Better Software Conference & EXPO 2005

When software development teams move to Agile methodologies, they often leave the project managers behind. Traditionally trained project managers are confused about their new roles and responsibilities in an environment that no longer allows them to make stand-alone decisions. In this session, Michele Sliger focuses on re-defining the job of the project manager and their new-and often more important-role in development. Michele discusses the shift in a project manager's role from "boss" to one who serves and supports the team.

Whereas the Agile Software Development Manifesto is a short and sweet list of principles for developers, the Declaration of Interdependence for Agile Project Management is more of a mouthful. The Declaration of Interdependence was written to provide concrete guidance for software projects and projects in general with applicability to general management. In constructing it, a dozen senior consultants, designers, and managers-project, product, and line-validated that it covered their individual core operating frameworks.

Your software development group is adopting Agile practices. Documentation and processes now are lightweight. There are more unit tests, and all are automated. The software changes quickly with new releases every one to two weeks. What's happening with QA? Quality Assurance groups are typically accustomed to more heavyweight processes in which they spend a third or more of their time documenting tests and tracking results.

In some contexts, the software development process can be optimized when it is thought of-and run-like a highly automated manufacturing production line. Rather than producing many identical widgets like a manufacturing plant, software organizations produce many programming changes. These changes may not be identical like manufactured widgets, but programming changes can start looking a lot like widgets when you look at the big picture.