Re: R: Scrum and RUP

Dear Adriano,

>Yes. Scrum does not need RUP. RUP needs Scrum practices to be effective.

You are right but "effective" doesn't imply "agile".

>But there are many IT organizations using RUP in an ineffective way, and
>Scrum could help them to improve. Sometimes it's difficult to tell these
>organizations, who made huge investments into RUP: throw it off, there are
>more effective approaches out there, try them instead. In such cases, I
>believe, it is better to suggest an improvement using agile practices in the
>context of the existing process.

Of course you are describing the real world but it must be clear that improving 
a Defined-Process with some practices from an Agile-Process do not make it 
Agile: it can make the process more effective (as you correctly wrote) but you 
will still miss peculiarity of the Agile Approach.

Jim Highsmith months ago wrote:

"In some ways agility has nothing to do with the process itself, but with how 
it is implemented and the philosophy of those doing the implementing. [...] but 
on the whole, I've not run acrosss clients of mine who have RUP who think it is 
either agile or lightweight. But lightweight is only one aspect of agile, the 
other two are collaborative values and principles and a fundamental 
understanding of the unpredictability of project activities (althought outcomes 
can be achieved). Agile is much more than lighter documentation and fewer 
processes."

I experienced a lot of clients (of mine, of course) professing they were 
implementing an "Agile version" of RUP but when I analysed their work I found 
they were just cutting off some documents feeling "more lightweight".

I definitly think this is one of the main issues: a lot of people believe Agile 
means just less docs, they try to cut off some of their docs and then affirm 
Agile is nothing more than this. As stated by Jim: they are missing fundamental 
understanding of the unpredictability of project activities.

Happy new year :-)  

P.S.: For those who haven't read it I suggest 'Agile Revolution' by Mike 
Beedle: http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?AgileRevolution


Marco Abis - CEO & Chairman
Agility SPI: Software Process Improvement
abis@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx - abis@xxxxxxx
http://agilemovement.it


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