Object Mentor Blog: Agile Snow Shoveling Plan

Agile Snow Shoveling Plan

James Grenning — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 14:51:00 +0000

My wife and I have evening plans. The driveway has a nice 10 inch layer of snow. To not keep our friends waiting we must leave the house by 6:30. We have a deadline. Working backwards, I need to be in the shower at 6:00. My requirements are to plow off the whole driveway and leave the house, showered and dressed by 6:30

Its 5:00. I have one hour. With the kids gone, the cub cadet (with plow) still in need of repair, I wonder can I meet my requirements and finish the job by 5:55 so I can dust off, open a beer and get in the shower by 6. The schedule looks tight, I could do more analysis, but starting the job will tell me a lot and help me get it done too.

I get my back friendly shovel and get to work, shoveling behind the car we plan on taking. After fifteen minutes I have a realization, I am not going to make it. The pan is not doable. A quick estimate and I see I have cleaned off about one eighth of the driveway and I have used one quarter of my time. Sound familiar. My back was not going to let me move more snow more quickly. Wishful thinking would mean not getting to the shower on time and possibly being blocked in the driveway. Thirty minutes from shower out the door is a metric established long ago. I needed to adjust the plan.

I got a committee together to discuss our options. Oh wait a second, that was a different plan.

I cleared about one eighth of the drive in fifteen minutes. Using my velocity it looks like a two hour job. So, its likely I will only have time to move half of the snow that’s preventing access to and from our house. I better focus on the “critical path”. The other car would be buried for another day and the front walk would have to wait.

A good snow drift could have destroyed my plan, but surprisingly there were none on the critical path. Shoveling this software is predictable, and my velocity was stable. I did not set any stretch goals, because I wanted to shovel another day. Keeping with my sustainable pace, I delivery the critical path by 5:55. The Heine tasted good, and we made the next milestone: dinner with our friends.

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by James

Sat, 29 Dec 2007 15:52:22 +0000

Yesterday’s shoveling went so well, I had time left over for two snowmen.

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by unclebob

Thu, 27 Dec 2007 12:03:29 +0000

James,

This sounds like a snow-job to me.

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by Kris

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 17:19:22 +0000

Man you don’t even know how long I’ve waited for this since disabling my own Movable Type widget

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by Ben Monro

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 12:54:17 +0000

See the problem here is that you’re not really addressing the solution at its core. Move to San Diego and I think you’ll find this problem will never rear its ugly head again.

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by Tim Hennekey

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 10:03:02 +0000

Does the realization that you do this cause you to feel nerdier? I recently rationalized that I could estimate our wait time in a long line by measuring our velocity (the floor had regular squares of carpet) and the distance to the counter (number of squares to the counter).

I can still hear the resulting groans.

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by James

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 08:32:39 +0000

I thought your time in Finland would give you some in-depth knowledge of snow.

"Agile Snow Shoveling Plan" by Michael Feathers

Thu, 20 Dec 2007 07:32:53 +0000

Why didn’t you get out the garden hose and squirt all the snow away? I do that for leaves in my driveway and it works well.