Wash, rinse, repeat. So many people are focused on execution that they often don’t take a step back and measure the results and adjust accordingly. Agile development has been a process that many companies have incorporated to speed up development, reduce release cycles and produce more features more often.
Some developers hate the process. In all honesty I’ve seen it executed well and executed poorly. At its best, it’s worked and, by shortening goal cycles, I’ve seen happier developers and improved applications. At its worst, I’ve seen developers spending more time planning and setting goals than actually developing – losing precious time writing code.
It wasn’t until I read Jascha Kaykas-Wolff’s interview on Agile Marketing, by John Cass, did I recognize that the same methodologies for agile development are processes I’ve applied over and over in direct and database marketing techniques. Online, this is perhaps most common with search engine marketing companies who are constantly tweaking their results and adapting changes while the campaigns are running.
Jason Cohan did a great video, referenced to me by John Cass of the PR Communications blog.
Just a note… I still have Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change by Kent Beck on my bookshelf – it’s one of my favorites!
