Kirk Bryde spent enough years (decades, actually) as a software development project manager to know that there must be a better way to deliver good software earlier - without as much fuss and anguish as with traditional waterfall methodologies.

His quest started in the mid-80s, and continued thru the late-90s - when he championed UML and RUP on numerous consulting contracts. UML and RUP seemed like such good ideas back then, so why didn’t everyone use them? Well, they were too heavy, and too formal. They inferred that a formal, rigid process was better than using common sense. They weren’t right-sized, and they distracted development teams from their primary role of developing software.

In the late 90s - before Agile and Scrum - any PM worth his salt had to use MS Project, be PMP certified, and go by the book – usually the PMBOK, the RUP book, or both.

Then along came the Agile thought leaders with their Agile Manifesto, emphasizing that people and interactions trumped processes, tools, and documentation. With Agile and Scrum, Kirk learned a whole new vocabulary, and developed a completely different mindset about managing software projects.

Today, Kirk empowers the teams he works for, and trusts them to do the right thing - which is often the easiest, most obvious thing. And he uses lean, practical processes – the ones that really work to deliver production-quality software, processes that he'd already been using to some degree in the crunch near the end of his waterfall projects.

Kirk no longer feels guilty about taking process or documentation shortcuts that don't comply with PMBOK guidelines or RUP best practices. As the ScrumMaster of Rockwell Automation's first Scrum pilot project, he is empowered to deliver the software that product owners are happy with. After all, that’s exactly what they ask for - every sprint!

With Agile and Scrum, Kirk now focuses on what's most important – helping his teams deliver software instead of artifacts!

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