Technical debt presentation at the Brisbane Scrum Users Group.
Update: I’m releasing the presentation under the Creative Commons (cc) by 3.0 license. This basically means that you can remix, edit or create derivative works of this presentation, provided that you attribute it to me, and the artists whose work (photographs) I’ve used. The license allows you to use it for profit, so you can use it for work purposes (for example, presentations to teams and/or management). The fully description of the license can be found here.
The presentation can be downloaded as a Powerpoint (ppt) file, here.
Or, as a zip file that contains a Apple Keynote (key) file, as well as the ppt file, here.
I recently did a presentation to the Brisbane Scrum Users Group on “Technical debt and what to do about it.” I even got to do the infamous “Squirrel Burger” exercise, which I haven’t done for about two years. I think it’s a wonderful exercise, but not everyone agrees and it can provoke some strong reactions. I stop using it in my CSM courses partly because of complaints about making people feel ill. I still love it, however, and certainly enjoyed dusting it off and the Technical debt presentation.
I’d like to thank James Brett and everyone at the BSUG for such a warm welcome. The presentation is available on my downloads page, and here:
Ok, you have my curiosity up over the Squirrel Burger exercise. I’ve got to know more about it if you can post it or email it to me.
Thanks,
Dutch Driver
Hi Dutch,
Update: I’ve just noticed that WP removes links in comments … bugger!! So, I’ve extracted the URL’s so that you can follow them.
A number of people have asked for more details about the Squirrel Burger exercise. Joe Tenczar wrote a nice description on the ScrumDevelopment mailing list, here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/scrumdevelopment/message/8798
The exercise is really about assuming risk inappropriately. It’s easy to see when it’s cast as the Squirrel Burger story, but much more difficult to see in our day-to-day behaviour. Many participants will feel ill when I walk them through the exercise, but will happily behave in exactly this way during their professional lives.
So, how does this relate back to technical debt? Assuming risk inappropriately is the root course of the problem. When we (and I include myself here, because I’ve been guilty of this in the past) compromise quality in order to deliver a fixed set of functionality in a given time, we make a decision that’s not ours to make. We deliver a Squirrel Burger. Ken argues in his infamous “Canary in a coal mine” presentation that, if quality is to be compromised then it’s ultimately a CXO decision. The video can be found here:
http://www.infoq.com/presentations/agile-quality-canary-coalmine