In my day job, I am a project manager/producer type. That means that spreadsheets and schedules are a large part of how I spend my day.
When I decided it was time to get it in gear and start working on Petra’s Call, between making the comic, setting up the website and learning all of the Flash, I realized I had A LOT of work to do.
Being the project management nerd that I am, I adapted my favorite agile project management system, Scrum, to a solo operation.
I broke all of the things I needed to do into small steps and estimated how many hours it would take to do each one. Then I prioritized everything that needed to be done and set up a series of 2 week ‘Sprints’ to get everything ready for launch.
Every day, I update the doc with what I’ve done, and if something is taking longer than expected, I update the hours on the doc. If something new comes up, unless it’s an absolute EMERGENCY, I add it to the ‘backlog’ of work that is remaining and keep focusing on my 2 week Sprint.
For me, it works wonders. It gives me a place to throw ideas for new features in the browser/website, let’s me break all of the different things that I need to do into individual steps and makes sure that I stay focused.
If you want to check out the how I do it (with a clear look at some of my future plans for NRD/Petra’s Call), I have made the doc public.
If you have any questions, comments etc on the process, please ask away! it works great for me and I’m sure it’ll help other people overcome chronic procrastination.
Comments from old forum:
Petras Call: Petra’s Call + Google Docs = 1 man agile development
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shaneneville Jul 10th 2009 edited edit delete discussion
Discuss on the Petra’s Call + Google Docs = 1 man agile development
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4est Jul 10th 2009 edited edit delete
Discussion? Gimme something to discuss! Actually scratch that comment. I’m an idiot.
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shaniber Jul 15th 2009 edit delete
I should like to see your scrum document. we’re using it here to do our fancy schmancy little iPhone app, -and- using google docs for taskboard and backlog. I’d like to compare your methodology with ours.
(look at us, talking about grownup things!)
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shaniber Jul 15th 2009 edit delete
(also the link to the doc returns a not found error…)
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shaneneville Jul 15th 2009 edit delete
dude – I’ll talk Scrum anytime anywhere. Let me know when a good time to talk is.
And the link is fixed – I changed the publishing options, which removed an ‘l’ from the end of the link.
Gotta love me some google docs though.
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shaniber Jul 16th 2009 edit delete
this is pretty nifty, and I think I’m getting most of it… you’re integrating your task board with your backlog?
yeah, we’ve gotta find time to sit down and talk about this… scrum is wicked cool, but we’re still trying to come up with a good way of doing it.
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shaneneville Jul 16th 2009 edit delete
yeah – for me the task board and backlog are one – since it’s a one man deal. The only exception is the episodes, where I keep them bulked into a 12-16 hour task and break down the steps when I start the sprint.
On our projects at work, we keep a separate backlog, and when we start the sprint, we break down the tasks into a task board. Much more formal.
we’re total scrum nerds.
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HairyMonster2 Jul 18th 2009 edit delete
Shane, can you please update this. Where’s the record on Episodes 2 or 3? Do you think you could have this done by Tuesday? 😉
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shaneneville Jul 18th 2009 edit delete
ah, scrum sarcasm.
Old stuff in in the ‘done’ area at the top – which is hidden. You just gotta click on the little arrows in the column and it’ll reveal everything that’s been done to date.
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HairyMonster2 Jul 18th 2009 edit delete
Yeah, I was just kidding around and drunk. Have you thought of fleshing out the user stories to include descriptions as to what is highlighted in each episode. Also, a comment section for internal notes about the process, things you learned, brainstorming, inspiration, ideas etc. You know, leave some brain droppings that you can have quick access to in order to help the overall process in general. Just a thought….good stuff.
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shaneneville Jul 18th 2009 edit delete
I have the outline together on index cards (old school!), which lets me take them everywhere and work out the larger pacing. I also bring my trusty Moleskine everywhere as well, so between those two, most of my notes are covered. And since it’s just me, I’m not really using User Stories – I know what the work is and what the deliverable is, so I just break it down into hours with a quick description of the feature/task.
I’m going to be doing ‘commentary’ posts with each episode that will focus on the lessons/process I learned in doing that episode. The first few are going to be ‘broad stroke’ interface/format themed and then getting into the nitty gritty as it goes forward. I’m also going to be doing blog posts about the inspirations (there are WAY too many) for Petra’s Call and NRD in general.
What else do you want to see?
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HairyMonster2 Jul 19th 2009 edit delete
A monkey riding a seal.
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shaneneville Jul 20th 2009 edit delete
I’ll see if I can work it in.