Agile Metrics

Agile is a frame of mind, a way of thinking.

But just because you are “agile” doesn’t mean there isn’t a need to track or measure effort. If you’re an organization using an Agile development process, your focus is on two key Agile objectives: quality software (free from defects) and velocity (speed). To effectively achieve those goals requires measurement and accountability.

We have the experience and industry know-how to take the guesswork out of your Agile development, with Agile metric methodologies that are proven to set you up for success.

The “what’s” and “why’s” of collecting metrics in an Agile environment

When implementing software quality metrics, you need to first understand the purpose of the metric and who will be using it. Will the metric be used for measuring people or assessing the process? Will it illustrate the level of quality in software products, or drive toward a specific objective? QA managers typically want to deliver productivity metrics, while management may want to see metrics that support customer or user satisfaction or cost-related (ROI) initiatives.

Many organizations are interested in metrics that help them figure out how to go faster or figure out where their bottlenecks are. But we’ve found that simply going for speed doesn’t result in quality. However, going for quality usually results in greater speed.

Hence, we believe that before undergoing a metrics effort, you really need to understand and clarify your objectives with Agile, and what metrics will support measuring whether or not you’ve achieved your objectives. Goal Question Metric (GQM), is a paradigm that enables you to specifically connect your metrics to your objectives, which we believe should be your first step. Once you’ve got that, we advocate the importance of developing a baseline and key indicators in order to adapt metrics to suit your particular needs. And over time, your needs and focus may change as your objectives are reached or modified. Just as in Agile development, flexibility, communication, and intuitiveness are important to success in Agile metrics.