In my experience, Agile adoption started in some of the organizations with lot of hype and inflated expectations. And in such cases, if Agile transformation is not handled properly, it can result in multiple challenges rather than providing the expected benefits. This practical experience sharing session would cover some such problems I faced while applying Agile in different environments. The audience practicing Agile can relate some of these challenges with their own environment as well. The attendees who are on their path to Agile transformation can learn from the lessons and mistakes shared by the speaker. The session would cover challenges observed due to nature of the project, customer-vendor engagement model, application of processes, attitude of people rolling out agile, unrealistic expectations, conflict in roles and responsibilities. It would also highlight challenges introduced to some of the roles (like Project/QA Manager/Manual Tester etc.) in Agile environment and impact on billing / project contracts / SOW etc.

2. Life has not been that rosy
with Agile!
-Rahul Sudame
-SPC, CSP, PMI-ACP

3. We are going Agile!
I heard it is something
amazing - VP
Agile must be
the silver spoon!
Agile is Faster!
Better!! Cheaper!!! We need to have
Agile in our service
offering!
Everyone else is
talking about Agile

4. Agile won’t work for us 
We cannot ship
Storage array
hardware in phases
We cannot skip
compliance in our
Banking
environment
How can we
plan a Sprint for
production
support?
Agile in
compliance
driven
environment
We have been anyways
doing incremental
delivery

5. Project 1
Product
Dev
VersionOne
PO in US
Selenium
based
framework
Multiple
Parallel
Releases
Multiple
Product
lines
 One Product line on Agile and
others on conventional model
 Cross-team dependency
resulted in delays
 Home-grown framework vs.
external automation product
 Detached ops team and
production timelines
 Implementation as per PMs
interpretation
 Flood of Agile Tools!

6. Who handles P1 tickets?
“Scrum Work”
(items from the
Product Backlog
that the team has
committed to do)
“P1 Bugs”
(emergency
requests
that need to be
responded to
immediately)
“Product Backlog
Work”
“P1 Bugs”
Commits in this
Sprint
Commits to fit P1 bugs.
Scrum Team D.R.

7.  Sprint Tester & System Tester model
 Dedicated team for building automation framework as well as tests
across applications
 Scrum-of-Scrum worked in multi-location environments
 Travel budget worked well 
 Release timeframe changed from 1.5 years to 3 months
 Customer feedback after 1st release candidate revealed customer
grievances on UX – big win due to Agile!
3 + 1
sprints
RC1
3 + 1
sprints
RC2
3 + 1
sprints
RC3
Release Candidate Model

8. Project 2
Product
Dev
Multiple
Product
Lines
Multiple POs
Multiple
Technologies
Village for
collavoration
UrbanDeploy
/ TeamCity
tools
 Synchronization across multi-
location feature & system teams
 Conflicting priorities amongst 3
product lines and technical debt
 Common backlog or Separate?
 Product 1
 Product 2
 Product 3
 UX Features
 Tech Features / Defects

9. Sprint 0
Sprint 0 activities & status:
 WBS & Effort estimation [Module 1]: Done
 WBS & Effort estimation [Module 2]: Done
 WBS & Effort estimation [Module 3]: <Partial>
 WBS & Effort estimation [QA]: Done
 WBS & Effort estimation [BO/BS]: <Partial>
 Requirements/UI Clarification – In Progress
 Design/Architecture – In Progress
 Environment Setup – In Progress
◦ JRuby setup: Done
◦ QA environment setup: Done
◦ Web server Instance setup: Done
◦ Migrate from Ruby version 1.8.6 to 1.9: In Progress
Risks:
 Availability of resources full time for the project duration
 Requirement of additional manual QA resource

10.  You don’t need a software
tester on your agile team!
 If we have BDD, ATDD, TDD,
UI Automation, Test
Automation, Unit Testing, why
do we need manual testing?
 Facebook has no testers!
 Lets replace manual testing
with automation!
 Repeating regression every
sprint is not possible and an
overhead!
Do we need Testers?

11. Module Auto
Deploy
Auto Sanity
tests
Auto Staging
Deployment
Auto Production
Deploy
Module 1    
Module 2    
Module 3    
 - to be done  - started  - done  - not required
CI Targets

12. Project 3
Startup
New
product
idea
Dynamic
features
Budget
constraints
Open
source
Lean(!)
processes
 Product Backlog? What is that?
 I cannot afford a BA/Product
owner
 Change Request? Come on
guys, we are Agile!
 Time-to-market pressure
 Continuous change in plans
 Fix budget & timeline contract
due to bootstrapping

13. Test case
Management
Defect
Management
Automation
Performance
Testing
DevOps
OpenSource
Commercial
We cannot afford licenses

14.  Dev team gives build on
last day of Sprint! QA is
behind Dev!
 Agile welcomes change
in requirements, WHY 
 Should I focus on manual
or automation?
 When would I get time for
regression?
Life is stressful in Agile

15.  Continuous change in scope widely impacted the timelines
 ‘Agile’ was a great excuse for changes 
 Agile was great for startup, considering dynamic business
environment, but over-Agility created chaos
 Absence of Product Backlog & agreement on scope resulted in
delays & losses
 No budget for Agile tools, Additional environment and licenses
 Final result – FAILURE!
Failure!

16. Project 4
Services
Storage
Client
Need for
system
integration
Kanban
Embedded
+ Plugins +
APIs
Hardware
certification
 Client’s unawareness about
Agile
 Defined hardware certification
cycle mandatory
 Incremental cycles for APIs, UI
and feature development
 Frequent integration and demo
cycles
 Technical environment mapped
with Agile

17.  Who would do my
appraisal?
 Whom should I listen?
 What if there are
conflicting directions from
these people?
 Should I follow QA
processes or Project
Processes or Scrum?
Whom should I report to?

18.  Shorter delivery cycles significantly helped for frequent integration
 Early visibility to customers through UAT environment
 Frequent customer feedback helped the client to make course
correction quickly
 T&M engagement with 20% efforts reserved for automation, resulted
in better quality
 Frequent demos helped in building client confidence and open new
business opportunities
 Helped the organization to convert short-term contract to long-term
partnership
It ‘can’ work for hardware
projects

19. Project 5
Services
Multi-vendor
environment
Faster time
to respond
TFS
Automation
with CodedUI
End-Client
certification
cycle
 Dev & QA with separate
vendors
 Challenge due to multi-location,
multi-time zone environment
 Team split based on technology
instead of feature teams
 Dictating manager 
 Velocity needs to double
every sprint!
 Continuous pressure for
frequent deliveries

20. Manual Testing knowledge
Coding knowledge (C# / .net)
Chef / Puppet knowledge
Linux admin knowledge
Database knowledge
Superman JD

21.  Manual regression testing
efforts: 5 days
 Automated regression testing
efforts: 4 hours
 90% effort reduction
 Continuous Integration tool
runs automated tests
everyday!
 Automated quality assurance
per Sprint
Why should I pay for Manual
Testing?

22.  I don’t have programming
background!
 Are you converting QA to
developers?
 Which Tool should I
learn?
 I am a developer, I won’t
do QA!
I don’t know C#

23.  Should I learn:
◦ Automation Testing?
◦ Performance Testing?
◦ Load/Stress Testing?
◦ Usability Testing?
◦ API Testing?
◦ Which Tool?
 Selenium RC / IDE /
Webdriver
 LoadRunner /
WinRunner
 SoapUI / TestNG /
Soasta
 Chef / Puppet
There is no end to it 

24. Manual Tester is not alone!
 What is role of QA
Manager?
 What is role of
Project/Functional/
People Manager?
 What happens to
hierarchical
organization?
 What happens to
reporting / appraisals?

25.  Agile and -
◦ Project Management?
◦ Risk Management?
◦ Design?
◦ Documentation?
◦ CMMI?
◦ Fix Price, Fix duration
projects?
◦ Compliance?
◦ Control Limits?
◦ Maintenance / Tech Support
Projects?
◦ Servant Leadership?
Laundry list is big
Quality
Management
Cost
Management
Communication
Management
Time
Management
Human Resource
Management
Procurement
Management
Risk
Management
Integration
Management
Scope
Management

26. Few things worked as well 

27. Team 1
System
Team
Team 5
Team 4
Team 3
Team 2
Cross Team Interactions
27
Product
Owner
Project
Managers
Architects
Program
Managers
PMO
Quality Master –
QM
Scrum Master – SM
Test Master – TSM
Tech Master - TM

28. Agility Assessment

29. Best Agile Implementation
Award

30. Agile on-boarding Plan

32. Inspect & Adapt

33. Retros

34. Innovation Games

35. Thank You !
- Rahul Sudame
rahulsudame@yahoo.com