Follow this link to register: http://linkd.in/10YOUMl

Kanban applies the Lean principles developed over decades in manufacturing to the Software Development and IT Operations worlds. It aims for Continuous Improvement, Waste Reduction and Value Maximization throughout your value stream. Although Kanban has 6 simple principles and advocates evolutionary change with low disruption and minimal conflict, many of its underlying concepts are counter-intuitive. Successfully adopting Kanban requires an understanding of the science behind it and embracing a set of axioms and values which depart significantly from traditional project and enterprise management orthodoxy. Training and coaching from people who have done this before is essential to making Kanban ‘stick’.

Kanban is not an alternative to Agile methods such as Scrum or XP. Neither does it require that you re-engineer the existing way you work, your roles and responsibilities, your tools and practices. Instead, it creates an environment where impediments to getting valuable work done are exposed. It encourages collaborations to improve across teams, functions and departments. It leads to radical reductions in wasted effort, reduces leads times, improves predictability and gives better quality. It can be applied at any and all levels in the organisation, from individuals to teams to business units, across software development, project management, portfolio management, infrastructure operations and even customer support.

Speaker
With over 25 years in software development, Colm has been applying agile and lean approaches for over 10 years. In the last four years as a trainer, coach and consultant, Colm has supported large scale agile adoptions in over 20 organisations including global multi-nationals and indigenous Irish firms across ICT, Finance and Telecoms. Colm is founder and principle of AgileInnovation – his company name reflects his research into the interplay of agile and lean development approaches and product and process innovation.

Colms’ interest in Lean Thinking began when automating Just-In-Time production lines in the 1980s. Implementing early agile software methods in 2001, Colm has extensive hands-on experiences across teams, organisations and technologies. In varied roles of developer, architect, ScrumMaster and Director, he has seen Lean and Agile from a variety of perspectives. These include the use of agile in the development of enterprise systems, embedded software, high-innovation research environments and in product organisations.

Colm delivers on-site and public courses such as Agile for Executives, ScrumMaster and Product Owner training and Lean/Kanban product and software development. He supports companies adopting these methods through assessments, consulting and team coaching.
Colm O’hEocha
Twitter @ColmOhEocha
colm@agileinnovation.eu
http://www.agileinnovation.eu

Product Camp Dublin 13 June 2013

Product Camp Dublin

Thursday, June 13, 2013 from 12:00 PM to 6:00 PM (BST)

Our next Public Training Course will be held in Dublin 4/5 April 2013 – an outline of the course is available here. Contact training@agileinnovation.eu for details and registration.

Compuworld: Financial difficulties stimulate agile adoption in US public sector

For more information about this event or anything else to do with testing please contact me on david.odowd@ie.sogeti.com (ie.linkedin.com/in/davidodowd/)

A big thank you to our sponsors Sogeti, ISA Skillnet, SQS and InterTradeIreland.

Using Business Stories to Build Better Software

As an industry, one thing we’ve consistently failed to do is meet the software requirements of business in an efficient, timely and cost effective way. Agile approaches are one way to solve this problem and for certain organisations and systems it’s an excellent solution. But the ‘pure’ agile approach is not for everyone and many organisations find it difficult to scale their agile success or merge agile teams into a larger programme of more structured work.

This talk introduces Business Story Method which shows how using structured Business Stories at the heart of software development can help to meet these challenges, independent of your development approach.

Specific topics covered include:

– Applying agile thinking to business analysis and testing
– Overcoming communications issues in organisational silos
– Applying an Acceptance Driven Development approach
– Adopting a lean approach and agile disciplines at a team level
– Delivering value to stakeholders rather than just working software

Business Story Method is a very powerful, effective and natural way to work. It includes techniques suchas specification and example, project profiling, ubiquitous language, ‘trusted’ requirements and test driven development. In summary, it provides a stable framework for development and quality assurance.

Attend this session and learn more about how this method can be used within your own project team. You’ll also receive a free Business Story Pocketbook to help you implement some of these techniques.

Speaker Bio: Susan Windsor
Susan is a specialist in Assurance, often involved in turning around troubled projects. She has been responsible for the delivery of software solutions for many years, as a service provider and as IT Manager for a Global Oil Company.

From small niche solutions through to large multi-geography/supplier programmes she has delivered testing services and consultancy as a Director of a specialist Test Consultancy and as manager of IBM’s UK Testing Services business.

Susan has spoken at many industry conferences throughout Europe, including EuroSTAR, Belgium Testing Days, Testing in Finance, Soft Test, BCS SIGIST, Next Generation Testing and ExpoQA. She is a Principal of Gerrard Consulting and is the programme chair for the Test Management Forum and Test Analysis Forum. She is also co-author of the Business Story Pocketbook.

Thursday 18:00 – 20:00 28th February

Lean Techniques for Creating and Driving Strategy and Architecture

We have two lean experts Claudio Perrone and Peter Jon Middleton share their experiences. Using case studies they will both describe how organizations have successfully delivered their business strategies and supporting IT projects using lean.

Some of the key benefits of attending this event are;

• Applying lean software development techniques (BBC case study)
• Gain insights into what lean tools could be used to check and improve IT strategy
• Identify the factors in reducing business risk in IT projects
• Find out the benefits of using lean rather than waterfall and agile
• Understand what actions you need to start on the path to success using lean

Presenters: Claudio Perrone and Peter Middleton

Free to ICS & IASA Members

Registration & Refreshment: – 17.30pm

Event start: 6.00 – 8.00pm

Following might be of interest to AgileIrelanders – contact lynette@leankit.co.uk to register

Webinar  – 4th February at 10.00, 11.30 and 14.00 UK/Ireland Time, 45 Minutes.

Lean/Agile/Kanban – the Economics of Speed: Agile, Lean and Kanban are underpinned by compelling economics which are now being realized in diverse organization types and industries. Here we look at how Kanban can lead to significant and on-going reductions in costs and improvements in ROI for both Operations work and development projects. We explore the ‘Economics of Speed’: the myriad ways shorter cycle time can eliminate costs, reduce investment risk and maximize profits or cost savings. All while improving business agility and customer outcomes.

Presenters: Colm O’hEocha (www.agileinnovation.eu) and Fran O’Hara (www.inspireqs.ie) have between them decades of experience in managing work and people in IT environments. First starting to apply Agile some 12 years ago and then in the last 5 or so years incorporating concepts from Lean, Visual Management and Kanban.

One of the major global conferences on the application of Lean to software and systems development is to be hosted in Galway in 2013! Details still sketchy but keep an eye on the website as the event takes shape.

Details at :

http://www.bcs.org/category/17403