communication

Articles

Testing team standing around a computer and smiling 3 Methods for Better Communication and More Effective Testing

Successful delivery of software requires the entire team, so it’s imperative that everyone choose their words carefully so they convey what they really mean, are sensitive to others’ feelings, and consider all aspects of a problem. Here are three questions to remember when communicating about your software testing projects to ensure you’re considering the power of words.

Ajay Balamurugadas's picture Ajay Balamurugadas
Sticky notes on cabinet doors Applying Agile to Life: Taking Retrospectives outside the Workplace

A lot of what agile teams do can be used effectively outside software development teams, and even outside the typical business organization. For instance, retrospectives and the practice of talking about what went well, what you should keep doing, and what can be improved can be applied anywhere—even to families. Read on to learn how to bring continuous improvement into your daily life.

Ben Kopel's picture Ben Kopel
The Space Shuttle Challenger launch Prevent Disaster by Righting Cultural Dysfunction on Your Team

The space shuttles Challenger and Columbia were two of NASA's biggest disasters. Investigations into these accidents discovered the engineering issues responsible, but management practices and cultural barriers also were found to be contributing factors. Does your organization have a healthy culture that lets you safely voice concerns? It could help you prevent tragedy.

Payson Hall's picture Payson Hall
Back to basics Back to Basics: Use the Heart of Agile to Frame Your Agile Adoption

Somewhere along the way, agile implementations have gotten overblown and unwieldy. Managers and leaders look at all the models and frameworks and think agile adoption is too confusing or not worth the effort. To communicate what agile truly means, we have to simplify the message by getting to the heart of agile: collaborate, deliver, reflect, and improve.

Phil Gadzinski's picture Phil Gadzinski
Learning soft skills Practice Soft Skills through Collaboration to Become Truly Agile

At the core of agile is the need to effectively communicate and interact with your team members, so it's important for all roles to practice soft skills. However, there is nothing soft about them. Soft skills are probably the most challenging thing you can focus on in your technical career. Rather than struggle to improve by yourself, develop these skills through collaboration.

Mark Kilby's picture Mark Kilby
man speaking into megaphone Speak Up: The Key to Agile Success

You can learn all the theoretical agile principles and best practices, but you still may not be agile. To be truly agile, you must also communicate and collaborate with your team—and this means speaking up. Even if you're not a natural extrovert, there are plenty of ways you can contribute during planning, sprints, and retrospectives to make your product and process better.

Brian Everett's picture Brian Everett
people talking The Real Key to Agile Success: Communication

Think about the common practices of an agile team: daily stand-up meetings, retrospectives after every sprint, pair programming and buddy reviews, collaborating with customers, and more face-to-face time instead of mountains of documentation. What is the agenda behind all these operations? Frequent and open communication.

Nishi Grover's picture Nishi Grover
gap between two teams Business and Development: Working Together to Build Better Products

Business stakeholders and DevOps teams both have to take an active approach to app development, but neither faction should have to change practices and processes in order to get their needs across. Investing the time to establish communication between these teams will drive delivery of the applications customers demand.

Renato Quedas's picture Renato Quedas
people with conversation bubbles Strategies for Encouraging and Facilitating Team Feedback Sessions

We know the importance of quick feedback cycles in our builds so we can fail fast and get reactions from the end-user. But sometimes agile teams forget the importance of gathering responses from other team members. This article details several methods for eliciting feedback, as well as how to pick what's right for your team.

Kiera Radman's picture Kiera Radman Jeff Wagner
jumbled communication Who Is the Real Product Owner?

Communication is always vital on an agile project to ensure everyone is on the same page, but it's perhaps most important in a relationship between a vendor and a customer. Here, Marcus Blankenship relates a personal story about a project where communication failed, and gives some good tips for how to avoid it happening to you.

Marcus Blankenship's picture Marcus Blankenship

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