Paper : Introducing Scrum into Government

Here is an award winning industry paper by Adrian Royce, from the Australian Software Engineering Conference (ASWEC 2009), via Rowans blog.

Here are some extracts;

This paper outlines the steps the author took in introducing the Scrum agile process into the Dept of Housing and what lessons were learnt.

Housing has now been running the ‘Scrum’ agile project delivery process for over 2 years. During that time all software projects have been delivered on or ahead of agreed time frames. ICT staff, engaged in the Scrum process, became motivated about delivering value to the client. ICT staff morale increased which led to staff retention. Feedback from business units across the department indicates that the usage of Scrum is a success.

The agile process called “Scrum” was selected over the
alternatives because it:

• Emphasized communication and collaboration, functioning software, and the flexibility to adapt to emerging business realities[1];
• Was not just relevant for developers but the entireproject team; and
• Embraced agile philosophies such as the Agile Manifesto[2].

I particularly like the summary, which highlights an often missed attribute of Scrum.

The use of Scrum was a success at the Department of Housing. However even as a lightweight methodology, it requires much discipline.

Whilst Scrum is an Agile method, Agile doesn't mean that there is a lack of discipline. In fact the contrary is true, in that Scrum and XP have a great deal of discipline. This is how higher quality software is produced. What is different from traditional 'waterfall' development is that redundant and wasteful practice has been removed.

If you are interested in such things, or how Scrum and Prince 2 integrated for this department, then go read the paper.