How self-assignment of tasks is practiced by Agile Practitioners?

Zainab Masood's picture
Zainab Masood asked on January 23, 2017 - 3:23pm | Replies (10).

Is self-assignment a purely self-directed practice or is a mix of self-directed with assistance from others?Assistance here could be from other team members or Product Owner/Manager/Team Lead/Client/Customer?

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10 Answers

Johanna Rothman's picture

The team decides, as a team, how they will manage the work. I like it when the team works together on stories, pairing, swarming, or mobbing. Why not work together? Working together moves stories across the board faster. 

If the team members really want to work along, the person who is ready to take more work does this:

  1. Walk up to the board. 
  2. Look at what's on the top of the ready column.
  3. Take that card and move it to in progress (or whatever the first column is) and starts to work on it.

Why would anyone else need to "assist" someone in taking work? 

Anonymous's picture
Anonymous replied on March 15, 2017 - 8:44am.

Look at that article published by wed and mobile development company 

<a href="/%3Ca%20href%3D"https://www.cleveroad.com/blog/what-is-agile-methodology--the-easiest-explanation-with-real-life-solutions" rel="nofollow">https://www.cleveroad.com/blog/what-is-agile-methodology--the-easiest-ex...">What is Agile methodology, the easiest explanation with real life solutions</a>

I think you could find all answers there.

Robert Gilles's picture

The best decision is to work with a team together. In the end, it's a common project and everyone is responsible for it. And it's always better when all the team members are involved in the planning process. Here's a link to a blog post about the most popular development methodologies, their pros and cons.

Adam Walder's picture

I use this to improve the supply chain risk management https://innovecs.com/blog/supply-chain-risk-management/. The essence of the concept of agile supply chains is to increase the level of service by increasing the speed of reaction to customer orders and flexibility regarding the product program by introducing a certain redundancy (high inventory levels, building new distribution centers near customers, etc.) in the chain supplies to account for uncertainty.

Dewi Clements's picture

We mostly use the self-directed method of task allocation while working on crowdfunding for real estate development. Despite all the benefits it promises, agile software teams do not practice it as regularly as other agile practices such as iteration planning and daily stand-ups, indicating that it is likely not an easy and straightforward practice.

Dewi Clements's picture

By the way, I would recommend you to read the book  "Foundations of Agile Python Development" by Jeff Younker. It is the first book to apply sought-after Agile development principles to the language of python development services. Discusses Python in the context of other popular technologies such as Eclipse and Subversion. Authored by Jeff Younker a well-known member of Python's agile community who is perhaps best known for his creation of a popular Python testing framework

Danil Karetin's picture

Collaborative work is much more productive, so although in some moments you need people to work separately, but the overall objectives of the firm should be created together.

Alfred Pierson's picture

Working together has a couple of drawbacks in the form of task distribution and the issue of responsibility. 

Stella Barnes's picture

Agile practitioners embrace self-assignment to promote flexibility, collaboration, and team autonomy. 

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