Leading Lean Software Development: Results Are Not the Point

Foreword

I was a relative newbie to both agile and lean when I first met Mary and Tom Poppendieck at an Agile Conference in Salt Lake City in 2003, so of course I started our conversation with the question that had been bothering me: “How do you reconcile the lean view that tests are waste with the need for tests in software development?” Mary’s immediate response: “Unit tests are what let you stop the line.”

I’ve learned a lot about both agile and lean since then, and the more I learn, the more I appreciate the profound understanding that led to that simple answer so clearly tying multiple agile practices to fundamental lean principles.

So, when Mary asked me to review her new book, I jumped at the chance, and I wasn’t disappointed. The approach ...