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Engineering Excellence: Cultivating Quality and Scalability Through Technical Rigor

Cultivating technical rigor, software craftsmanship, and continuous improvement to deliver reliable, scalable, and sustainable software systems.

Promoting high standards in software craftsmanship and development practices.

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https://nkdagility.com/resources/engineering-excellence/

Overview

Engineering Excellence: Driving High-Quality, Sustainable Software Development

Engineering excellence is the foundation of high-quality, maintainable, and scalable software systems. It is about fostering a culture that values continuous improvement, technical rigor, and long-term sustainability in software development. This category is dedicated to discussions on how organisations can elevate their engineering standards to deliver predictable, resilient, and valuable software.

Why Engineering Excellence Matters

Core Principles of Engineering Excellence

  1. Software Craftsmanship - Engineering excellence is grounded in a deep understanding of design, architecture, and maintainability. It prioritises clarity, simplicity, and adaptability, ensuring that software remains robust over time.
  2. Modern Software Engineering Practices - A commitment to continuous validation, automation, and integration enables teams to build and evolve software with confidence. These practices ensure that software remains reliable, scalable, and secure, while allowing teams to respond quickly to change.
  3. Technical Debt Management - Engineering excellence requires a proactive approach to code health and system maintainability. It involves regular assessment, improvement, and simplification to prevent long-term inefficiencies and ensure that systems remain adaptable.
  4. Metrics & Observability - Effective engineering is driven by measurable outcomes and transparency. By establishing clear metrics and monitoring, teams gain insights into performance, stability, and efficiency, enabling data-driven improvements.
  5. Security & Compliance - A secure and compliant system is fundamental to engineering integrity. Engineering excellence ensures that security is embedded into development processes, reducing vulnerabilities and aligning with regulatory and organisational standards.
  6. Scalable & Resilient Architecture - Scalability and resilience are essential to long-term software success. Engineering excellence ensures that systems are designed to handle change, growth, and unexpected conditions, enabling sustainable evolution.

Learn More about Engineering Excellence

Blog

Testing in Production Maximises Quality and Value

Explains how audience-based deployment and testing in production enable faster feedback, safer rollouts, and higher software quality by targeting real users and reducing risk.
Blog

Stop Promoting Branches

Explains why promoting code through multiple branches slows delivery, increases risk, and suggests GitHub Flow or Release Flow as simpler, safer alternatives for deployment.
Signals

Do More Staging Environments Really Reduce Deployment Risk

Adding more staging environments does not reduce deployment risk; true safety comes from automated testing, continuous integration, and quality engineering practices.
Tags

Lead Time

Measuring the time from work initiation to customer delivery, helping teams monitor workflow efficiency and improve value delivery.
Videos

Stop Hoping for Quality: Why Automated Pipelines Are the Only Way to Deliver with Confidence

Stop relying on memory for quality. Discover why automated pipelines beat manual checks, and how embedding quality gates ensures trust, speed, and consistency.
Videos

Why “Done” Only Counts When It’s Live: Moving Beyond Fake Finishes to Real Value in Software Delivery

Discover why “done” means live in production—not just code complete. Learn to deliver real value, close feedback loops, and drive outcomes that matter.
Blog

Your Evolving Definition of Done

Explains how the Definition of Done evolves in Scrum, aligning team practices with organisational standards to ensure consistent quality, compliance, and business value delivery.
Videos

Why a Shared Definition of Done Is the Secret to Consistent, Predictable Quality in Agile Teams

Struggling with inconsistent delivery? Discover why a shared definition of done is key to predictable, high-quality results your teams—and stakeholders—can trust.
Engineering-Notes

Building a Resilient Token Server: Engineering for Flow, Fault Tolerance, and Speed

Explains how to engineer a robust, fault-tolerant token counting server using FastAPI and PowerShell, covering error handling, retries, fallbacks, and resilient workflows.
Videos

Stop Paying the Hidden Costs of Weak Delivery: Why a Strong Definition of Done Transforms Your Team’s Results

Stop paying the hidden costs of weak delivery. Discover how a strong, shared definition of done builds trust, quality, and real agility in your team.
Videos

Building a culture of Quality

Explores how fostering a culture of quality and engineering excellence across teams leads to better, safer products, highlighting the impact of leadership and shared values.
Videos

The Power of Technical Excellence in Agile Development

Explores how technical excellence in Agile development reduces risk, prevents technical debt, and boosts product quality and delivery speed through strong engineering standards.
Blog

How to Build for Business Resilience and Continuity

Learn key strategies for building business resilience and continuity, including observability, system decoupling, routine deployments, team empowerment, and rapid recovery.
Tags

Continuous Integration

Ensure fast, reliable development with Continuous Integration (CI). Merge code frequently, detect errors early, and maintain a healthy codebase.
Tags

One Engineering System

One Engineering System (1ES) is a strategic standardised, integrated framework designed to streamline software development by unifying tools, processes, and practices across teams. It provides a consistent, scalable foundation that supports high-quality, efficient, and secure software delivery.
Tags

Test First Development

Test First is a practice that defines success before implementation. It supports manual and automated testing, with a strong preference for automation to improve flow and quality.
Blog

Quality enablement with Visual Studio 2012

Explores how Visual Studio 2012 supports continuous quality enablement, automated testing, and rapid delivery in modern software development for higher user satisfaction.
Signals

Velocity isn’t how many story points a team burns down

Velocity measures how quickly teams turn ideas into value, using build, test, deploy, and feedback times—not just story points—to track real delivery speed.
Videos

How to Tackle Technical Debt Without Halting Progress: Smarter Ways to Keep Your Team Moving Forward

Struggling with technical debt? Discover practical ways to tackle legacy systems, boost team morale, and deliver value—without grinding to a halt.
Blog

Fragile by Design: The Cost of Pretending to Be Resilient

Explores how poor engineering, shallow product thinking, and organisational denial lead to fragile systems, stressing that true resilience requires rigorous, real-world testing.
Signals

Rethinking Dev-Test-Staging-Production Pipelines for Safety

Explores why traditional Dev-Test-Staging-Production pipelines fall short and highlights audience-based deployment for safer, faster feedback in real production environments.
Signals

Scrum Teams don’t set the bar for quality—they meet it

Scrum Teams uphold, not lower, quality by strictly following and evolving the Definition of Done, ensuring predictable releases and reducing technical debt and risk.
Tags

Shift Left Strategy

A Shift-Left Strategy brings testing, security, and compliance earlier in development, reducing defects, accelerating feedback, and improving quality for faster, more reliable delivery.
Tags

Acceptance Test Driven Development

Drive high-quality software development with Acceptance Test Driven Development (ATDD). Define clear, testable acceptance criteria before implementation to ensure alignment with business needs.
    Signals

    Technical debt isn’t just messy code

    Technical debt includes slow feedback, fragile systems, and manual processes that hinder progress. Addressing it early with automation and testing reduces long-term costs.
    Signals

    Technical debt cripples business agility and slows engineers down

    Technical debt limits business agility, slows engineering, and hinders innovation. Managing it with automation and transparency is key to staying competitive and responsive.
    Signals

    The Hidden Costs of Supporting Multiple Versions in Production

    Maintaining multiple production versions increases bugs, merge conflicts, and technical debt, making development harder and less efficient for engineering teams.
    Signals

    Scrum Masters are not glorified meeting schedulers

    Scrum Masters must have technical and business expertise to guide teams, improve code quality, and drive real agility—not just schedule meetings. Coding skills are essential.
    Signals

    There no such thing as "good" technical debt

    Technical debt always harms productivity and system stability. Ignoring it leads to inefficiency and risk, making it essential to address rather than accept or normalise.
    Blog

    Stop Hiding Behind Complexity and Start Delivering Continuously

    Continuous delivery is achievable for any software, regardless of complexity. Success depends on investment in automation, quality, and process improvement—not technical barriers.
    Blog

    A better way than staggered iterations for delivery

    Explains why staggered iterations harm software delivery, increasing technical debt, and recommends cross-functional teams, test-first, and working software each sprint.
    Videos

    Mastering Site Reliability: Insights from Azure DevOps on Building a Resilient Live Site Culture

    Explore proven strategies from Azure DevOps for building resilient, reliable software systems—covering transparency, automation, telemetry, incident response, and team culture.
    Blog

    Delivery is the only Measure of Progress in Scrum

    Scrum teams must deliver working software to real users every Sprint; true progress is measured by delivery to production, not just by completing internal work.
    Videos

    Transforming Chaos into Clarity: How Optimising Systems Fuels Engineering Excellence

    Explores how optimising systems, reducing technical debt, and strong leadership improve engineering quality, productivity, and innovation while minimising chaos.
    Videos

    Transforming Engineering Excellence: The Power of Naked Agility in Quality and Leadership

    Explores how adopting naked agility boosts engineering excellence, quality, and leadership by addressing technical debt, shifting left, and fostering a culture of improvement.
    Videos

    Cultivating a Culture of Quality: Lessons from Boeing and Volkswagen for Engineering Excellence

    Explores how fostering a culture of quality and engineering excellence prevents failures, using Boeing and Volkswagen as examples, and highlights the impact on software development.
    Videos

    The Crucible of Learning: Transforming Organizational Effectiveness Through DevOps

    Explores how DevOps transformation, refactoring, and ownership reduce technical debt, streamline development, and boost efficiency, team satisfaction, and business value.
    Blog

    Professional Scrum teams build software that works

    Professional Scrum Teams prioritise software quality, accountability, and continuous improvement, ensuring each release is reliable, defect-free, and delivers real value.
    Blog

    Without Delivery, There Is No Value

    Value in software is only realised through delivery. Frequent releases validate assumptions, reduce risk, and enable rapid feedback, adaptation, and continuous improvement.
    Videos

    Navigating Technical Debt: How to Transform Challenges into Opportunities for Quality and Efficiency

    Explains how managing technical debt and distinguishing it from poor quality can boost product efficiency, reduce costs, and support sustainable software development.
    Videos

    Mastering Technical Debt: Strategies to Transform Challenges into Opportunities for Your Development Team

    Explains technical debt in software development, its impact on teams, and practical strategies to identify, manage, and reduce it for long-term productivity and code quality.
    Videos

    NKD Agility: Your partner in developing engineering excellence

    Learn how NKD Agility supports organisations in building engineering excellence through modern practices like performance engineering, testing in production, and leadership.
    Videos

    Technical Debt Management for Long-Term Quality

    Explains how managing and repaying technical debt improves software quality, delivery speed, and long-term value by addressing both known and unknown code issues.
    Blog

    Avoid the pick-n-mix branching anti-pattern

    Explains the risks of the pick-n-mix branching anti-pattern in source control, its impact on code quality, and recommends feature branching and toggles for stability.
    Signals

    Why Engineering Teams Use Staging Environments for Risk Reduction

    Explores how staging environments aim to reduce risk in software development, their hidden costs, and modern alternatives like feature flags and progressive rollouts.
    Videos

    Maximising Deployment Frequency: The Key to Faster Time to Market and Business Success

    Explores how increasing deployment frequency, stable environments, and fast feedback loops improve software delivery, reduce time to market, and align with business goals.
    Videos

    The Hidden Costs of Poor Quality Code—and How to Turn It Into a Superpower

    Explores the financial, productivity, and reputational impacts of poor-quality code, and offers practical steps to turn code quality into a competitive advantage.
    Blog

    Getting started with a modern source control system and DevOps

    Learn key practices for adopting modern source control and DevOps, including automation, release pipelines, and team collaboration to improve software delivery quality.
    Videos

    Code Reviews for Quality Assurance

    Explores modern code review practices, emphasising automation, pre-reviewed code, and shift-left strategies to improve software quality, speed, and team collaboration.
    Blog

    You are doing it wrong if you are not using test first

    Explains how adopting test-first practices in software development improves quality, reduces bugs, and enables confident continuous delivery by validating requirements early.
    Tags

    Technical Excellence

    Technical Excellence encompasses engineering practices and methodologies that enhance agility, improve code quality, and enable continuous delivery.
    Videos

    Embracing Automation: The Key to Transforming Your Development Process and Boosting Confidence

    Explores how automation in testing, deployment, and validation streamlines development, reduces technical debt, and builds confidence for teams and customers alike.
    Videos

    Unlocking Code Quality: The Transformative Power of Frequent Deployments

    Explores how frequent code deployments improve code quality, reduce technical debt, enable faster feedback, and support iterative, user-focused software development.
    Videos

    Evidence-Based Management: The Four Key Value Areas in Scrum

    Explains Scrum’s four key value areas—current value, unrealised value, ability to innovate, and time to market—for data-driven product and organisational improvement.
    Videos

    From Chaos to Clarity: My Journey Through DevOps and the Three Key Challenges to Overcome

    Explores a developer’s transition to DevOps, highlighting key challenges: cultural change, toolchain automation, and continuous learning for effective software delivery.
    Blog

    Getting started with a Definition of Done (DoD)

    Explains how to create, apply, and improve a Definition of Done (DoD) in Scrum to ensure software quality, transparency, and consistent delivery of working increments.
    Blog

    Metrics that matter with evidence-based management

    Explains how evidence-based management uses reliable metrics and KPIs at team and organisational levels to drive better decisions, value delivery, and process improvement.
    Blog

    Building a release pipeline with Release Management with Visual Studio 2013

    Explains how to set up a scalable release pipeline using Release Management in Visual Studio 2013, covering continuous release, feedback environments, and DevOps practices.
    Blog

    Quality enablement to achieve predictable delivery

    Explains how defining quality standards, acceptance criteria, and automation in software delivery leads to predictable outcomes, fewer bugs, and improved team performance.
    Videos

    Unlocking the True Power of Continuous Delivery: How Automation Transforms Software Development

    Explains how automation in continuous delivery improves software reliability, reduces risk, and enables faster, safer deployments through consistent, rapid feedback loops.
    Videos

    Security by Design Building Secure Software

    Explains how integrating security and quality early in software development—using practices like TDD, pair programming, and continuous feedback—builds robust, reliable systems.
    Videos

    Code Reviews for Quality Assurance

    Explores code review practices for quality assurance, highlighting automation, pull requests, and early defect detection to ensure high-quality, reliable software delivery.
    Videos

    Unlocking Continuous Delivery: How Feature Flags Transform Software Development

    Explains how feature flags enable safe, incremental software releases, support continuous delivery, and use user feedback to improve features before full rollout.
    Videos

    Unlocking the Future of Software Development: Why Automation is Your Key to Success

    Explores how automation boosts software development by reducing errors, speeding up deployments, and ensuring consistent, high-quality releases in dynamic environments.
    Videos

    Why Embracing Automation is Essential for Reducing Human Error in Software Development

    Explores how automation in software development reduces human error, improves reliability, and streamlines workflows, using real-world examples and practical insights.
    Blog

    Standard Environments for Automated Deployment and Testing

    Explains how to set up and use Standard Environments in Visual Studio 2012 TFS for automated software deployment and testing, enabling consistent, repeatable pipelines.
    Blog

    Automated Testing in a modern application lifecycle

    Explains the role of automated testing in modern software development, covering types, integration, benefits, challenges, and tools for maintaining code quality.
    Signals

    Every delay increases the risk of failure

    Delaying software releases increases failure risk. Frequent, small releases improve success rates, adaptability, and recovery, as shown by CHAOS Report and DORA metrics.
    Signals

    If teams struggle with quality or delivery, the problem is often the system

    Team issues with quality or delivery often stem from weak systems, lacking clear standards, automation, and leadership support—not just team performance.
    Signals

    Why Organisations Believe Their Software Is Too Complex for CD

    Many organisations cite software complexity as a barrier to continuous delivery, but real obstacles are technical debt and lack of investment in quality and automation.
    Signals

    We don’t have time for automation—but manual testing slows releases and quality

    Manual testing limits release speed and quality, while automation enables faster, more reliable software delivery by reducing regressions and tester workload.
    Signals

    A changing Definition of Done undermines quality and predictability in teams

    Frequent changes to the Definition of Done reduce team quality and predictability. Consistent, enforced standards are key to reliable delivery and continuous improvement.
    Tags

    Continuous Delivery

    Continuous Delivery is the practice of frequently delivering small increments of valuable product directly to real users, enabling rapid feedback, validation, and continuous improvement from the very first iteration.
    Signals

    Deploying Windows OS Directly to Production: Then vs Now

    Explains how Windows OS updates shifted from infrequent, risky releases to safe, staged rollouts using ring-based deployment and real-time user feedback for reliability.
    Signals

    Best Branching Strategies for Development Teams Explained

    Explains why environment-based branching slows development, and recommends using feature flags and progressive rollouts for simpler, faster, and safer code delivery.
    Signals

    If every release feels high-risk, you lack a true Definition of Done

    Releases feel risky when teams lack a clear Definition of Done. Learn how a strong DoD ensures stress-free, reliable software delivery with built-in quality and security.
    Signals

    Branch promotion is a relic of slow, manual software delivery

    Explains why modern software teams avoid branch promotion, using continuous integration, feature flags, and production-like testing to streamline delivery and reduce risk.
    Signals

    Frequent releases are not just a technical strategy

    Frequent software releases reduce risk, enable faster feedback, and help teams adapt to user needs, preventing costly mistakes and improving overall performance.
    Signals

    Too many teams overcomplicate their branching strategies

    Learn why simple branching strategies like GitHub Flow and Release Flow help teams deliver faster, reduce risk, and avoid the pitfalls of complex version control.
    Blog

    Release planning and predictable delivery

    Explores how agile teams can achieve predictable software delivery through quality focus, effective release planning, and continuous improvement, despite inherent uncertainty.
    Tags

    Behaviour Driven Development

    Align development with business goals using Behaviour Driven Development (BDD). Improve collaboration and create clear, testable requirements.
      Videos

      Scaling Smart: How to Tackle Technical Debt for Sustainable Growth

      Learn how unmanaged technical debt can hinder growth, and discover strategies like sustainable architecture, DevOps, and automation to scale efficiently and maintain quality.
      Videos

      Transforming Agility: How Azure DevOps Went from Two-Year Releases to 880,000 Deployments

      Explores how Azure DevOps shifted from slow, two-year releases to rapid, continuous delivery, highlighting the benefits of fast feedback, agility, and frequent deployments.
      Blog

      Why Handoffs Are Killing Your Agility

      Excessive handoffs in software development create delays, reduce quality, and harm team morale. Learn how eliminating handoffs boosts agility, flow, and value delivery.
      Blog

      The Insufficiency of Scrum is a fallacy

      Scrum alone does not cause project failure; lacking strong engineering practices and effective retrospectives leads to technical debt and poor Agile outcomes.
      Blog

      The Sprint is a container for Planning and not necessarily for Delivery

      Explains how Scrum Sprints are primarily for planning, not fixed delivery, and discusses aligning delivery schedules, continuous deployment, and improving software quality.
      Signals

      Understand the true risk of technical debt in your business

      Technical debt poses significant business risks, reducing agility, slowing innovation, and causing lost opportunities. Addressing it is crucial for long-term organisational success.
      Videos

      Embrace Simplicity: How to Transform Complexity into Continuous Delivery Success

      Explains how simplifying complex software and committing to change enables continuous delivery, highlighting the need for cultural shift, resilience, and ongoing improvement.
      Videos

      Rethinking Continuous Delivery: Why Best Practices Don't Exist in Complex Environments

      Explores why fixed best practices don’t suit complex continuous delivery, highlighting adaptive approaches like audience-based delivery, testing in production, and ongoing improvement.
      Tags

      Internal Developer Platform

      An Internal Developer Platform streamlines development processes, enabling teams to build, test, and deploy applications efficiently within a controlled environment.
      Signals

      let-us do the maths

      Explains how slow product release cycles delay feature delivery, risk losing relevance, and create competitive disadvantages, highlighting the benefits of faster iterations.
      Signals

      There a common belief that rollback is the ultimate safety net

      Rollback is often riskier than rolling forward, especially for stateful apps. Safer deployment relies on progressive delivery and fail-forward strategies, not reversals.
      Videos

      Transforming Waste into Value: How to Boost ROI with Agile Metrics

      Learn how agile metrics like innovation rate, product index, usage index, and version adoption help identify waste and improve ROI by focusing on value-driven engineering.
      Blog

      All technical debt is a risk to the product and to your business.

      Technical debt increases risk to products and businesses, leading to hidden costs, reduced quality, and slower delivery. Ignoring it can harm long-term value and growth.
      Blog

      Release Management with Team Foundation Server 2012

      Explains how to automate and streamline software release management using Team Foundation Server 2012, Lab Management, and Octopus, focusing on build, deployment, and quality.
      Blog

      Professional Scrum Developer (.NET) Training in London

      Intensive five-day course for software developers covering Scrum, Visual Studio 2010, .NET, and Agile practices through hands-on team sprints and real-world case studies.
      Blog

      Who broke the build?

      Explains the importance of passing builds, common causes of build failures, how to identify issues and responsible users, and best practices for build ownership.
      Tags

      GitHub

      GitHub is a platform for version control and collaboration, offering tools for code hosting, CI/CD, project management, and team collaboration.
      Blog

      Create a Release Management pipeline for Professional Developers

      Step-by-step guide to building an automated Release Management pipeline for professional developers, covering build, deployment, environment setup, and parameterisation.
      Tags

      Forecasting

      Enhance forecasting in Agile and Scrum. Use empirical data to predict delivery timelines, manage risk, and optimise value delivery.
      Signals

      Microsoft shift from 2-year cycles to 3-week Sprints caused team anxiety

      Microsoft’s switch to 3-week Sprints increased team anxiety due to greater transparency, exposing inefficiencies but enabling faster, more frequent software delivery.
      Signals

      I’ll never understand teams that manage bugs instead of fixing them

      Highlights the importance of promptly fixing software bugs instead of managing backlogs, arguing that unresolved defects harm product quality and team effectiveness.
      Tags

      Platform Engineering

      Platform Engineering is the practice of designing, building, and maintaining internal platforms that enable developers to deliver value independently, reliably, and at pace.
      Signals

      Every unreleased feature is a cost

      Unreleased features create hidden costs and risks. Regular software delivery reduces failure rates, rework, and missed opportunities, ensuring real value is delivered.
      Course

      Continuous Delivery Using Azure DevOps Services Training

      This two-day course provides students with the DevOps principles and related hands-on practices to work better as a team, scale their agility, share and integrate their work, and deliver working software continuously in order to enable faster delivery of value and receive early and valuable feedback.
      Course

      Applying Professional Scrum for Software Development (APS-SD) with Certification

      Experience APS-SD: Hands-on Scrum training for delivering quality software. Gain practical skills in Agile, DevOps, and Scrum principles. Free PSD I certification exam included. Enhance your software development expertise.
      Course

      Assuring Quality Using Azure Test Plans Training

      Azure DevOps provides a set of cloud-hosted tools that software teams can use as an end-to-end solution to plan, develop, test, and deliver value in the form of working software.
      Course

      Mastering Azure Repos Training

      Azure DevOps Services provide a set of cloud-hosted tools that software teams can use to quickly plan, develop, test, and deliver value in the form of working software. Azure Repos provide public or private Git repositories that enable better collaboration and cleaner code. To maximize learning, students will work in teams, in a common team project, on a common codebase.
      Signals

      Executives want predictability

      Lack of a clear, enforced Definition of Done leads to hidden risks, unreliable forecasts, and eroded trust in delivery, undermining predictability and organisational confidence.
      Signals

      Staging Environments Do Not Prevent Production Failures

      Staging environments can’t fully replicate production, often leading to false confidence. Real risk reduction comes from safe, incremental releases to actual users.
      Tags

      Azure DevOps

      Azure DevOps is a product from Microsoft that provides tools around CI/CD, collaboration, and agile project management. Other names are Team Foundation Server, TFSOnline, Visual Studio Online (VSO), and Visual Studio Team Services.
      Videos

      Navigating the Unpredictability of Software Development: Embrace Agile for Success

      Explores how Agile principles, technical leadership, and engineering excellence help teams manage unpredictability, adapt to change, and deliver quality software projects.
      Videos

      Empowering Teams for Success: The Key to Thriving Product Development

      Explores how empowering and engaging diverse software teams boosts motivation, collaboration, and product quality through trust, feedback, skills development, and shared goals.
      Videos

      If a client hasn't considered DevOps consulting as part of their Agile Consulting needs, why should they?

      DevOps consulting enhances Agile by improving collaboration, accelerating delivery, and ensuring quality, making software development more efficient and resilient.
      Videos

      Transform Your Software Architecture: The Game-Changing Impact of TDD and Pair Programming

      Explores how test-driven development and pair programming improve software architecture, code quality, team skills, and long-term productivity by reducing complexity and errors.
      Videos

      DevOps: Elevating Your Organization’s Performance Through Bespoke Solutions

      Learn how tailored DevOps strategies help organisations assess current practices, streamline processes, ensure compliance, and boost software quality and delivery frequency.
      Signals

      Would your CFO approve misrepresenting corporate assets?

      Ignoring technical debt misrepresents software asset value, risking financial loss and operational issues. Properly account for technical debt to protect business assets.
      Videos

      Mastering Evidence-Based Management for Agile Success

      Learn how Evidence-Based Management uses data to guide Agile teams, improve decision-making, track value, and boost innovation, customer satisfaction, and time to market.
      Guides

      Detecting Agile BS

      Discover more about Detecting Agile BS and how it can help you in your Agile journey!
      Guides

      The Evidence-Based Management Guide: Improving Value Delivery under Conditions of Uncertainty

      Discover more about “The Evidence-Based Management Guide and how it can help you in your Agile journey!
      Videos

      Detecting Agile BS: Lessons from the Department of Defense

      Explores why true organisational agility needs more than Agile development, highlighting the importance of continuous delivery, quality, and removing bureaucratic barriers.
      Blog

      How Usable Working Products Are Your Ultimate Weapon Against Risks

      Delivering usable, working products frequently is key to reducing risk in Agile. Focus on feedback, automation, and lean practices over excessive documentation.
      Blog

      Live Site Culture & Site Reliability Engineering

      Explores how agile teams use DevOps and Site Reliability Engineering to deliver high-quality software rapidly, with insights from Microsoft’s Azure DevOps team practices.
      Blog

      Can the Definition of Done change per Sprint?

      The Definition of Done can evolve to improve quality but should not be weakened or vary per backlog item. Consistency ensures transparency and reliable product increments.
      Blog

      DOD has made it illegal to do waterfall

      The US Department of Defence now requires agile, iterative software development, ending mandatory waterfall methods and influencing global government IT practices.
      Blog

      Continuous value delivery with modern business applications

      Explains how modern business applications use continuous delivery to release new features frequently, reduce risk, and improve customer satisfaction through rapid updates.
      Engineering-Notes

      How I Used Generative AI to Transform Site Tagging and Categories

      Explains how generative AI and PowerShell scripts automate and improve blog post tagging and categorisation in Hugo, with human oversight and transparent audit trails.
      Blog

      Testing in the modern application lifecycle

      Explores challenges and solutions for manual testing in agile software development, focusing on tracking, automation, actionable bugs, and integrated test management tools.
      Videos

      Balancing Speed and Stability: Why Quality Should Always Come First in Delivery Management

      Explores why prioritising quality and stability over speed in delivery management leads to better long-term outcomes, even when facing tight deadlines or external pressure.
      Blog

      Is ALM a useful term?

      Explores whether Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) is a useful term, its role in agile software delivery, and differences in adoption across organisations and regions.
      Videos

      Unlocking the Superpower of Software Development: How Shifting Left Transforms Quality Assurance

      Explains how adopting a shift-left approach in software development improves quality, speeds up delivery, reduces costs, and fosters collaboration by involving QA early.
      Blog

      The Definition of Done: Ensuring Quality without Compromising Value

      Explains how to maintain clear, measurable quality standards with the Definition of Done, while avoiding confusion with acceptance criteria and preserving product value.
      Blog

      Unit Testing against the Team Foundation Server 2012 API

      Explains how to unit test applications against the Team Foundation Server 2012 API, focusing on handling authentication for automated and unattended test scenarios.

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