As you may have gathered, we’re fans of Agile development. Although we don’t subscribe specifically to any one of the main agile styles such as SCRUM or XP, we continually develop and refine our own processes and methods through the projects we work on. We know that each project is essentially unique, but we want to be up-front with you about our general approach so that you know what you can expect from us.
This page outlines the typical steps one of our projects goes through. Hopefully it will give you some understanding of our work process and how it fits with our core philosophies as well as giving a brief introduction to our project management system, Basecamp.
New Beginnings
Every project has a starting point and for us it’s here. We’ve probably chatted on the phone or e-mailed each other a few times by now, but sooner or later we need to take the plunge and arrange our first date. We’re going to be working together and there’s so much we want to know.
Perhaps you're more interested in what our clients think or maybe you want to see some past projects.
We want to know who you are, get a feel for your business, discover what you’re trying to achieve with this project and what your long term goals are. We want to feel your enthusiasm and hear your ideas and find out what talents you have. By the end of it we’ll be looking at the project from your perspective, we’ll have a strong idea of your requirements and you’ll leave satisfied that we can deliver.
The B Word
It’s unlikely that you’ll come to us knowing exactly what you want from the word go. It doesn’t matter to us that you don’t have a full specification, they’re as restricting as they are informative and usually they only get in the way. Once we’ve got a good idea of the scope of the project, it’s time to talk budget. Okay, you can stop rolling your eyes, we’re not going to ask you there-and-then to commit to the full amount…you’re such a cynic. Having a reasonable idea of your budget gives us a yardstick to measure the project by. if you’re on a tight budget we can talk about which features are most important and which could be left out; if you’ve overestimated the cost then we can look at what enhancements we might be able to introduce to the project.
Getting Underway
Once we’ve agreed on the scope, budget and time we can really get to work. We typically work in two to four week iterations which basically means that after every iteration you get new updates to play with. Getting this functionality to you sooner rather than later gives you chance to use it and guide the further development of it. You get to tell us very early on if something’s needs changing and we can react earlier, before it impacts on the cost or time scale. You might even find that it’s good enough to use before the project’s actually finished.
During these iterations you’re kept fully updated on the project’s status. We use a web based project management system called Basecamp to manage all of our projects. It’s deliberately simple and is a great place for everyone on the project to contribute to the project, keeping all project-related information in one organised place.