release-train

Release Train

A Release Train is an Agile methodology that synchronizes multiple Agile teams through timeboxed Program Increments. It fosters collaboration, alignment, and value delivery by coordinating efforts, planning within fixed cycles, and promoting cross-team communication. This approach enhances efficiency and reduces risk in complex software development projects.

Overview:

  • The concept of a Release Train is a fundamental aspect of Agile software development methodologies, especially in the context of large and complex projects.
  • It serves as both an organizational structure and a time-based synchronization approach, aiming to optimize the delivery of software products.
  • The primary objectives are to streamline collaboration among multiple Agile teams, ensure the consistent flow of value to customers, and enhance the overall efficiency of the development process.

Understanding Release Trains:

What are Release Trains?

Release trains are a fundamental concept within the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe), a framework designed to facilitate Agile practices at scale. A release train is a long-lived team of Agile teams, typically comprised of multiple Scrum or Kanban teams, working together to deliver value to customers. These teams are organized around a common mission and share a synchronized cadence for planning, delivery, and integration.

Key Components of Release Trains:

  1. Synchronized Planning: Release trains operate on a shared planning cadence, ensuring alignment and coordination across multiple Agile teams.
  2. Common Vision: All teams on a release train work toward a common mission or vision, focusing their efforts on delivering value in a coordinated manner.

Why Release Trains Matter:

Understanding the significance of release trains is crucial for organizations seeking to scale Agile practices, enhance collaboration, and deliver value to customers efficiently and predictably.

The Impact of Release Trains:

  • Scalability: Release trains provide a framework for scaling Agile practices across large organizations, enabling them to maintain agility while growing.
  • Alignment: They ensure alignment between multiple Agile teams, preventing fragmentation and enabling coordinated delivery.

Benefits of Release Trains:

  • Predictable Delivery: Release trains facilitate predictable delivery by synchronizing planning and providing a clear roadmap.
  • Enhanced Collaboration: They foster collaboration among teams, reducing silos and promoting knowledge sharing.

Challenges in Implementing Release Trains:

  • Organizational Resistance: Some organizations may resist transitioning to a release train model due to existing hierarchies and structures.
  • Complexity: Coordinating multiple teams within a release train can be complex, requiring effective governance and communication.

Coordination and Synchronization:

  • A Release Train plays a crucial role in coordinating the efforts of various Agile teams.
  • It acts as a mechanism for synchronizing work on interdependent features and components of a software product.
  • The primary goal is to ensure that all teams are aligned towards common goals and objectives, avoiding conflicts and promoting effective collaboration.

Program Increments (PIs):

  • At the core of the Release Train concept are timeboxed Program Increments (PIs), typically spanning a duration of 8-12 weeks.
  • These PIs serve as predefined cadences for planning, development, testing, and delivery activities within the Agile framework.
  • PIs provide a structured framework for organizing and executing the work of Agile teams, enhancing predictability and planning.

Agile Teams:

  • Agile teams are the fundamental building blocks of a Release Train.
  • These teams are characterized by being cross-functional, self-organized, and responsible for delivering specific features, enhancements, or components of the software.
  • Agile teams collaborate closely to achieve the objectives set for each Program Increment.

PI Objectives:

  • Each Program Increment is closely associated with clear and measurable objectives.
  • These objectives serve as a guiding light for Agile teams, providing a shared understanding of what needs to be achieved during the PI.
  • PI objectives help align the efforts of all teams towards common goals.

Synchronization:

  • The beginning of each Program Increment marks a significant event in the Release Train methodology.
  • It involves a synchronized planning event that brings together all Agile teams participating in the Release Train.
  • During this event, teams collaborate to align their work, identify and address dependencies, and define the specific features and components to be delivered during the PI.

Cadence and Rhythm:

  • The concept places a strong emphasis on establishing a regular cadence or rhythm within the development process.
  • This regularity is primarily driven by the cycles of Program Increments, ensuring that planning, review, and delivery activities occur predictably.
  • A consistent cadence fosters a sense of predictability and allows teams and stakeholders to anticipate key milestones and activities.

Value Delivery:

  • A key focus of the Release Train is the delivery of incremental value to customers.
  • This is achieved at the end of each Program Increment, ensuring that tangible benefits are provided to customers sooner rather than later.
  • Rapid value delivery enables customers to provide feedback early in the process, facilitating adjustments and refinements as needed.

Risk Reduction:

  • One of the significant advantages of the Release Train methodology is its ability to mitigate risks associated with complex projects.
  • By proactively aligning efforts, addressing dependencies, and emphasizing continuous integration, testing, and validation, the methodology helps identify and manage risks effectively.

Collaboration and Communication:

  • Effective collaboration among Agile teams is a core principle of the Release Train.
  • This is fostered through regular ceremonies, such as daily stand-ups and cross-team communication.
  • Transparency and visibility are promoted to prevent silos and ensure that all teams have a shared understanding of project status and goals.

Adaptability:

  • While overall objectives for a Program Increment are defined upfront, the Release Train methodology allows for flexibility within the PI.
  • This flexibility enables Agile teams to adapt to changing requirements, emerging insights, and evolving project dynamics.
  • It ensures that the development process remains agile and responsive to evolving needs.

Continuous Improvement:

  • After the completion of each Program Increment, a retrospective is conducted.
  • During this retrospective, Agile teams reflect on their performance, identify areas for improvement, and adjust their processes and practices for the next PI.
  • This commitment to continuous improvement ensures that the Release Train becomes more efficient, effective, and aligned with the organization’s goals over time.

Key Highlights

  • Enhanced Collaboration: A Release Train serves as an effective mechanism for enhancing collaboration among multiple Agile teams. It helps align teams towards common goals and objectives, fostering a sense of unity and shared purpose within complex projects.
  • Predictable Delivery: The use of timeboxed Program Increments (PIs) establishes a predictable cadence for planning, development, testing, and delivery activities. This predictability allows teams and stakeholders to anticipate key milestones, enhancing planning and management.
  • Customer-Centric Value: The Release Train methodology places a strong emphasis on delivering incremental value to customers at the end of each Program Increment. This customer-centric approach ensures that tangible benefits are provided sooner, enabling rapid feedback and adjustments.
  • Risk Mitigation: By actively addressing dependencies and encouraging continuous integration and testing, the Release Train methodology effectively mitigates risks associated with complex projects. Proactive risk management is a cornerstone of its success.
  • Adaptability: While it provides a structured framework, the Release Train methodology allows for flexibility within Program Increments. This adaptability enables Agile teams to respond to changing requirements, emerging insights, and evolving project dynamics.
  • Continuous Improvement: The commitment to continuous improvement is ingrained in the Release Train concept. After each Program Increment, retrospectives provide opportunities for teams to reflect on their performance, identify areas for enhancement, and refine processes.
  • Effective Communication: Effective cross-team collaboration and communication are essential components of the Release Train methodology. Daily stand-ups and regular ceremonies promote transparency and visibility, preventing silos and ensuring everyone is on the same page.
  • Overall Efficiency: The Release Train methodology ultimately aims to enhance the overall efficiency of software development processes, particularly in large and complex projects. By optimizing collaboration, predictability, and value delivery, it contributes to the successful execution of Agile principles.
Related FrameworksDescriptionWhen to Apply
Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe)– SAFe is a widely-used framework for scaling Agile practices across large enterprises. It organizes teams into Agile Release Trains (ARTs), which are cross-functional teams aligned to a common mission or value stream. ARTs coordinate their work through Program Increments (PIs), time-boxed iterations that typically last 8-12 weeks. SAFe provides guidance on roles, ceremonies, and artifacts to facilitate the synchronization and delivery of value across multiple teams within the organization.– When scaling Agile practices across large organizations with multiple teams and dependencies. – In organizations undergoing digital transformation or seeking to improve alignment, collaboration, and value delivery across departments or business units.
Disciplined Agile Delivery (DAD)– DAD is a process decision framework that provides guidance on adopting Agile and lean practices within the context of the entire IT lifecycle. DAD recognizes the importance of release management and encourages organizations to adopt a risk-value lifecycle approach. DAD offers several release strategies, including Agile Release Trains (ARTs), which align multiple teams to deliver value incrementally. ARTs focus on releasing working software at the end of each iteration or iteration increment to manage risk and gather feedback early.– When organizations need guidance on adopting Agile practices across the entire IT lifecycle, including release management. – In environments where flexibility and adaptability are crucial, and organizations seek a pragmatic approach to Agile adoption that can be tailored to their specific needs and context.
Large-Scale Scrum (LeSS)– LeSS is an Agile scaling framework that extends Scrum principles and practices to larger organizations. LeSS emphasizes simplicity, transparency, and empirical process control. In LeSS, multiple Scrum Teams work together on the same product, sharing the same Product Backlog and Sprint Backlog. LeSS defines the concept of a “Release Train” where multiple teams synchronize their work and aim to deliver potentially shippable product increments at the end of each sprint. LeSS focuses on minimizing dependencies, optimizing flow, and enhancing organizational agility.– When scaling Scrum practices in organizations with multiple teams working on the same product or value stream. – In environments where simplicity, transparency, and empirical process control are valued, and organizations seek a lightweight framework that preserves the core principles of Scrum while enabling collaboration and alignment across multiple teams.
Nexus Framework– Nexus is a scaling framework built on Scrum principles and designed for organizations with multiple Scrum Teams working on the same product. Nexus provides guidance on how to scale Scrum by defining a set of roles, events, and artifacts that enable multiple Scrum Teams to work together effectively. Nexus introduces the concept of a “Nexus Integration Team” responsible for ensuring alignment, reducing dependencies, and facilitating communication among the Scrum Teams. The goal of Nexus is to enable the development of integrated and potentially shippable product increments at least once per Sprint.– When scaling Scrum practices in organizations with multiple Scrum Teams collaborating on a single product or product line. – In environments where organizations seek a lightweight framework that builds on Scrum principles to enable collaboration, integration, and alignment across multiple teams while minimizing overhead and complexity.
Enterprise Service Planning (ESP)– ESP is an organizational framework designed to help companies achieve business agility by aligning teams, activities, and outcomes to strategic business goals. ESP emphasizes value stream management, Lean thinking, and system optimization. In ESP, Agile Release Trains (ARTs) are used to synchronize the work of multiple teams and deliver value in a coordinated manner. ARTs operate within the context of value streams, which represent the end-to-end flow of value through the organization. ESP focuses on continuous improvement, feedback loops, and adaptive planning to drive organizational agility and responsiveness.– When organizations aim to align Agile practices with strategic business objectives and achieve business agility. – In environments where end-to-end value stream optimization is critical, and organizations seek a holistic approach to Agile scaling that integrates Lean principles, value stream management, and system optimization.
Rapid Release Management (RRM)– RRM is an Agile release management framework that emphasizes frequent and predictable releases of working software. RRM aims to reduce the time and effort required to release software by streamlining the release process and automating repetitive tasks. RRM incorporates practices such as continuous integration, continuous delivery, and automated testing to enable teams to release software quickly and reliably. RRM focuses on shortening feedback loops, increasing deployment frequency, and improving overall release quality.– When organizations need to accelerate the pace of software delivery and reduce time-to-market. – In environments where frequent and predictable releases are essential for meeting customer demands, adapting to market changes, and maintaining a competitive edge.
DevOps Release Pipeline– The DevOps Release Pipeline is a continuous delivery framework that enables organizations to automate the end-to-end software delivery process. The release pipeline consists of a series of automated stages, including code integration, testing, deployment, and monitoring. DevOps teams use tools and practices such as version control, automated testing, and infrastructure as code (IaC) to streamline the release process and ensure consistency, reliability, and repeatability. The DevOps Release Pipeline aims to reduce manual effort, minimize errors, and accelerate the delivery of high-quality software.– When organizations adopt DevOps practices to automate and optimize the software delivery process. – In environments where continuous integration, continuous delivery, and automated testing are integral to achieving shorter release cycles, faster time-to-market, and improved software quality.
Feature Flag Management– Feature Flag Management is a release management technique that enables organizations to control the rollout of new features or changes to production environments. Feature flags allow teams to toggle features on or off dynamically, enabling gradual rollout, A/B testing, and controlled exposure to users. Feature Flag Management helps mitigate risks associated with releasing new features by enabling teams to monitor performance, gather feedback, and make data-driven decisions before fully releasing features to all users.– When organizations need to manage the release of new features or changes to production environments with minimal disruption. – In environments where controlled feature rollout, A/B testing, and gradual exposure to users are essential for mitigating risks, gathering feedback, and ensuring a smooth transition to new features or changes.
Risk-Based Release Management– Risk-Based Release Management is an approach to release planning and execution that focuses on identifying, assessing, and mitigating risks associated with software releases. Teams prioritize release activities based on risk exposure, impact, and likelihood to ensure that high-risk items are addressed early in the release process. Risk-Based Release Management incorporates risk assessment techniques, such as risk matrices, risk registers, and impact analysis, to guide decision-making and resource allocation throughout the release lifecycle.– When organizations need to prioritize release activities based on risk exposure and impact to ensure successful and timely software releases. – In environments where managing risks associated with software releases is critical for maintaining product quality, protecting customer satisfaction, and avoiding costly errors or failures.
Minimum Viable Product (MVP)– MVP is a product development strategy that emphasizes releasing a minimal version of a product with just enough features to satisfy early customers and gather feedback. MVPs enable teams to validate product assumptions, test hypotheses, and iterate based on real-world usage and customer insights. By releasing an MVP, teams can reduce time-to-market, mitigate development risks, and focus on delivering value to customers incrementally. MVPs are typically released early in the product lifecycle to gather feedback and inform subsequent iterations.– When organizations aim to validate product assumptions, test hypotheses, and gather feedback from early adopters with minimal development effort. – In environments where reducing time-to-market, mitigating development risks, and focusing on delivering customer value incrementally are priorities for product development initiatives.

Connected Agile & Lean Frameworks

AIOps

aiops
AIOps is the application of artificial intelligence to IT operations. It has become particularly useful for modern IT management in hybridized, distributed, and dynamic environments. AIOps has become a key operational component of modern digital-based organizations, built around software and algorithms.

AgileSHIFT

AgileSHIFT
AgileSHIFT is a framework that prepares individuals for transformational change by creating a culture of agility.

Agile Methodology

agile-methodology
Agile started as a lightweight development method compared to heavyweight software development, which is the core paradigm of the previous decades of software development. By 2001 the Manifesto for Agile Software Development was born as a set of principles that defined the new paradigm for software development as a continuous iteration. This would also influence the way of doing business.

Agile Program Management

agile-program-management
Agile Program Management is a means of managing, planning, and coordinating interrelated work in such a way that value delivery is emphasized for all key stakeholders. Agile Program Management (AgilePgM) is a disciplined yet flexible agile approach to managing transformational change within an organization.

Agile Project Management

agile-project-management
Agile project management (APM) is a strategy that breaks large projects into smaller, more manageable tasks. In the APM methodology, each project is completed in small sections – often referred to as iterations. Each iteration is completed according to its project life cycle, beginning with the initial design and progressing to testing and then quality assurance.

Agile Modeling

agile-modeling
Agile Modeling (AM) is a methodology for modeling and documenting software-based systems. Agile Modeling is critical to the rapid and continuous delivery of software. It is a collection of values, principles, and practices that guide effective, lightweight software modeling.

Agile Business Analysis

agile-business-analysis
Agile Business Analysis (AgileBA) is certification in the form of guidance and training for business analysts seeking to work in agile environments. To support this shift, AgileBA also helps the business analyst relate Agile projects to a wider organizational mission or strategy. To ensure that analysts have the necessary skills and expertise, AgileBA certification was developed.

Agile Leadership

agile-leadership
Agile leadership is the embodiment of agile manifesto principles by a manager or management team. Agile leadership impacts two important levels of a business. The structural level defines the roles, responsibilities, and key performance indicators. The behavioral level describes the actions leaders exhibit to others based on agile principles. 

Andon System

andon-system
The andon system alerts managerial, maintenance, or other staff of a production process problem. The alert itself can be activated manually with a button or pull cord, but it can also be activated automatically by production equipment. Most Andon boards utilize three colored lights similar to a traffic signal: green (no errors), yellow or amber (problem identified, or quality check needed), and red (production stopped due to unidentified issue).

Bimodal Portfolio Management

bimodal-portfolio-management
Bimodal Portfolio Management (BimodalPfM) helps an organization manage both agile and traditional portfolios concurrently. Bimodal Portfolio Management – sometimes referred to as bimodal development – was coined by research and advisory company Gartner. The firm argued that many agile organizations still needed to run some aspects of their operations using traditional delivery models.

Business Innovation Matrix

business-innovation
Business innovation is about creating new opportunities for an organization to reinvent its core offerings, revenue streams, and enhance the value proposition for existing or new customers, thus renewing its whole business model. Business innovation springs by understanding the structure of the market, thus adapting or anticipating those changes.

Business Model Innovation

business-model-innovation
Business model innovation is about increasing the success of an organization with existing products and technologies by crafting a compelling value proposition able to propel a new business model to scale up customers and create a lasting competitive advantage. And it all starts by mastering the key customers.

Constructive Disruption

constructive-disruption
A consumer brand company like Procter & Gamble (P&G) defines “Constructive Disruption” as: a willingness to change, adapt, and create new trends and technologies that will shape our industry for the future. According to P&G, it moves around four pillars: lean innovation, brand building, supply chain, and digitalization & data analytics.

Continuous Innovation

continuous-innovation
That is a process that requires a continuous feedback loop to develop a valuable product and build a viable business model. Continuous innovation is a mindset where products and services are designed and delivered to tune them around the customers’ problem and not the technical solution of its founders.

Design Sprint

design-sprint
A design sprint is a proven five-day process where critical business questions are answered through speedy design and prototyping, focusing on the end-user. A design sprint starts with a weekly challenge that should finish with a prototype, test at the end, and therefore a lesson learned to be iterated.

Design Thinking

design-thinking
Tim Brown, Executive Chair of IDEO, defined design thinking as “a human-centered approach to innovation that draws from the designer’s toolkit to integrate the needs of people, the possibilities of technology, and the requirements for business success.” Therefore, desirability, feasibility, and viability are balanced to solve critical problems.

DevOps

devops-engineering
DevOps refers to a series of practices performed to perform automated software development processes. It is a conjugation of the term “development” and “operations” to emphasize how functions integrate across IT teams. DevOps strategies promote seamless building, testing, and deployment of products. It aims to bridge a gap between development and operations teams to streamline the development altogether.

Dual Track Agile

dual-track-agile
Product discovery is a critical part of agile methodologies, as its aim is to ensure that products customers love are built. Product discovery involves learning through a raft of methods, including design thinking, lean start-up, and A/B testing to name a few. Dual Track Agile is an agile methodology containing two separate tracks: the “discovery” track and the “delivery” track.

eXtreme Programming

extreme-programming
eXtreme Programming was developed in the late 1990s by Ken Beck, Ron Jeffries, and Ward Cunningham. During this time, the trio was working on the Chrysler Comprehensive Compensation System (C3) to help manage the company payroll system. eXtreme Programming (XP) is a software development methodology. It is designed to improve software quality and the ability of software to adapt to changing customer needs.

Feature-Driven Development

feature-driven-development
Feature-Driven Development is a pragmatic software process that is client and architecture-centric. Feature-Driven Development (FDD) is an agile software development model that organizes workflow according to which features need to be developed next.

Gemba Walk

gemba-walk
A Gemba Walk is a fundamental component of lean management. It describes the personal observation of work to learn more about it. Gemba is a Japanese word that loosely translates as “the real place”, or in business, “the place where value is created”. The Gemba Walk as a concept was created by Taiichi Ohno, the father of the Toyota Production System of lean manufacturing. Ohno wanted to encourage management executives to leave their offices and see where the real work happened. This, he hoped, would build relationships between employees with vastly different skillsets and build trust.

GIST Planning

gist-planning
GIST Planning is a relatively easy and lightweight agile approach to product planning that favors autonomous working. GIST Planning is a lean and agile methodology that was created by former Google product manager Itamar Gilad. GIST Planning seeks to address this situation by creating lightweight plans that are responsive and adaptable to change. GIST Planning also improves team velocity, autonomy, and alignment by reducing the pervasive influence of management. It consists of four blocks: goals, ideas, step-projects, and tasks.

ICE Scoring

ice-scoring-model
The ICE Scoring Model is an agile methodology that prioritizes features using data according to three components: impact, confidence, and ease of implementation. The ICE Scoring Model was initially created by author and growth expert Sean Ellis to help companies expand. Today, the model is broadly used to prioritize projects, features, initiatives, and rollouts. It is ideally suited for early-stage product development where there is a continuous flow of ideas and momentum must be maintained.

Innovation Funnel

innovation-funnel
An innovation funnel is a tool or process ensuring only the best ideas are executed. In a metaphorical sense, the funnel screens innovative ideas for viability so that only the best products, processes, or business models are launched to the market. An innovation funnel provides a framework for the screening and testing of innovative ideas for viability.

Innovation Matrix

types-of-innovation
According to how well defined is the problem and how well defined the domain, we have four main types of innovations: basic research (problem and domain or not well defined); breakthrough innovation (domain is not well defined, the problem is well defined); sustaining innovation (both problem and domain are well defined); and disruptive innovation (domain is well defined, the problem is not well defined).

Innovation Theory

innovation-theory
The innovation loop is a methodology/framework derived from the Bell Labs, which produced innovation at scale throughout the 20th century. They learned how to leverage a hybrid innovation management model based on science, invention, engineering, and manufacturing at scale. By leveraging individual genius, creativity, and small/large groups.

Lean vs. Agile

lean-methodology-vs-agile
The Agile methodology has been primarily thought of for software development (and other business disciplines have also adopted it). Lean thinking is a process improvement technique where teams prioritize the value streams to improve it continuously. Both methodologies look at the customer as the key driver to improvement and waste reduction. Both methodologies look at improvement as something continuous.

Lean Startup

startup-company
A startup company is a high-tech business that tries to build a scalable business model in tech-driven industries. A startup company usually follows a lean methodology, where continuous innovation, driven by built-in viral loops is the rule. Thus, driving growth and building network effects as a consequence of this strategy.

Minimum Viable Product

minimum-viable-product
As pointed out by Eric Ries, a minimum viable product is that version of a new product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort through a cycle of build, measure, learn; that is the foundation of the lean startup methodology.

Leaner MVP

leaner-mvp
A leaner MVP is the evolution of the MPV approach. Where the market risk is validated before anything else

Kanban

kanban
Kanban is a lean manufacturing framework first developed by Toyota in the late 1940s. The Kanban framework is a means of visualizing work as it moves through identifying potential bottlenecks. It does that through a process called just-in-time (JIT) manufacturing to optimize engineering processes, speed up manufacturing products, and improve the go-to-market strategy.

Jidoka

jidoka
Jidoka was first used in 1896 by Sakichi Toyoda, who invented a textile loom that would stop automatically when it encountered a defective thread. Jidoka is a Japanese term used in lean manufacturing. The term describes a scenario where machines cease operating without human intervention when a problem or defect is discovered.

PDCA Cycle

pdca-cycle
The PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) cycle was first proposed by American physicist and engineer Walter A. Shewhart in the 1920s. The PDCA cycle is a continuous process and product improvement method and an essential component of the lean manufacturing philosophy.

Rational Unified Process

rational-unified-process
Rational unified process (RUP) is an agile software development methodology that breaks the project life cycle down into four distinct phases.

Rapid Application Development

rapid-application-development
RAD was first introduced by author and consultant James Martin in 1991. Martin recognized and then took advantage of the endless malleability of software in designing development models. Rapid Application Development (RAD) is a methodology focusing on delivering rapidly through continuous feedback and frequent iterations.

Retrospective Analysis

retrospective-analysis
Retrospective analyses are held after a project to determine what worked well and what did not. They are also conducted at the end of an iteration in Agile project management. Agile practitioners call these meetings retrospectives or retros. They are an effective way to check the pulse of a project team, reflect on the work performed to date, and reach a consensus on how to tackle the next sprint cycle. These are the five stages of a retrospective analysis for effective Agile project management: set the stage, gather the data, generate insights, decide on the next steps, and close the retrospective.

Scaled Agile

scaled-agile-lean-development
Scaled Agile Lean Development (ScALeD) helps businesses discover a balanced approach to agile transition and scaling questions. The ScALed approach helps businesses successfully respond to change. Inspired by a combination of lean and agile values, ScALed is practitioner-based and can be completed through various agile frameworks and practices.

SMED

smed
The SMED (single minute exchange of die) method is a lean production framework to reduce waste and increase production efficiency. The SMED method is a framework for reducing the time associated with completing an equipment changeover.

Spotify Model

spotify-model
The Spotify Model is an autonomous approach to scaling agile, focusing on culture communication, accountability, and quality. The Spotify model was first recognized in 2012 after Henrik Kniberg, and Anders Ivarsson released a white paper detailing how streaming company Spotify approached agility. Therefore, the Spotify model represents an evolution of agile.

Test-Driven Development

test-driven-development
As the name suggests, TDD is a test-driven technique for delivering high-quality software rapidly and sustainably. It is an iterative approach based on the idea that a failing test should be written before any code for a feature or function is written. Test-Driven Development (TDD) is an approach to software development that relies on very short development cycles.

Timeboxing

timeboxing
Timeboxing is a simple yet powerful time-management technique for improving productivity. Timeboxing describes the process of proactively scheduling a block of time to spend on a task in the future. It was first described by author James Martin in a book about agile software development.

Scrum

what-is-scrum
Scrum is a methodology co-created by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland for effective team collaboration on complex products. Scrum was primarily thought for software development projects to deliver new software capability every 2-4 weeks. It is a sub-group of agile also used in project management to improve startups’ productivity.

Scrumban

scrumban
Scrumban is a project management framework that is a hybrid of two popular agile methodologies: Scrum and Kanban. Scrumban is a popular approach to helping businesses focus on the right strategic tasks while simultaneously strengthening their processes.

Scrum Anti-Patterns

scrum-anti-patterns
Scrum anti-patterns describe any attractive, easy-to-implement solution that ultimately makes a problem worse. Therefore, these are the practice not to follow to prevent issues from emerging. Some classic examples of scrum anti-patterns comprise absent product owners, pre-assigned tickets (making individuals work in isolation), and discounting retrospectives (where review meetings are not useful to really make improvements).

Scrum At Scale

scrum-at-scale
Scrum at Scale (Scrum@Scale) is a framework that Scrum teams use to address complex problems and deliver high-value products. Scrum at Scale was created through a joint venture between the Scrum Alliance and Scrum Inc. The joint venture was overseen by Jeff Sutherland, a co-creator of Scrum and one of the principal authors of the Agile Manifesto.

Six Sigma

six-sigma
Six Sigma is a data-driven approach and methodology for eliminating errors or defects in a product, service, or process. Six Sigma was developed by Motorola as a management approach based on quality fundamentals in the early 1980s. A decade later, it was popularized by General Electric who estimated that the methodology saved them $12 billion in the first five years of operation.

Stretch Objectives

stretch-objectives
Stretch objectives describe any task an agile team plans to complete without expressly committing to do so. Teams incorporate stretch objectives during a Sprint or Program Increment (PI) as part of Scaled Agile. They are used when the agile team is unsure of its capacity to attain an objective. Therefore, stretch objectives are instead outcomes that, while extremely desirable, are not the difference between the success or failure of each sprint.

Toyota Production System

toyota-production-system
The Toyota Production System (TPS) is an early form of lean manufacturing created by auto-manufacturer Toyota. Created by the Toyota Motor Corporation in the 1940s and 50s, the Toyota Production System seeks to manufacture vehicles ordered by customers most quickly and efficiently possible.

Total Quality Management

total-quality-management
The Total Quality Management (TQM) framework is a technique based on the premise that employees continuously work on their ability to provide value to customers. Importantly, the word “total” means that all employees are involved in the process – regardless of whether they work in development, production, or fulfillment.

Waterfall

waterfall-model
The waterfall model was first described by Herbert D. Benington in 1956 during a presentation about the software used in radar imaging during the Cold War. Since there were no knowledge-based, creative software development strategies at the time, the waterfall method became standard practice. The waterfall model is a linear and sequential project management framework. 

Read Also: Continuous InnovationAgile MethodologyLean StartupBusiness Model InnovationProject Management.

Read Next: Agile Methodology, Lean Methodology, Agile Project Management, Scrum, Kanban, Six Sigma.

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