The title of this presentation is taken from two quotes attributed to Colin Chapman, the founder of Lotus cars, who said: “adding power makes you faster on the straights; subtracting weight makes you faster everywhere”. This same philosophy underlies principle 10 of the Manifesto for Agile Software Development. Simplicity – the art of maximising the work not done – is essential. Principle 10 is the most important and most misunderstood of the Agile principles. It stands out from the other 11 in a number of ways. It is the only one described as an art; the specific phrasing,“maximising the work not done”, is somewhat unusual; and it is the only one to be explicitly called out as essential. The presentation introduces attendees to the idea that Principle 10 is essential because it underlies, supports and enables everything else and that without unwavering adherence to it, achieving agility in software development or anything else will be compromised. This presentation teach will teach you to identify and evaluate opportunities for simplification and maximisation of work not done.

1. G e t F a s t e r E v e r y w h e r e
SIMPLIFY THEN ADD
LIGHTNESS
Kelsey van Haaster
kelseyvh@thoughtworks.com
@kelseyvh

2. “Simplicity, the art of maximising
the work not done; is essential’’
The principles of the Manifesto for Agile Software Development
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3. ABOUT ME
PAST
More than 20 years of total experience in Information Technology
More than 15 years experience working with Agile software development
PRESENT
TechOps - ThoughtWorks
PM/IM/PO leading a 100% distributed team
FUTURE
Completion (estimated mid 2017) of a PhD with Charles Sturt University
Investigating the consequences of various organisational approaches to
transitions towards business Agility
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4. OVERVIEW
• Principle 10 - what does it all mean?
• Simplicity what do we mean?
• Why maximise the work NOT done, rather than minimise the work done?
• Why is principle 10 essential?
• Anti-patterns for principle 10
• What does principle 10 look like in practice?
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5. Occam's Razor
The idea that, in trying to understand something, getting
unnecessary information out of the way is the fastest way to
the truth or to the best explanation.
William of Ockham (1285-1349)
SIMPLICITY
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PHILOSOPHY

6. SIMPLICITY
“A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is
nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away”
Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Experience Design
“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
Claire Booth Luce (1903 -1987)
(often misattributed to both Leonardo da Vinci and Steve Jobs)
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INDUSTRIAL DESIGN
EXPERIENCE DESIGN

7. Simplicity is achieved by maximising
the work not done.
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8. 8
MAXIMISING
THE WORK NOT DONE

9. “Adding power makes you faster on the straights; subtracting
weight makes you faster everywhere.”
Colin Chapman, Founder Lotus cars.
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10. FROM A TECHNOLOGY PERSPECTIVE
Principle 10 expresses the connection between Agile and Lean:
“Strive for perfection by continually
removing waste”
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11. WHY IS PRINCIPLE 10 ESSENTIAL?
• Some recent comments
• Alistair Cockburn - Heart of Agile
• Dave Thomas - Agile is dead
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12. HEART OF AGILE - ALISTAIR COCKBURN
“Agile has become overly decorated. Let’s scrape away those
decorations for a minute, and get back to the centre of agile.
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13. AGILE IS DEAD - DAVE THOMAS
“Long Live Agility”
What to do:
1. Find out where you are
2. Take a small step towards your goal
3. Adjust your understanding based on what you learned
4. Repeat
How to do it:
When faced with two or more alternatives that deliver
roughly the same value, take the path that makes future
change easier.
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14. 14
PRINCIPLE 10 -
ANTI-PATTERNS
How did we get into this state in the first place?

15. BEYOND FEATURES - DAN NORTH
We have based our model of software engineering on civil engineering
When we consume Civil Engineering -
• Bigger is better, more is better (more features)
• We front load our risks to avoid surprises (not enough bricks)
When we consume surgery
• We want the minimum possible amount (nobody wants more surgery)
• But we don’t want to front load our risk to avoid surprises (more surgery)
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16. MODERN TAYLORISM
“We will win, and you will lose. You cannot do
anything about it because your failure is an internal
disease. Your companies are based on Taylor’s
principles. Worse, your heads are Taylorized, too.”
1986, Konosuke Matsushita the founder of Panasonic
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17. THE NEW FRANKENSTEIN
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18. IN PRACTICE….
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19. PRINCIPLE 10 + SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Write Less Code
Principle 10 Opportunity:

20. PRINCIPLE 10 + SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Use a DevOps model - You build it, you run it
Principle 10 opportunity

21. Minimise the time between comprehension and completion
PRINCIPLE 10 + SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Principle 10 Opportunity

22. PRINCIPLE 10 + SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Use Technical Debt to your advantage
Principle 10 Opportunity

23. Combine the paradigm of TDD with the customer focus of BDD
PRINCIPLE 10 + SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Principle 10 Opportunity

24. Use Product Teams not Project Teams
PRINCIPLE 10 - BEYOND SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Principle 10 Opportunity

25. Lean Governance
PRINCIPLE 10 - BEYOND SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Principle 10 Opportunity

26. Use Continuous Feedback
PRINCIPLE 10 BEYOND SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Principle 10 Opportunity

27. Track Failure Demand
PRINCIPLE 10 - BEYOND SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT
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Principle 10 Opportunity

28. “Maximize the outcome and minimize the output.”
Jeff Patten
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