Having worked with a wide variety of clients and projects, the underlining common denominator of success for me, as a project manager is happy satisfied and (hopefully) returning customers. Winning clients’ trust for me has become even smoother with Agile practises as, since I’ve embraced this methodology of working at Cameron and Wilding, I have noticed a few patterns of success across our projects with our clients such as the Telegraph Media Group, Sage Publications, The Economist that I’d like to share with you in today’s session. Cameron & Wilding Ltd. http://www.cameronandwilding.com/

1. DrupalCamp Brighton
Winning clients’ trust
Successful Agile project management
Cameron & Wilding , 18. 06. 2016

2. @ytulauratambien( This is my very bad choice for a Twitter ID … And yes , it’s from the Pedro Almodóvar movie : Y Tu Mama Tambien )
@cameronwilding( Yes , this is a much sensible choice of Twitter ID )

3. Talk Overview
Since embracing Agile Scrum project management methodology, winning clients’
trust has become smoother across our accounts. Along the years, I have noticed a
few patterns of success across these projects, with clients such as the Imperial
War Museums, the Telegraph Media Group, Sage Publications, and The
Economist. The underlying common denominator of success being happy,
satisfied and returning customers.

4. Agenda
● A bit about me and C&W
● Quick Agile overview
● Winning Clients’ Trust - Patterns
○ Culture: What we stand for
○ Scrum Workflow
○ Effective Communication
○ Scrum Ceremonies
○ Budget Management
● Winning Clients’ Trust - Case studies
○ Sage Publications - Workflow review
○ The Economist - Backlog grooming
○ The Telegraph - Team re-alignment
● The Golden Rule

5. A bit about me
and C&W

6. A bit about me
● 9 years in the digital industry
● 6 years focus on open source
technology
● 2+ years Agile
● Italian #StayIn

7. Cameron & Wilding
● Drupal specialist since 2006
● Team of 20 people, London HQ
● Professional, passionate, friendly
● Award Winning
● Drupal 8, web and App dev, UX design,
strategy consultancy...
● Agile project management and coaching
● Experience in travel, media, publishing, third
section, finance, arts
“ Great team, great clients,
great work ”

8. Quick Agile overview

12. The Agile Manifesto
Individuals & interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan

13. Winning Clients’ Trust:
Practices

14. Culture: What we stand for
● Open and honest
● Under promise, over deliver
● Great team, great clients, great work
● Great communication
● Professional and friendly

15. Scrum Workflow [1/2]
● Jira sprint boards are always up to
date, ensuring transparency over the
progress
● Tickets include detailed user stories
with refined acceptance criteria

16. TO DO IN PROGRESS PEER REVIEW IN TESTING DONE
local / dev local / dev local & test / dev candwtest / QA candwtest / QA
Assigned to the dev
at the start of the
sprint
Dev implement peer
review feedback as
priority
2 devs peer review,
code only
Functional testing: all
ACs are met
Stories that have
passed testing are
ready here
Prioritised top to
bottom
Dev starts working on
story
Once code is
approved merge to
candwtest
If yes, story is closed
with a comment
Stories in this
column, are merged,
passed testing,
realise tagged
Flagged stories that
didn’t pass testing
are back here at the
top of the queue
Quick testing: dev
makes sure all ACs
are met
Once merged, dev
tags the user story on
Jira against its
release
If not, story is
flagged and sent
back to the dev with
a comment
Dev completes dev
specs
Dev completes QA
instructions before
assigning ticket to QA
team
If ACs are met, but
we realise we
wanted something
different a new story
is raised in the
backlog

17. Effective Communication [1/2]
● Instant BUT streamlined communication
● Fast feedback loop
● Encourages collaboration
● Whole team = no “middle man”
● Reduce misunderstanding(-s)
● Be assertive, confident but collaborative

18. Effective Communication [2/2]
● Keep your personal touch
○ Be genuine
○ Down to earth
○ Be fun
● It’s not always easy
○ Disagree
○ Admit mistakes
○ Encourage feedback
“The quality of the work they produced was
outstanding, and the project was run with
great humour and with the spirit of one big
team.
I would not hesitate to recommend the
Cameron & Wilding team, who have been a real
joy to work with”
Jeremy Ottevanger, Technical Web Manager
Imperial War Museums (IWM)

19. Scrum Ceremonies [1/2]
● Sprint backlog grooming [Jira]
● Sprint planning
● Daily scrums
● Sprint demo
● Sprint retrospective

20. Scrum Ceremonies [1/2]
● Clients prepare for meetings, as it’s us (grooming)
● Be informative when sharing information (stand ups)
● Facilitate meetings
○ cut off off-topic conversations
○ assign owners to actions (retrospectives)
○ review and monitor agreed actions/mitigation points, before the end of the sprint
“Your clients time is precious... as it’s yours”

21. Budget Management [1/2]
● Budget tracking
● Budget forecasting (team availability)
● Reporting, we’re always in control:
○ sprint reports
○ release reports
○ timesheets
“Their excellent project management -
which is an example of how a third party
company should report about the "health"
of a project - their developers’ passion for
high quality code and the "openness" of
their management were key in our
successful relationship”
Emilio Vacca, Director of Mobile
The Telegraph Media Group (TMG)

22. Budget Management [2/2]

23. Winning Clients’ Trust:
Case studies

24. ● Agenda
○ Agile improvements
○ Sage Jira board & workflows
○ Team roles & responsibilities
● Attendees
○ C&W
○ Sage UK
○ Sage India
○ Sage US
○ 3rd parties
● Goal
As all new teams we need a common
understanding of
[1] how to best work together and
[2] roles & responsibilities of each team
member
in order to run smooth, more integrated and
collaborative sprints
Sage Publications - Workflow review [1/2]

25. Agile improvements already in place
○ What is a user story, and what is not
○ Working with sprint goals
○ Backlog grooming and preparation

26. The Economist - Backlog grooming
● The backlog grooming meetings are a product backlog refinements
● Writing user stories and prioritisation happens ahead (!!) of the session
● It helps keeping the backlog clean and orderly
What happens during the backlog grooming sessions? We
○ Discuss the top items on the product backlog by asking questions
○ Refine user stories by translating the answers in additional Acceptance Criteria
○ Estimate user stories
○ Look deeper into the backlog to do longer-range planning (2 sprints)

27. The Telegraph - Team re-alignment
● Your knowledge of the product is built here, its intricacies, its history
● You are aware why certain decisions are taken
● You pro-actively contribute to shape the product
● You ensure user stories are clear for you / your team
○ It’s not only about the devs !
When you have a good backlog session, the rest of your time is focus time,
as the majority of your Qs have been answered already

28. The Golden Rule
Flexibility ● There’s no just ONE way to do things
● Adapt your work style
● Be receptive
● Observe
● Keep an open mind

29. Thank you !

30. C&W TWITTER @cameronwilding
C&W EMAIL info@cameronandwilding.com
C&W WEB www.cameronandwilding.com
C&W LINKEDIN https://www.linkedin.com/company/cameron-&-wilding/
LAURA TWITTER @ytulauratambien
LAURA EMAIL laura.delnevo@cameronandwilding.com
VALENTINO ROSSI FAN CLUB … only kidding !