Thoughts from a Thirsty Bear

I recently wrote a somewhat tongue in cheek piece with a serious message . For agile - well, actually, any software development project - to succeed, business needs to be fully and intelligently engaged. Iterative delivery processes appear particularly sensitive to this (arguably, they just show it up sooner, but that’s another discussion). So, how do you make sure that your software team(s) successfully deliver what’s needed? A very good question - and one with no definitive answer. But here are a few hints that should give you a better than average chance of success. Firstly, and perhaps most importantly, is to recognise that “ The Business ” generally does not really understand the engineering discipine of software development. They might have an appreciation of it (at least, I hope they do!), but they don’t have skin in that particular game. They don’t cut code daily, so they don’t experience the trials and tribulations of producing the end product. So they don’t general