Agile software development –

also referred to simply as Agile -- is a type of development methodology

that anticipates the need for flexibility and applies a level of pragmatism to
the delivery of the finished product. Agile software development requires a
cultural shift in many companies because it focuses on the clean delivery of
individual pieces or parts of the software and not on the entire application. 

Benefits of Agile include its ability to help teams in an evolving landscape

while maintaining a focus on the efficient delivery of business value. The
collaborative culture facilitated by Agile also improves efficiency throughout
the organization as teams work together and understand their specific roles
in the process. Finally, companies using Agile software development can
feel confident that they are releasing a high-quality product since testing is
performed throughout development, providing the opportunity to make
changes as needed and alert teams to any potential issues.

Agile has replaced waterfall as the development methodology of choice in

most companies, but is itself at risk of being eclipsed or consumed by the
growing popularity of DevOps.

The four core values outlined in the Agile

Manifesto are :
Individual interactions are more important than processes and tools.

 People drive the development process and respond to business needs.

They are the most important part of development and should be valued
above processes and tools. If the processes or tools drive development,
then the team will be less likely to respond and adapt to change and,
therefore, less likely to meet customer needs.

A focus on working software rather than thorough

documentation.

 Before Agile, a large amount of time was spent on documenting the

product throughout development for delivery. The list of documented
requirements was lengthy and would cause long delays in the development
process. While Agile does not eliminate the use of documentation, it
streamlines it in a way that provides the developer with only the information
that is needed to do the work -- such as user stories. The Agile Manifesto
continues to place value on the process of documentation, but it places
higher value on working software.

Collaboration instead of contract negotiations.

 Agile focuses on collaboration between the customer and project manager,

rather than negotiations between the two, to work out the details of
delivery. Collaborating with the customer means that they are included
throughout the entire development process, not just at the beginning and
end, thus making it easier for teams to meet the needs of their customers.
For example, in Agile software development, the customer may be included
at different intervals for demos of the product. However, the customer could
also be present and interacting with the teams on a daily basis, attending
all meetings and ensuring the product meets their desires.

A focus on responding to change. Traditional software development

used to avoid change because it was considered an undesired expense.
Agile eliminates this idea. The short iterations in the Agile cycle allow
changes to easily be made, helping the team modify the process to best fit
their needs rather than the other way around. Overall, Agile software
development believes change is always a way to improve the project and
provide additional value.
The 12 principles of Agile

The Agile Manifesto also outlined 12 core principles for the development
process. They are:

1. Satisfy customers through early and continuous delivery of valuable

work.

2. Break big work down into smaller tasks that can be completed
quickly.

3. Recognize that the best work emerges from self-organized teams.

4. Provide motivated individuals with the environment and support they

need and trust them to get the job done.

5. Create processes that promote sustainable efforts.

6. Maintain a constant pace for completed work.

7. Welcome changing requirements, even late in a project.

8. Assemble the project team and business owners on a daily basis

throughout the project.

9. Have the team reflect at regular intervals on how to become more

effective, then tune and adjust behavior accordingly.

10. Measure progress by the amount of completed work.

11. Continually seek excellence.

12. Harness change for a competitive advantage.

The Agile software development cycle

The Agile software development cycle can be broken down into six steps:
concept, inception, iteration/construction, release, production and
retirement.

The first step, concept, involves the identification of business opportunities

in each potential project as well as an estimation of the time and work that
will be required to complete the project. This information can then be used
to prioritize projects and discern which ones are worth pursuing based on
technical and economic feasibility.

During the second step, inception, team members are identified, funding is

established and the initial requirements are discussed with the customer. A
timeline should also be created that outlines the various responsibilities of
teams and clearly defines when work is expected to be completed for
each sprint. A sprint is a set period of time during which specific work has
to be completed and made ready for review.
 A
visualization of the Agile software development cycle

The third step, iteration/construction, is when teams start creating working

software based on requirements and continuous feedback. The Agile
software development cycle relies on iterations -- or single development
cycles -- that build upon each other and lead into the next step of the
overall development process until the project is completed. Each iteration
typically lasts between two to four weeks, with a set completion date. The
goal is to have a working product to launch at the end of each iteration.

Multiple iterations occur throughout the development cycle and they each
possess their own workflow. A typical iteration flow consists of:

 defining requirements based on the product backlog, sprint backlog

and customer and stakeholder feedback;

 developing software based on the set requirements;

 conducting quality assurance testing, internal and external training
and documentation;

 delivering and integrating the working product into production; and

 gathering customer and stakeholder feedback on the iteration in

order to define new requirements for the next sprint.

The fourth step, release, involves final quality assurance testing, resolution

of any remaining defects, finalization of the system and user documentation
and, at the end, release of the final iteration into production.

After the release, the fifth step, production, focuses on the ongoing support
necessary to maintain the software. The development teams must keep the
software running smoothly while also teaching users exactly how to use it.
The production phase continues until the support has ended or the product
is planned for retirement.

The final step, retirement, incorporates all end-of-life activities, such as

notifying customers and final Migration. The system release must be
removed from production. This is usually done when a system needs to be
replaced by a new release or if the system becomes outdated,
unnecessary or starts to go against the business model.

BEST PRACTICES FOR SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE :-

Project managers should recognize that because of the ways in which business
intelligence is used, solutions must be flexible and modifiable in response to
changing business requirements. Given the lack of understanding of what is
possible with BI and that users often don’t know what they want until they see
it, agile development techniques are preferable to traditional waterfall
development process.
 ■ Be prepared to change the business-facing parts of BI on a more rapid basis
than the behind-thescenes infrastructure.
■ Use collaborative development and rapid prototyping.
■ Repeat the project manager’s mantra: there is scope, resources, and time.
When you change one aspect, expect it to affect the others.
■ Understand how quality and the desire for perfection can sabotage a
project’s timeline. Manage expectations about quality early-on and agree upon
acceptable quality levels.

BI Organizing For Success :-

Given the myriad ways that business intelligence reaches across an entire
organization, attention to organizational issues can accelerate BI success;
failure to address organizational issues hinders success. In each of the
successful BI case studies, how the BI team was organized and evolved played
a pivotal role in ensuring greater success

What is enterprise business

intelligence?
Business intelligence encompasses all the processes and methods of collecting,
storing, and analyzing data from business operations to provide a
comprehensive view of a business. The most basic enterprise business
intelligence definition is the deployment of BI throughout a large corporation.
Larger, more complex companies create more data and require more extensive
and sophisticated business intelligence platforms. Enterprise BI helps these
organizations increase productivity and efficiency.

The strategic use of business intelligence (BI) can benefit an organization in

many ways. From day-to-day decision making to forecasting for the future, BI
plays an essential role in how your company operates and ultimately grows.
And as your company grows, you need a BI platform that can scale fluidly and
handle the volumes of data created by more employees, processes, and sales
Coca-Cola Bottling Company Empowers the Enterprise
Implementing an enterprise business intelligence solution allowed Coca-Cola
Bottling Company to bring together up to 200 million lines of data from 100
different systems into one dashboard, replacing a daily 45-minute manual
process. The new platform serves the needs of multiple audiences and roles,
from leadership dashboards that focus on strategy and growth to field sales
dashboards with customer portfolios and sales quota tracking. Users can
quickly answer questions like: Are products delivered on time? Are projects
staying within budget? How is this salesperson performing?

Departmental BI
Even today, enterprise companies are choosing a limited, “departmental”
approach to business intelligence (BI) strategy and adoption. They resort
to working with multiple vendors, each of which provides what they
consider the best technology for an individual department within their
companies. It’s a common phenomenon driven largely by rapid changes in
the technology market, including growing data footprints and high
demand for analytics. Departments within organizations have
understandingly sought the best solutions for the most urgent challenges.

But this approach rarely aligns with real market complexities because an
amalgamation of BI solutions doesn’t drive the organizational value that’s
possible with a single, open analytics environment. Leading analytics of
this kind provide self-service capabilities to business users across
departments, connecting each user to a “single version of the truth”
through interfaces designed specifically for their roles.
The BI Steering Committee :-
The BI steering committee includes senior representatives from the various
businesses and functions who set priorities on both the data and functional
capabilities of the BI portfolio. The BI program manager is also an active
member of the steering committee. Other IT directors that have integration
points with BI, such as the enterprise resource planning (ERP) owner, should
also be on the steering committee. Steering committee members will meet on
a regular basis, as often as weekly, to resolve conflicting priorities, identify new
opportunities, and resolve issues escalated from the project team. The steering
committee is an important forum for the BI project leader to understand the
business context for BI, ensure business alignment, and to keep business
leaders abreast of new project developments.
For example, at Continental Airlines, the Data Warehouse Steering Committee
is comprised of 30 people, most of whom are at the director level and higher.
This steering committee sets the priorities for the data warehouse and
identifies ways for the BI team to be more involved with the individual
business units.
While the steering committee at Continental Airlines is quite large and
commensurate with the size of the corporation, sometimes working with such
large committees can make progress more difficult. I found in working with a
biotechnology client that they too had a large steering committee but one
whose effectiveness I would question. In many respects, it was necessary to
include all functions and business units to ensure buyin to the BI initiative.
However, cultural and political issues that existed outside the BI steering
committee impacted the dynamics of the committee.
Trying to schedule face-to-face meetings with larger groups became a logistical
nightmare. When key committee members failed to participate in such
meetings, they would later second-guess priorities and decisions agreed upon
by those present. In this regard, the ideal size of the committee balances the
trade-offs of being able to perform with the needs of ensuring buy-in and
alignment with the business.

Business Intelligence Competency Centers

(BICC)
 A Business Intelligence Competency Center (BICC) is a cross-
functional organizational team that has defined tasks, roles,
responsibilities and processes for supporting and promoting the
effective use of Business Intelligence (BI) across an organization.
 Gartner started advocating that companies need a BICC to
develop and focus resources to be successful using business
intelligence in 2001.[1] Since then, the BICC concept has been
further refined through practical implementations in organizations
that have implemented BI and analytical software.
 A BICC coordinates the activities and resources to ensure that a
fact-based approach to decision making is systematically
implemented throughout an organization. It has responsibility for
the governance structure for BI and analytical programs, projects,
practices, software, and architecture. It is responsible for building
the plans, priorities, infrastructure, and competencies that the
organization needs to take forward-looking strategic decisions by
using the BI and analytical software capabilities.
BICC Guiding Principles :-
Develop a vision for BI and establish guiding principles that all the
stakeholders, steering committee members, project teams, and BICC can refer
to. Use the following list as inspiration for developing your own principles:

■ Business intelligence is a strategic asset that provides a competitive

differentiator.

■ The business will establish the priorities, and IT will deliver according to
those priorities.

■ Issues that cannot be resolved by the project team will be escalated to the
steering committee.

■ We will strive to focus on the business value of business intelligence and not
get side tracked by technology for technology’s sake.

■ We will borrow great ideas from people who have gone before us, garnering
the best ideas from departmental innovations (otherwise known as, no “not
invented here” attitude).

■ Data errors will be corrected at the source.

■ Success will be measured according to perceived business impact, number of

active users, and return on investment. These successes will be communicated
and actively promoted.

■ Services that can be shared and that provide economies of scale will be
centralized, including hardware, software, policies and procedures, data
acquisition, cleansing, and modeling. Customize those items in which there is a
major difference in requirements and fulfilling those requirements adds value to
the business.
■ The BICC will promote a buy versus build mentality.

■ Technology adoption will fall into the leading edge, not bleeding edge
category.