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10 Powerful Agile Metrics

1. Sprint Burndown The sprint burndown chart visualizes how many story points have been completed during the sprint and how many remain, and helps forecast if the sprint scope will be completed on time. Why it is powerful:  Makes it instantly clear how much value a sprint has already delivered and how close we are to completing our commitment to customers. 2. Agile Velocity Velocity measures how many story points were completed by a team, on average, over the past few sprints. It can be used to predict the team’s output in the upcoming sprints. Why it is powerful:  Velocity is powerful because it’s a result metric – how much value was actually delivered to customers in a series of sprints. Be careful not to compare velocity across teams because story points and definition of done can vary between teams. 3. Lead Time Lead time measures the total time from the moment a story enters the system (in the backlog), until it is completed as part of a sprint, or released to

Agile metric to measure agile success

#1 On-Time Delivery According to the  State of Agile survey , 58% of the respondents* said they measured the success of their agile initiatives by on-time delivery. With agile, our schedule is fixed and our scope is flexed. What does that mean for on-time? Well, time just happens, so theoretically, we are always on time. But, on-time is generally measured in context with the expectations about what will be delivered. To measure and have visibility of what is being delivered, we may look to the out-of-the box metrics of  the burndown or the burnup . For instance, in this VersionOne burndown chart you can see progress as the team heads toward an expected end date. This burnup chart, on the other hand, allows you to see the trend of getting stuff done, as well as the impact of scope changes. #2 Product Quality A total of 48% of the respondents to the survey said they measured the success of their agile initiatives through product quality. Quality is often measured in m

The Characteristics of a Successful Agile Coach

1. Patience An agile coach, just like any coach, needs to be patient with the people they are leading. If you want your business to be agile, then you need  everyone in your company  to fully-understand what you’re working towards, and not everyone is going to “get it” straight away. Ultimately, you’re probably going to be asked the same question a thousand different times, and you need to figure out how to keep your cool. 2. Flexibility The agile framework can’t exist without flexibility. The whole point of being “agile” in the business world, is being able to adapt to changes in your marketplace. In other words, as a coach, you’ll need to be prepared for whatever happens in your organization, and have a certain strength about you when it comes to rolling with the punches. There will be times when you face challenges that leave you scratching your head and wondering what to do next. However, whenever you encounter a new scenario, you need to be able to take your tried and tes

Agile Metrics

Know your business "Done" only tells half the story. It's about building the right product, at the right time, for the right market. Staying on track throughout the program means collecting and analysing some data along the way. In any agile program, it's important to track both business metrics and agile metrics. Business metrics focus on whether the solution is meeting the market need, and agile metrics measure aspects of the development process. A program's business metrics should be rooted in its roadmap. For each initiative on the roadmap, include several key performance indicators (KPIs) that map to the program's goals. In addition, include success criteria for each product  requirement  such as adoption rate by end-users or percentage of code covered by automated tests. These success criteria feed into the program's agile metrics. And the more teams learn, the better they can adapt and evolve.  How to use agile metrics to optimi