The megapopular series about the use of Agile methodology at large companies is coming to a close. We have already learned how Agile is practised at Apple, Philips, Nokia, Intel, Microsoft and Exigen Services. Now let’s enjoy the story about Agile at Salesforce and Luxoft.
Agile and Salesforce
Salesforce.com is an American company that has been a leader in the CRM system market since 2012. It’s famous not only for its own name and the development of its own CRM, it is also famous for its creations — Force.com and Database.com. Force.com offers a platform for application development, whereas Database.com is an online database management system.
Salesforce.com uses Agile in its own special way. There are so many particularities that every newcomer needs to take a 2-day Agile course.
Scrum, the heart of Agile, helps in managing projects, using iterations, improving team’s skills through learning. It’s also used for a better communication with a client to make sure that a product is developed as required.
To reach technical excellence, the company uses pair programming, continuous integration (merging all production copies into one main development branch and frequent automated builds of the parts of a project for the better spotting and solving of integration problems), everyday stand-ups and test-driven development.
One of the key pillars of Salesforce.com are the self-sufficient and responsible teams, which are able to self-organize, know their role, and are totally independent of the other departments.
Agile and Luxoft
Luxoft is the biggest Russian IT web outsourcing company that cooperates with giants like Boeing, Deutsche Bank, IBM, and Dell. This company is the Agile pioneer in Russia and Eastern Asia.
The company’s employees are sure that it’s Agile that helps them to render services with the minimum time before the release. High productivity and product quality are achieved by an iterative approach to programming, which is twice as effective as the traditional methods.
The Forrester Research report is not only on the Agile’s economic gains, but also on the way of keeping the client satisfied. The Luxoft’s most important task is to establish a relationship of trust between a customer and a team. The methodology allows the company to introduce a client-oriented software product faster and with a higher quality.
The fact that in 2006 one of the Luxsoft’s workers got a Certified Scrum Master certificate — one of the few flexible software development certificates in the world — proves this company’s leadership in best practices.
Agile: beyond ІТ and team management
To crown it all, here are a few interesting facts about Agile going beyond IT and team management. Just imagine, members of governments in developed countries study this methodology in California to be able to rule their country better! Norway, New Zealand, two USA ministries and a few more governments use it.
Bad governance is often associated with people and their desires and ambitions. But the problem is not in people, but in the system itself. The changes are made with the help of reorganization. And what’s reorganization? It’s a project that is managed by a project manager.
To be able to do a huge amount of work, Washington’s information service uses the Scrum method. The Scrum teams were formed and even the internal walls in the building were removed.
Michael de Angelo, information service’s Vice Director, says that they try to provide the state’s institutions with usable practical instructions every week. The main goal is to improve the process of submitting investment plans forward for approval, as well as to change something every week. For this purpose, a step-by-step approach is used. Every week, the team releases a potentially ready-to-be-supplied product, and all the institutions can put it to the test. In this way, the representatives of the institutions can see for themselves all the work that has been done.
Agile is changing our reality, and this fact is proved true not only by the companies but also by the progress of entire countries!