Exploring Our Love-Hate Relationship with Metrics
Businesses rely on data to make decisions, and metrics allow them to roll up data into bite-sized morsels for managerial consumption. But while metrics can help leaders make good business decisions, sometimes the numbers are “massaged” in a way that doesn’t realistically portray what’s happening. Ultimately, there’s validity on both sides of the debate: Sometimes metrics imply something totally different from reality, but other times, they provide valuable insights that can guide efforts with better questions and decisions about how projects or teams should proceed. Shaun Bradshaw—aka the Minister of Metrics—will discuss various aspects of metrics, particularly how they relate to product quality. We'll explore the dysfunctions arising from “objective” metrics, as well as what makes metrics useful and how they can be used for good. You’ll walk away with a better sense of how to use metrics in a way that minimizes potential dysfunctions and truly reaps the benefits of the data available.
Shaun Bradshaw is a cofounder and principal of Zenergy Technologies, a software delivery solutions firm with multiple industry experts under one roof and a large testing facility in North Carolina. With more than twenty years in the IT industry, Shaun is a recognized expert, coach, and thought leader in QA and test process improvement, agile testing, test management, and metrics. Shaun has architected the test strategy and managed large teams of testers for numerous projects, including a multi-year ERP implementation that went into production with no major issues. More recently, Shaun has spent a majority of his consulting time assisting organizations through their agile transformations, coaching leaders, managers, and teams to ensure they make the shift not just into agile practices, but agile thinking and behaviors.