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Medium

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Your first 90 days as a Product Owner

Establish trust with stakeholders by scheduling 1-on-1 meetings and demonstrating your understanding and skills.
Position yourself as an enabler, supporting the success of your development team.
Avoid micromanagement and keep developers focused to minimize distractions.
Audit your product backlog and prioritize the most impactful items for your first 90 days.

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Medium

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Avoiding Flow Metric Confusion: Aligning Agile Work Hierarchy to Flow Items

Misinterpreting Agile work elements when modeling Flow Items is a common issue faced by organizations.
The article provides guidance on aligning Agile work hierarchy to Flow Items and understanding Value Stream concepts.
A Technology division struggled to map Jira Issue types to Flow Items due to a lack of understanding and adherence to industry guidelines.
An Agile Work Hierarchy model is proposed to standardize project tracking tools and align with Flow Items effectively.
Defining Flow Items correctly is crucial for Agile methodologies to ensure the delivery of value independently.
Flow Items are identified as the smallest units of work that deliver meaningful value to the user or the business.
The article emphasizes the importance of aligning Agile work elements with Flow Items to improve measurement and decision-making.
OKRs play a significant role in aligning team work with customer needs and organizational objectives, encouraging a focus on value.
Teams should define sprint goals based on outcomes rather than tasks to drive impactful results.
Explicit alignment or cascading of higher-level key results into team objectives ensures clear alignment and purpose.

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Scrum

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How To Handle "Urgent Request" in Scrum

In Scrum, Product Owners often face challenges with handling 'urgent requests,' especially from individuals with high political power.
Scrum involves two backlogs: Product Backlog and Sprint Backlog, with the latter containing work the Developers have committed to for the current Sprint.
It's crucial to differentiate between 'urgent requests' and defects or critical production incidents in Scrum.
Not every 'urgent request' should be automatically added to the Sprint Backlog; some can wait and be stored in the Product Backlog for future consideration.
As a Product Owner, consulting and involving the Developers in discussions about 'urgent requests' for the Sprint Backlog is essential to maintain collaboration and trust within the team.
Assessing whether an 'urgent request' aligns with the Sprint Goal is a critical step for Product Owners to determine its urgency and impact.
Using tools like the Financial Impact vs. Reputation Impact Matrix can help Product Owners quantify the urgency of 'urgent requests' based on their potential financial and reputational impacts.
Quantifying the financial impact of an 'urgent request' in monetary terms and assessing the reputation impact can aid in prioritizing these requests effectively.
In cases of high financial and reputational impacts, 'urgent requests' may be considered for inclusion in the Sprint Backlog after discussion with the Developers.
Open communication, managing stakeholder expectations, and addressing the implications of adding 'urgent requests' to the Sprint Backlog are crucial aspects of handling such requests effectively.

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Testim.io

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Javascript Code Smells: 7 to Watch out For

Code smells are signs in your code that indicate potential deeper problems and should be investigated and addressed to improve code quality.
Defining JavaScript code smells helps developers identify warning signs in their code that might indicate underlying issues.
Some common JavaScript code smells include too many indentation levels, long functions, too many parameters, complex code, copy-pasted code, wrong use of equality, and comments or dead code.
Excessive indentation levels can make code harder to read and understand, leading to maintenance challenges.
Long functions are more challenging to troubleshoot and understand, so keeping them concise is essential for code maintainability.
Functions with too many parameters can be harder to work with and may indicate a need for refactoring to simplify the code.
High cyclomatic complexity in code can make it difficult to reason about and test effectively, impacting code quality.
Avoiding copy-pasted code and ensuring proper use of equality operators can help maintain code clarity and prevent errors.
Removing unnecessary comments and dead code is important for keeping code documentation accurate and minimizing confusion.
Being aware of and addressing these code smells can lead to improved JavaScript codebases through refactoring and adopting best practices.

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Scrum-Master-Toolbox

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Anuj Ojha: Helping Product Owners Move Beyond User Story Templates to True Customer Understanding

Anuj Ojha discusses the importance of moving beyond user story templates to true customer understanding for Product Owners.
An exemplary Product Owner excels at inclusive product development, focusing on the vision and problem space while allowing team members to explore solutions.
Common anti-patterns observed in Product Owners include creating user stories without understanding customer needs and relying too heavily on story templates.
To transition from being a requirements translator to a value maximizer, Product Owners should engage directly with customers, focus on problem exploration, and collaborate with the entire team.

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Scrum

145

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Stakeholders in Scrum: Who They Really Are (And Who You Might Be Missing)

The role of stakeholders is emphasized in the Scrum Guide.
Stakeholders are not just limited to management, but include users, customers, competitors, and others.
Knowing and understanding stakeholders is crucial to meeting requirements and expectations.
Missing stakeholders can lead to missed feedback and building something no one wants.

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Scrum-Master-Toolbox

Anuj Ojha: Building Agile Team Maturity Through Honest Feedback

Anuj Ojha emphasizes the danger of viewing Scrum as a universal solution and behaving like a 'cult master'.
He advises against manipulating conversations or using others' authority to validate decisions.
Anuj promotes viewing Scrum as a continuous PDCA cycle and maintaining an open mind about different approaches.
Anuj recommends a team shared self-evaluation retrospective format to build interpersonal relationships through structured feedback.

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Scrum

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The anti-patterns of a Product Owner

Product Owners play a crucial role in creating valuable products, but ineffective Product Owners can lead to challenges and product failures.
Anti-patterns of Product Owners include Proxy Product Owner, Inaccessible Product Owner, Feature Factory Product Owner, and Product Owner with a Changing Scope of Work.
Proxy Product Owners become bottlenecks, while Inaccessible Product Owners hinder team progress by being unavailable for clarifications.
Feature Factory Product Owners focus solely on releasing features, often neglecting user value, clarity of product vision, and team engagement.
Product Owners with a constantly changing scope disrupt team plans and lead to stress and burnout among team members.
Product Owners who cater to all stakeholder demands without discernment can end up with unrealistic expectations and loss of credibility.
Overly Technical Product Owners who micromanage technical implementations hinder team ownership and can deviate from maximizing product value.
Dictatorial Product Owners make decisions unilaterally, demoralizing the team and inhibiting creativity and problem-solving.
Breaking free from these anti-patterns involves training, learning, mentoring, and coaching Product Owners to empower them to make effective decisions.
By addressing these anti-patterns, organizations can enable Product Owners to guide teams effectively and deliver products that meet customer needs.

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Dev

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Introduction to Agile Framework

Introduction to Agile Framework
Agile is a structured approach for applying Agile principles in project management and software development.
Key terms in Agile framework include user story, product backlog, sprint, epic, Scrum Master, Product Owner, and development team.
There are various types of Agile methodologies like Scrum, Kanban, Lean, Extreme Programming (XP), Feature-Driven Development (FDD), Dynamic Systems Development Method (DSDM), Crystal, and Agile Unified Process (AUP).

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Medium

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There’s nothing wrong with waterfall

The original 'Manifesto for Agile Software Development' was a response to the deterministic nature of the waterfall methodology.
Agile treats software development as an ongoing process, taking advantage of product flexibility.
The world has changed with the increased complexity of modern product suites and distributed teams.
Waterfall works well for physical products, but software is more adaptable and can be updated even after deployment.

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Medium

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Understanding Key Roles in Agile Teams

The Product Owner (PO) is the voice of the customer and the key decision-maker when it comes to prioritizing work in an Agile team.
The Scrum Master is a servant-leader responsible for ensuring that Agile principles and practices are followed within the team.
The Development Team consists of professionals who work collaboratively to deliver working increments of the product.
Stakeholders include executives, customers, business leaders, and other external parties who have an interest in the product and provide input to shape its direction.

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Scrum-Master-Toolbox

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Anuj Ojha: Beyond the Iron Triangle, A Path to True Agility

Anuj Ojha shares his journey of understanding the complexities behind Scrum implementation.
He emphasizes the importance of effective communication with stakeholders.
The traditional iron triangle (fixed time, scope, and resources) is a fiction in agile environments.
Ojha suggests building cases for critical needs and ensuring all voices are heard when determining possibilities.

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Testim.io

305

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Angular Testing Tutorial: What You Need and How to Start

This Angular testing tutorial offers insights on how to start testing Angular for front-end developers, emphasizing the importance of testing in maintaining user trust.
The tutorial covers the basics of Angular testing, including unit tests, end-to-end tests, and integration tests, explaining the differences and importance of each.
Unit tests focus on verifying small pieces of an application in isolation, while end-to-end tests simulate user interactions with the application.
The article introduces the testing pyramid as a guide for prioritizing unit, integration, and end-to-end tests, emphasizing the significance of unit tests as the foundation.
It further delves into practical examples of unit testing Angular components and services using spies to mock dependencies and ensure test speed and maintenance.
The tutorial also discusses end-to-end tests in Angular, highlighting the use of Protractor and emphasizing testing UI displays rather than specific data.
Integration tests in Angular involve testing how components and services respond to different API responses, necessitating a fake server setup to serve test data.
Various options for spinning up a data server for integration tests are outlined, such as using a back-end framework, ng-apimock, or Cypress.
The tutorial provides steps for setting up integration tests with a framework like Express, involving creating a local server, configuring tests, and setting up a proxy in Angular.
In conclusion, the article encourages implementing Angular testing across the testing pyramid with tools like Protractor and Jasmine, ensuring comprehensive test coverage for user satisfaction.
By following the guidelines in this tutorial, developers can enhance their testing practices in Angular, leading to more stable and reliable applications for end-users.

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Medium

283

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What is Agile Software Development?

Agile software development prioritizes flexibility, collaboration, and iterative progress.
It focuses on delivering small, working increments of software in short, time-boxed iterations called sprints.
Agile values collaboration within the development team and with customers to ensure the product meets real-world needs.
Agile methodologies like Scrum, Kanban, and Extreme Programming are used to implement Agile principles.

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Scrum

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Myth 39: Technical Debt is the Developers’ Problem

Myth # 39: Technical Debt is the Developer's Problem. They caused it, so they should fix it on their own time.
The Product Owner should be kept informed of Technical Debt by the Scrum Team and should add fixes for Technical Debt to the Product Backlog and order it along with new features.
Teams should consider enhancements to their Definition of Done to reduce the accumulation of new technical debt.
Developers should inform the Product Owner of any technical debt to ensure that fixes for Technical Debt are added to the Product Backlog.

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