If there is one person who has seen Scrum and Agile grow in Asia, it is Pete Deemer. He has been involved in Yahoo’s large scale adoption of Scrum in SunnyVale, CA as well as its state of the art development center in Bangalore. More than 800 people were transitioned to Scrum. He also co-write the Scrum Primer. After Yahoo, Pete founded his own firm, GoodSafe, LLC and through GoodAgile, conducts regular trainings and coachings in India and Asia. Pete, is only one of the very few Certified Scrum Trainers and is a leading thought leader in Agile and Scrum Community. In this interview, Pete Deemer, shares his experiences in implementing Scrum and Scrum in India as well as outsourcing environment.

agilecollab : GoodAgile recently conducted Scrum Unconference in Hyderabad. What was the motivation for the same?

Pete Deemer : Over the last year, we have seen rapid growth of Scrum in India and invariably people have asked me during CSM classes and otherwise, on why there are few oppotunities to meet, learn and network. At GoodAgile, we felt like the time had come to start doing Scrum-specific events where people could meet in person, hone their skills, and have a fun time. We also wanted something that we could pull off quickly and without lengthy upfront planning and also have a model that we could replicate in different cities around India.  So we thought the Bar-Camp style UnConference was the right approach. We got a group of people together, and in real-time we created a full day of talks, exercises, and other fun activities.  But best of all, the format was based on the self-organization and self-management that’s so central to Scrum, so it felt “Right”.

agilecollab : How was the experiences?

Pete Deemer : It was great — we had about 60 people from lots of different companies in Hyderabad coming together, sharing experiences, and learning from each other. Scrum can be very challenging especially if you do not have people to network in your own organization, and it’s great to be able to get advice and learn from other people who’ve been through the same challenges and succeeded.  The main thing I carried back was something I’m constantly reminded of, and why I like being in the IT industry — software people, even though thought of as “geeks” by the rest of the world, are some of the most interesting, creative, and thoughtful people you could ever meet!

agilecollab : Tell us about your implementation of Scrum in Yahoo? What metrics did you guys track to know that Scrum was successful?

Pete Deemer : We did gather metrics, but for most teams, we didn’t need the metrics to tell us Scrum was making a significant difference — the results in business value and team morale were pretty apparent to all.

agilecollab : Based on the above, what is your advice to companies transitioning to Agile?

Pete Deemer : If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing properly — get the best training and coaching you can find, and make sure the entire organization understands and can support the team’s efforts. 

agilecollab : At what stage do you think is Scrum awareness and implementation in India?

Pete Deemer : Over the last year or so, there’s no question it’s entered the stage of rapid growth. Almost all the best-known IT firms in India have teams using Scrum now. There are lots of people in many companies in India, who are holding on to the values of Scrum, working to implement Scrum properly and trying to improve the way their businesses are run. There are many conferences and events being held as well. We would like to support such people. The challenge now is helping people be as successful as possible within the specific context of India, and helping grow the expertise. Having unconferences and speaking at other Agile and IT events is an effort in this regard. We have also started the Scrum-India Yahoo Group, which is again another opportunity for people to share and learn from fellow Scrum users.  I also appreciate the effort that www.agilecollab.com is making - this is coming up great and explains concepts to beginners in a simple fashion.

agilecollab : Do you think it makes sense for outsourcing/ service companies to use Scrum?

Pete Deemer : Absolutely.  If speed, quality, and “getting it right for the customer” are your part of the value you offer customers, you should definitely consider Scrum. This is not always going to be easy. However, the results can be dramatic, and a lot of teams say “I wish we’d discovered this sooner!”

agilecollab : What are the benefits for customers in choosing a company which does Scrum or true Agile rather than one which does not?

Pete Deemer : Some of the biggest benefits of Scrum for the customer are visibility into what’s being produced, and “is it right” — and the ability to rapidly iterate, without lapsing into chaos or thrashing. It in a way also helps you focus and participate. Scrum does require a more involved approach from the customer side, but only for their own benefit. One risk for the customers is that there are a lot of companies who claim to be doing “Agile”, but are in fact just using it as a marketing label — so I’d recommend choosing carefully.

agilecollab : You conduct lots of trainings and CSM classes in Bangalore and Hyderabad but comparatively lesser in NCR or North. Why do you think north India lags behind in Scrum awareness?

Pete Deemer : I’m not sure why this is — especially since there are leading Agile companies and also others who are exploring Agile, in the Delhi area and from what I hear, in Chandigarh too. I think we’ll see more and more growth in the north in the coming year.

agilecollab : Finally, what are goodagile plans for new year?

Pete Deemer : The plans for the coming year are many. I am traveling all across India and Asia, helping people learn about Scrum. We hope to continue to spread the Agile and Scrum message, and help companies succeed with it!

agilecollab.com, wishes Pete all the best for this year and always.

Popularity: 21%

Posted on April 11th, 2008 by admin
Filed under: Around the Globe, Interviews | No Comments »

Naresh Jain is the founder Vice-Chairman of the Agile Software Community of India (ASCI) and the organizer of the Simple Design And Testing Conference (SDTConf). Naresh has help start various Agile User Groups including the Agile Philly User Group and various groups in India. Naresh is an active Open Source committer and enjoys teaching software development courses in Universities. By being a part of the team, Naresh helps software companies embrace agile. Naresh is passionate about building a community of talented and capable software craftsman, the next generation software leaders in India. In recognition of his accomplishments, in 2007 the Agile Alliance awarded Naresh with the Gordon Pask Award for contributions to the Agile Community by establishing Agile User Groups in India and for creating the Simple Design and Testing conference. He has worked on variety of software projects utilizing XP, Scrum and Crystal techniques since 2003. Currently, Naresh Jain is software craftsman working for Directi as Quality and Community Evangelist. In this interview, Naresh talks about his experiences in spreading awareness about Agile and helping companies adopt Agile in India.

agilecollab : Please tell us how were you exposed to Agile?

Naresh Jain : Back in the dark days of my life, I was working as a coder (not programmer) on a big J2EE project. This was for a IT division of a big Bank. We had a really smart Architect sitting in UK who would provide development guidelines. One of his guidelines was, as soon as we finish a feature, we were supposed to write JUnit tests before we check in the code. As soon as any team member would check-in code, he would check out the code on his machine and do a code review (he literally acted as our Continuous integration build server). For those of us who had never written a unit test, this was a boon in disguise to avoid stupid mistakes. As I got used to this approach of writing unit tests after the code was written, I felt I was wasting too much time building the wrong code. My test would give me the feedback that I made a silly assumption. This feedback was great, but I had already spent the time writing the wrong code. My manager always told us, work smarter not harder. So in the search of smarter ways to do the same, I stumbled upon the life changing article “Test Infected“. The whole Test-First approached seemed so much superior than what we were doing. And thus began my journey into the Agile world!

agilecollab : What has been the motivation behind ASCI?

Naresh Jain : Scratch your personal itch! While I saw a clear value in Agile and light-weight methods, there were very few companies in India who actually knew about these methods. Agile was making big news in the west and community based conferences was a growing trend there. In late 2004, Owen Rogers and Manoj Bharadwaj were planning to organize a one day conference in Bangalore similar to the XP Day. Manoj spotted my interest in community building and asked me to help them. I was very interested and happily joined forces with Owen and Manoj. Soon the conference planning started picking up steam. At one point, (a month before the conference) we had to figure out a way to manage funds. So we wanted to open a bank account. We realized that it would be difficult to open a bank account without having some kind of an organization. Since this was a non-profit event, KK Rajan suggested we register a non-profit society and open a bank account in its name. Bhavin Javia suggested the name ASCI - Agile Software Community of India. And today we have ASCI. So what started off as a means to handle funds for a non-profit conference, today is grown into a large body of Agile enthusiasts and practitioners. Today ASCI provides a platform for people from different software organizations to come together and share their experience with Software development methodologies. ASCI’s focus is Agile and related light weight methodologies/philosophies. ASCI evangelizes itself to be a facilitating body which fosters and innovates lightweight methodologies in software development in India.

agilecollab : How can one become a member of ASCI?

Naresh Jain : We believe in keeping it simple and lean. Details : http://agileindia.org/membership.htm

agilecollab : What are the plans for coming year and ahead for ASCI?

Naresh Jain : While Agile is got into mainstream, there are a huge number of organizations in India who want to adopt Agile. So the focus of ASCI has shifted from Agile awareness to Agile adoption. ASCI’s model to achieve this has mainly been through conference and user groups. We have consciously not got into training and certification. And hope we’ll never get into it. ASCI has just formed a new board and I think this board will take ASCI to the next level.

agilecollab : How have last few years been in adoption of Agile principles and practices in India?

Naresh Jain : There has been an exponential growth. In 2004, there were hardly any companies that were aware of Agile. Today most of the big companies have piloted at least a few projects using Agile and some companies are using Agile principles and practices in majority of their projects. Smaller companies have found it easy to adopt agile while the big CMM companies are getting there.

agilecollab : Do you think the motivation for adopting Agile is more in product companies than IT Services companies?

Naresh Jain : I don’t really have data to say whether its more in product companies or in services companies. There are a large number of companies in both categories that are adopting Agile. In the product space, time to market and improving efficiency/ productivity is driving the adoption. In other words, the motivation is mostly internal. While in the services space, competitive advantage and customer/counterpart pressure is really driving the adoption. In other words, the motivation is mostly external.

agilecollab : Is there a regional bias in India with regards to Agile adoption, with South leading way over North?

Naresh Jain : Based on my interaction with various companies all over India, Bangalore has the highest number of companies practicing Agile. Also in terms of their experience, Bangalore seems to have lot more companies with pretty good understanding of Agile. Having said that, companies in Pune, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, NCR, Chandigarh, etc are catching up big time. But, I think Bangalore does have the first starter advantage.

agilecollab : According to you, which of Agile frameworks fits better in Indian context?

Naresh Jain : In my personal experience eXtreme Programing, Crystal and Lean are the frameworks from which companies in India will really benefit. Scrum would also be important form a marketing perspective. For Ex: A services company can bid for a project saying “We have 5 certified scrum masters”!

agilecollab : What according to you are major factors which impede organizations journey towards agility?

Naresh Jain : Organization Culture and People’s attitude towards change.

agilecollab : We have started Agile Chandigarh [users can join on LinkedIn and Yahoo Groups]. It is at a nascent stage. However, it would be probably only second such group in North. What advice would you give to the group?

Naresh Jain : I’m nobody to give advice. But now that you have asked. I have 3 advices:
1. Perseverance
2. Perseverance
3. Perseverance
It takes a bloody long time for people to invest time in user groups and to value free peer-to-peer community based learning. Most people want an easy way out. Pay, sit through a class for 2 days and walk out with a certificate. Now that we have taken the first step in the right direction, I think 50% of our job is done. Also remember ASCI will live as long as such initiatives are taken by people in different parts of the country.

agilecollab : Finally, any plans to visit Chandigarh?

Naresh Jain : Not that I know of. But if you plan to organize a Agile Chandigarh 08 Conference, you can count on me to move the boxes.

Popularity: 31%

Posted on March 24th, 2008 by admin
Filed under: Around the Globe, Interviews, Leadership | 2 Comments »