Essential Kanban Condensed - David J. Anderson and Andy Carmichael

Kanban is a method of organizing and managing professional services work.
It uses Lean concepts such as limiting work in progress to improve results. A Kanban system is a means of balancing the demand for work to be done with the available capacity to start new work. 
This book provides a distillation of Kanban: the "essence" of what it is and how it can be used. 
This brief overview introduces all the principal concepts and guidelines in Kanban and points you to where you can find out more. 
Essential Kanban Condensed is a great resource to get started or continue exploring ideas for evolutionary change and improvement in business agility.

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com  ] 


Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 3.95 out of 5 (21  Ratings; 4 Reviews - As on April 10 2017)
My Rating:  4 out of 5
My Comments:  A very precise summary of The Kanban Method that serves as a great introduction to the topic and provides guidance for further study. 
Probably the first book one should read about The Kanban Method.  

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Kanban: Successful Evolutionary Change for Your Technology Business by David J. Anderson

Kanban is becoming a popular way to visualize and limit work-in-progress in software development and information technology work. 
Teams around the world are adding kanban around their existing processes to catalyze cultural change and deliver better business agility. This book answers the questions: 
What is Kanban? 
Why would I want to use Kanban? 
How do I go about implementing Kanban? 
How do I recognize improvement opportunities and what should I do about them? 
The author David J. Anderson pioneered the kanban technique with Microsoft in 2004 and has been refining the approach ever since.
This book gives his insights into this new, evolutionary approach to change management.
The Kanban Method will improve your organization's maturity and agility with minimum resistance to change.

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com  ] 


Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 3.96 out of 5 (1739  Ratings; 80 Reviews - As on April 9 2017)
My Rating:  4 out of 5
My Comments:  The official and comprehensive introduction to the Kanban Method. Well written with convincing enough arguments to try out Kanban. 

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Kanban and Scrum - Making the Most of Both by Henrik Kniberg and Mattias Skarin

Scrum and Kanban are two flavors of Agile software development - two deceptively simple but surprisingly powerful approaches to software development. 
So how do they relate to each other?
The purpose of this book is to clear up the fog, so you can figure out how Kanban and Scrum might be useful in your environment.
Part I illustrates the similarities and differences between Kanban and Scrum, comparing for understanding, not for judgement. 
There is no such thing as a good or bad tool - just good or bad decisions about when and how to use which tool.
Part II is a case study illustrating how a Scrum-based development organization implemented Kanban in their operations and support teams.
Consistent with the style of "Scrum and XP from the Trenches", this book strikes a conversational tone and is bursting with practical examples and pictures.
This book includes:

• Kanban and Scrum in a nutshell
• Comparison of Kanban and Scrum and other Agile methods
• Practical examples and pitfalls
• Cartoons and diagrams illustrating day-to-day work
• Detailed case study of a Kanban implementation within a Scrum organization

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com  ] 


Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 3.94 out of 5 (448 Ratings; 46 Reviews - As on April 7 2017)
My Rating:  4 out of 5
My Comments:  A very concise and too-the-point book that brings out the similarities and differences between Scrum and Kanban approaches clearly. The conversational style writing  supported by illustrations and cartoons makes it a very light weight and interesting reading. It also has a  well described case study drawn from real-life experience of the authors. Highly recommend this  book to get a super-quick introduction to how Scrum and Kanban can work together.
 
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101 Design Ingredients to Solve Big Tech Problems by Eewei Chen

One page, one ingredient. 101 reasons to become more successful at solving those big technology problems. 
101 Design Ingredients will help your technology team identify problems, share responsibilities, and work better together.

In parts 1 through 4, you'll find 101 problem-solving ingredients grouped into project stages, to help you apply the right ingredient at the right time. 
Start at any point and page through the humorously illustrated ingredients until you find one that matches your needs best. 
The ingredients cover the spectrum your business needs to be successful, with tips on team-building, creating a business model, product launch, productivity, and much more. 
Each ingredient includes three practical suggestions to get you started right away.

In part 5, you'll see examples of how companies can blend some of the ingredients used in this book to solve specific business requirements for investment, innovation, leadership, and more. Each recipe shows how a company fine-tuned six of the ingredients to build their own unique solution. 
You'll learn how to mix and match ingredients to create your own recipes for success, tailored to your company's needs.

The ingredients and recipes in this book can be applied by beginners starting out on their first technology project, as well as seasoned professionals who have been tackling the same big problems for years and need a fresh new approach to problem solving.

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com ] 


Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 3.03 out of 5 (30 Ratings; 5 Reviews - As on December 25 2016)
My Rating:  3 out of 5
My Comments: Has got nice cartoons and lots of links which may be of interest. Content wise just OK.


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Scrum Insights for Practitioners - Hiren Doshi

The Scrum Guide Companion 

Hiren Doshi, Scrum.org Professional Scrum Trainer & Coach in his book, Scrum Insights for Practitioners: The Scrum Guide Companion helps the practitioners master the Scrum framework by gaining in-depth practical insights and helps answer questions like: 

• What are some common myths, mysteries, and misconceptions of Scrum?
• The Scrum Guide recommends three to nine members in a Development Team, but we have fifteen members. Is this Scrum?
• Can you share some tactics to do effective Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, Sprint Retrospective, and Product Backlog Refinement?
• My designation is development manager. Does this mean I have no role in Scrum?
• How is Scrum Empirical?
• Can Scrum Master and Product Owner be the same person?
• We don’t have a Scrum Master. Are we still practicing Scrum?
• What does Self-Organization really mean?
• How does Scrum embrace the four values and twelve principles of the Agile Manifesto?
• Please share a case study on Scrum based product development?

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com ] 


Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 4 out of 5 (1 Rating; 0 Reviews - As on December 10 2016)
My Rating:  3.5 out of 5
My Comments: This book will help you understand the nuances of Scrum.
It takes a very practical approach towards implementing Scrum without compromising on its values and principles.
Perhaps the first book on Scrum that newbies should read after going through the official Scrum Guide.
A useful and handy reference for Scrum practitioners!


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Agile Game Development with Scrum - Clinton Keith

Deliver Better Games Faster, On Budget—And Make Game Development Fun Again!

Game development is in crisis—facing bloated budgets, impossible schedules, unmanageable complexity, and death march overtime. 

It’s no wonder so many development studios are struggling to survive. Fortunately, there is a solution. 

Scrum and Agile methods are already revolutionizing development outside the game industry. 

Now, long-time game developer Clinton Keith shows exactly how to successfully apply these methods to the unique challenges of game development.

Keith has spent more than fifteen years developing games, seven of them with Scrum and agile methods. 

Drawing on this unparalleled expertise, he shows how teams can use Scrum to deliver games more efficiently, rapidly, and cost-effectively; craft games that offer more entertainment value; and make life more fulfilling for development teams at the same time.

You’ll learn to form successful agile teams that incorporate programmers, producers, artists, testers, and designers—and promote effective collaboration within and beyond those teams, throughout the entire process. 

From long-range planning to progress tracking and continuous integration, Keith offers dozens of tips, tricks, and solutions—all based firmly in reality and hard-won experience.

Coverage includes

• Understanding Scrum’s goals, roles, and practices in the context of game development
• Communicating and planning your game’s vision, features, and progress
• Using iterative techniques to put your game into a playable state every two to four weeks— even daily
• Helping all team participants succeed in their roles
• Restoring stability and predictability to the development process
• Managing ambiguous requirements in a fluid marketplace
• Scaling Scrum to large, geographically distributed development teams
• Getting started: overcoming inertia and integrating Scrum into your studio’s current processes

Increasingly, game developers and managers are recognizing that things can’t go on the way they have in the past. 

Game development organizations need a far better way to work.  

Agile Game Development with Scrum gives them that—and brings the profitability, creativity, and fun back to game development.

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com ]

Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 3.99 out of 5 (85 Ratings; 5 Reviews)

My Rating:  3 out of 5. Well written. Seems to provide quite useful and practical guidance for teams working in Game development projects. 
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Adaptive Leadership - Jim Highsmith

Accelerating Enterprise Agility

The agile software movement has now been around for a full decade. 

As coauthor of the original Agile Manifesto, Jim Highsmith has been at its heart since the beginning. 

He’s spent the past decade helping hundreds of organizations transition to agile/lean. 

When it comes to agile, he’s seen it all–in a variety of industries, worldwide.

Now, in Adaptive Leadership , he has compiled, updated, and extended his best writings about agile and lean methods for a management audience. Highsmith doesn’t just reveal what’s working and what isn’t; he offers a powerful new vision for extending agility across the enterprise.

Drawing on what’s been learned in application development, this guide shows how to use adaptive leadership techniques to transform the way you deliver complete solutions, whatever form they take. 

You’ll learn how enterprise agility can enable the ambitious organizational missions that matter most; how leaders can deliver a continuous stream of value; how to think disruptively about opportunities, and how to respond quickly by creating more adaptive, innovative organizations.

Coverage includes

• Discovering and executing new business opportunities far more quickly
• Delivering complete business solutions earlier, and iterating them more often
• Organizing for innovation, and systematically managing opportunity flow
• Clarifying the degree of strategic, portfolio, and operational agility you need, and focusing on your highest-value transformations
• Creating cultures that actually can adapt and learn
• Reinvigorating the roots of agile value and values
• Understanding IT’s changing value proposition, and retraining your people accordingly
• Integrating economics, products, and social responsibility
• Choosing metrics that guide agility, not counterproductive traditional metrics
• Understanding the financial implications of technical debt
• Optimizing business value by doing less–and guiding the process with ”NOT to do“ lists
• Speculating intelligently when you can’t plan away uncertainty
• Customizing management to each project’s needs (because not all projects should be equally agile)

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com ] 

Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 3.74 out of 5 (19 Ratings, 3 Reviews)

My Rating:  3 out of 5.  

Buying Options 
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Management 3.0 by Jurgen Appelo

Leading Agile Developers, Developing Agile Leaders

In many organizations, management is the biggest obstacle to successful Agile development. 

Unfortunately, reliable guidance on Agile management has been scarce indeed. Now, leading Agile manager Jurgen Appelo fills that gap, introducing a realistic approach to leading, managing, and growing your Agile team or organization.

Writing for current managers and developers moving into management, Appelo shares insights that are grounded in modern complex systems theory, reflecting the intense complexity of modern software development. 

 Appelo’s Management 3.0 model recognizes that today’s organizations are living, networked systems; and that management is primarily about people and relationships.

 Management 3.0 doesn’t offer mere checklists or prescriptions to follow slavishly; rather, it deepens your understanding of how organizations and Agile teams work and gives you tools to solve your own problems. 

Drawing on his extensive experience as an Agile manager, the author identifies the most important practices of Agile management and helps you improve each of them.

Coverage includes

 • Getting beyond “Management 1.0” control and “Management 2.0” fads

• Understanding how complexity affects your organization

• Keeping your people active, creative, innovative, and motivated

• Giving teams the care and authority they need to grow on their own

• Defining boundaries so teams can succeed in alignment with business goals

• Sowing the seeds for a culture of software craftsmanship

• Crafting an organizational network that promotes success

• Implementing continuous improvement that actually works

Thoroughly pragmatic–and never trendy–Jurgen Appelo’s Management 3.0 helps you bring greater agility to any software organization, team, or project.

[Book Description Source: www.amazon.com ] 

Ratings
Goodreads Rating - 4.12 out of 5 (771 Ratings, 61 Reviews)

My Rating:  4 out of 5.  

Buying Options 
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(Anybody can read Kindle books—even without a Kindle device—with the FREE Kindle app for smartphones and tablets.)