Way of Working
Principles of quality software
The Activity Kit
It’s important throughout all phases of a project to have specific activities and tools available to a software team to solve problems. For this, it’s recommended to have an Activity Kit as a collection of tools available to teams throughout the software development process. The kit should be a curated list built by various leaders within all sectors of the business and in many cases, will be deeply influenced by and tested on numerous software projects. Each activity should clearly define its purpose, how to perform it and what deliverables or outcomes should be expected.
An example of some activities that will be useful often in the software process are as follows. This is not an extensive list, however representative of some with high value:
- Defining a problem statement
- User story mapping
- Performing discovery interviews
- Writing a product backlog
- Project prioritisation
- Running a retrospective
- Facilitating a user testing session
There is no formula for what activities to run and when to run them. It is entirely dependent on what the project needs at the time. We recommend having a deep understanding of the Activity Kit items available. Then, based on where your project’s at and what is needed, choose the Activity Kit item that fits.
Throughout the Way of Working, you’ll see links and references to Activities. While it is not mandatory to complete them, you may find the hands-on nature of an activity can help add value to your project.
