterfall Backlog Signs(01:28) 2.1 No Feature Usage Metrics(02:09) 2.2 No Release After Sprint(02:55) 2.3 Backlog Never Reordered(03:37) 2.4 Features Never Removed(04:19) 2.5 No New Features(04:54) 2.6 Estimates For All Stories(05:35) 2.7 Measuring Output Not Outcomes(06:32) 3. 7 Ways To Get Backlog Agility(06:53) 3.1 Measure Feature Impact(07:51) 3.2 Release Every Sprint(08:51) 3.3 Don't Build Onto Features(10:08) 3.4 Use Data To Reprioritize(10:42) 3.5 Remove Bad Features(11:28) 3.6 Commit To Outcomes(12:40) 3.7 Use Cross-Functional Teams(15:25) Episode Groove

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