Being Agile: Eleven Breakthrough Techniques to Keep You from “Waterfalling Backward”

Start with Whole Teams

Agile teams are whole teams. Whole teams are created at the beginning of a project and stay together throughout the project. Whole teams consist of everyone needed to complete the planned product deliverables.

Team members each have unique skills and expertise that they use to contribute to the overall effort, but they are also expected to cross outside of their skill boundaries when required to help the rest of the team reach the iteration goals. Teams new to agile often respond to this notion with anxiety. “We cannot afford to have developers test.” “I cannot learn how to develop.” “I am not a good writer.” Team productivity will obviously increase if the entire team could do any of the tasks; however, this is not the ...