In my last post, I said that I was committing to a dodeca-thalon of posts on the Agile Manifesto — one for each Agile principle. I think this is great stuff that everyone should be exposed to. If you use Agile, or wonder why people are so hot for Agile, this series is for you.

And with that intro, here’s #2 of 12

Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.

Everything changes. Software is not set in stone, and even if it was set in stone, it would still change. So, we need a process that gracefully handles change. Part of this trick is by getting rid of the idea of a 12-week project, and instead having 12, 1-week projects. You want to have small, frequent plans.

In the last episode of “Cloudspace does Agile,” I talked about the weekly meetings. I also promised a post about the daily meetings. Here you go. And of course, feel free to comment on this post, or get in touch with me if you’ve got questions. tim @ my company’s domain dot com. (Darn spammers!)

---

This will be a quick post. Not because I’m lazy, but because I’m making a point. The daily meeting should be quick.

Ever heard the term “stand up meeting”? It’s because people literally stand, so they don’t get comfortable in cushy executive chairs, and drag meetings out. 5-10 minutes tops.

In my last post, I gave a brief intro to Agile, and I promised a post about simple planning. Here you go.

---

So, to plan software, it should be simple. You know what you want, so just figure out a plan for making it happen, and then follow the plan. What could be easier? If you’re planning the entire project up front, nothing could be harder.

If you’re reading this post, you already know that plans change. That’s why we do Agile. We plan often, and we review the plan daily.