The typical Agile team may work in a common "teamroom", but personal space is also needed. Teams find out fast enough that some of the creature comforts left behind in their former traditional spaces were there for good reasons. This article shares the collected wisdom of dozens of teams who created their own work spaces, as collected by several experienced Agile coaches.
Does technology matter when it comes to recruiting developers? Or is the way of thinking the only thing that’s really important? In a time when many job advertisements are flooded with technology buzzwords, Dan Creswell found an Amazons recruitment ad that solely focuses on thinking and understanding.
The discussions that have been happening in distributed pockets of the community regarding certification of Agile processes has prompted the Agile Alliance to take a stance. Their position is employers should have confidence only in certifications that are skill-based and difficult to achieve. That means that certifications such as Certified Scrum Master and DSDM Foundation do not pass muster.
A recent Gartner report on the gender gap in IT states that although many feel that women are "innately better suited than men" to navigate the new global economy, they are not choosing to enter IT - and some are leaving. Gartner predicts that by 2012, 40% of women in the IT workforce will leave traditional IT career paths.
Ziff Davis' August surveys find that IT is growing in all sectors, leading to increased IT hiring. And though execs express a significant preference for IT professionals with a head for business over technical wizards, they anticipate these will be hard to find. Particularly in demand are professionals in project management, business-process redesign, business analysis and systems integration.
Team dynamics can dramatically affect team performance, so staffing teams well is a critical success factor. Rob Myers, an Extreme Programming coach, has recorded a podcast "Interviewing Techniques for Staffing Lean-Agile Teams."
Good news: a) in many places, it's a job-hunter's market again; b) recruiters are looking for exceptional, well-rounded, super-smart generalists - multitalented, multifaceted, multitasking problem-solvers. Have you been updating your skillset? Work-force consulting firm Foote Partners tells us which skills are in demand.
