02 | Define an Effective End-to-End Software

Development Lifecycle

Steven Borg | Co-founder & Strategist, Northwest Cadence

Anthony Borton | ALM Consultant, Enhance ALM
Module Overview

• Understand the value of an end-to-end view of Application

Lifecycle Management (ALM) tools and practices
• Explain the benefits of fast feedback
• Implement strategies to reduce end-to-end cycle time
• Implement strategies to improve software quality
• Implement strategies to reduce waste
• Create a process improvement plan
Tips

• This section is all about attitude and mindset, not knowing

specific details.
• Having the right mindset will get you through nearly all of the
questions, without having to focus on specific technical details.
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Understand the value of an end-to-end

Academy

view of Application Lifecycle

Management (ALM) tools and practices
What the Study Guide says…

• Understand the value of an end-to-end view of Application

Lifecycle Management (ALM) tools and practices.
– understanding that an observable problem may be indicative of a
more general process issue
– explaining the difference between optimizing a piece of the ALM
process such as manual testing and optimizing the entire ALM process
Work Item Traceability and Flow
Value delivery impediments
Team barriers =
Value delivery impediments

||
Teams without barriers deliver continuous value

Continuous
value delivery
Visual Studio ALM
Teams without barriers. Continuous value delivery

Deliver

• Faster cycle times

• Realized value opportunities

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Explain the benefits of fast feedback

What the Study Guide says…

• Explain the benefits of fast feedback.

– explaining the importance of fast feedback related to communicating
requirements
– explaining the benefits of end customer feedback to early software
iterations
Feedback Loops

Measure

Adjust
Feedback Loops

Measure
Problems with Slow Feedback

• Introduce more work into the system

– Long time between code and bug fix makes it harder for developer
– Long time between bug find and bug fix verification makes it harder for
the tester
– Added complexity
– More context switching
• Lowers overall productivity
New Tools to speed feedback
• Requirements - PowerPoint Storyboarding
• Customer Feedback - Feedback Client
PowerPoint Storyboards
Feedback Client
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Implement strategies to reduce end-to-

end cycle time
What the Study Guide says…

• Implement strategies to reduce end-to-end cycle time.

– identifying bottlenecks in the delivery process
– understanding the relationship between work in process (WIP) and
cycle time
– identifying metrics that highlight bottlenecks
– creating potential solutions whose effectiveness can be validated
Identifying Bottlenecks
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DEMO
Relationship between Work in Process and Cycle Time
Little’s Law (Two Minutes of Math)

Delivery Rate = Work-in-Progress ÷ Lead Time

implies
Lead Time = Work-in-Progress ÷ Delivery Rate

thus

WIP is a LEADING metric

for Lead Time
Key metrics for identifying bottlenecks
• Leading indicators
– Queue sizes
– Batch Sizes
• Lagging indicators
– Velocity
• Other metrics:
– Rework costs
– Bug trends
Pay Attention to Queues
CLOSE Attention to Queues
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Implement strategies to improve

software quality
What the Study Guide says…

• Implement strategies to improve software quality.

– identifying process steps that introduce defects
– understanding the end-to-end quality process
– bringing quality efforts early in the development cycle
Conventional QA in the Modern app lifecycle
Document requirements
as BRDs and
functional specs

Write code to QA
implement Operations
UAT
requirements readiness
verification

UAT post
Testing post Pre-deployment
implementation
implementation. Mostly verification
and systems
manual with limited
testing
automation.
 Continuous quality
Shortened cycle times
 Manual testing

User
Interface Automated testing

Services
Business Processes Automated testing
Business Rules and Logic
Service integrations
Data access
Identity

Data
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Implement strategies to reduce waste

What the Study Guide says…

• Implement strategies to reduce waste.

– identifying wasteful activities
– creating strategies to eliminate waste
– measuring the effectiveness of waste removal activities
What is waste?
• Inventory - Incomplete work. Work not in production
• Overproduction - Rarely used features
• Processing – Unneeded or excessive documentation / Looking for data
• Transport – Handovers, context switching
• Excessive Motion - Task Switching (Working on several projects in parallel,
20% loss)
• Waiting - Delays (caused by large batches, or too much work-in-process)
• Rework due to defects- Bugs
Dealing with Waste
• Finding Waste:
– Look for delays or bottlenecks in your software development.
– Work backward to identify the cause.
– The cause is likely wasteful.
• Eliminating Waste:
– Depends…
– Likely, focus on continuous improvement and cycle time reduction
• Key metrics:
– Cycle time reduction
– Rework costs
– Bug trends
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Create a process improvement plan

What the Study Guide says…

• Create a process improvement plan.

– creating strategies for implementing organizational change
– identifying key metrics to be tracked during the improvement effort
– creating consensus for the change
Key metrics
• Business value
• Rework costs
• Cycle time
• Bug trends
• Queue sizes
• Batch Sizes
• Visit http://www.visualstudio.com/alm for an overview of the
theory, and how theory aligns with the Visual Studio tools
• Focus on reducing cycle time, speeding feedback, small batch
sizes, breaking down barriers, fast communication, minimally
viable products and building quality in
• If you’re not convinced focusing on completing things faster with
high quality is the most important thing, fake it for the test.
• For tools, understand Storyboarding and the Feedback Client
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