Lean Startup Tools


This page is deprecated, it has not been updated since March of 2010, we need a new approach --Sean Murphy

 

With respect, I think there is a better, table-based approach.  I will try to start one here:

 

See http://groups.google.com/group/lean-startup-circle/browse_thread/thread/96b1f28443d78b8a?hl=en 

 

Net Promoter Score popup code: http://petewarden.typepad.com/searchbrowser/2009/08/net-promoter-score-nps-example-code.html

 

There seem to be other pages with lists of tools already in this wiki.  Please add links to them here to make them easier to find:

 

 

 

Hi all, 

Has anyone had good luck with Agile software for product management, 
specifically software that would work in a lean environment?  I've 
tried a physical scrum board in the past, but never quite got it off 
the ground.  If so, I'd love to hear about your suggestions and 
experiences. 

Thanks! 
Tracy 

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gilad  
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 More options Aug 17, 5:56 pm
I recently stumbled upon http://www.agilezen.com/ but have not tried 

it 

I also used  https://www.acunote.com/ in the past , and liked it very 

much 

but at the end I find (if your team is all in one place) a physical 

board to be the best. 

On Aug 17, 5:34 pm, Tracy Frey <tracypf...@gmail.com> wrote: 

 

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Yosem Sweet  
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 More options Aug 17, 5:57 pm
Pivotal Tracker is pretty amazing as a kanban board. Agile Zen shows   

some promise as well. Neither of them are all that great at doing   

product roadmapping for a huge product family, but then doing so seems   

a little less than lean ;) 

Cheers, 

On 17-Aug-09, at 5:34 PM, Tracy Frey wrote: 

 

> Hi all, 

> Has anyone had good luck with Agile software for product management, 

> specifically software that would work in a lean environment?  I've 

> tried a physical scrum board in the past, but never quite got it off 

> the ground.  If so, I'd love to hear about your suggestions and 

> experiences. 

> Thanks! 

> Tracy 

 

Yosem Sweet 

Director of Product Development 

yosem.sw...@suite101.com 

Suite101.com Media Inc. 

350-1122 Mainland Street 

Vancouver, BC, V6B 5L1, Canada 

phone: 604 682-1400 x 203 

www.suite101.com 

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William Pietri  
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 More options Aug 17, 6:03 pm

 

Tracy Frey wrote: 

> Hi all, 

> Has anyone had good luck with Agile software for product management, 

> specifically software that would work in a lean environment?  I've 

> tried a physical scrum board in the past, but never quite got it off 

> the ground.  If so, I'd love to hear about your suggestions and 

> experiences. 

 

Hi, Tracy. I've tried it both ways, and I strongly encourage teams to 

get a physical board working well for them before they consider moving 

to software. 

Here's an example board that you may find helpful: 

    http://www.scissor.com/resources/teamroom/ 

Bill Wake also has a nice gallery of team rooms and charts: 

    http://xp123.com/xplor/room-gallery/index.shtml 

If you're absolutely dead set on using software, then I'd check out 

Pivotal Tracker: 

    http://www.pivotaltracker.com/ 

It's pretty opinionated, but in this case I think that's good. 

Still, consider taking another swing at using card. Appealing as 

software seems, every product management tool I've tried reduces 

feedback, increases communication cost, and distorts behavior in ways 

that make it harder for teams to learn Agile techniques. The best teams 

I coach all use physical boards. 

William 

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Eric Ries  
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 More options Aug 17, 6:20 pm
I also recommend Corey Ladas' Scrumban (Scrum + Kanban) for a very 

detailed account of how to use index cards for WIP constraints: 

http://leansoftwareengineering.com/ksse/scrum-ban/ 

 

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Mosses Akizian  
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 More options Aug 17, 6:22 pm
How secure are software based product management tools? I just signed-up 

to Pivotal Tracker, but would like to know if my information is safe 

from prying eyes. 

 

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Chandika  
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 More options Aug 17, 8:39 pm
We used ThoughtWorks Mingle for early product planning. Particularly 

good for its tree structure for Stories that you can drill down into. 

Later on engineering had trouble keeping up with Mingle's overhead 

therefore we switched to Pivotal Tracker. Pretty happy so far. Only 

thing we miss is the birds eye view of high level product goals 

though. 

On Aug 18, 6:22 am, Mosses Akizian <mess...@monocat.com> wrote: 

 

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Mark Mansour  
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 More options Aug 17, 7:24 pm
I'd try Agile Bench (warning: I'm the founder and increadbily biased, 

but it really is pretty good - promise!). 

http://agilebench.com/home2 - we are cloaked at the moment, but this 

will get you past the initial holding screen. 

We do all the normal stuff like: 

* iteration burndown and project velocity charts 

* managing stories, iterations, projects and backlogs 

* multi user 

* backlog. 

You can use it free for 3 people and 200 stories, which should be 

enough to see if you like it. 

But we are focusing on information that will make your project succeed 

rather than adding more and more fields. 

We opening up the kimono later this week but I think it is good enough 

for you guys to play with, being start up type people :) 

Mark 

-- 

Mark Mansour 

m...@agilebench.com 

On Aug 18, 11:22 am, Mosses Akizian <mess...@monocat.com> wrote: 

 

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David J Bland  
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 More options Aug 18, 8:18 am

My suggestions: 

*RallySoftware:* http://www.rallydev.com/ 

*VersionOne*: http://versionone.com/ 

** 

I'm currently using Rally to run a series of Distributed Teams, and I've 

used VersionOne in the past with success in the Financial Services Startup 

Sector: 

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Finetre+Recognized+as+Award+Winner+by+I... 

V1 also just baked in a Kanban board, yummy. 

In my opinion they are the 2 strongest products on the market today. 

 

 

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-- 

David J Bland 

http://www.7thpixel.net 

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Tracy Frey  
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 More options Aug 18, 9:12 am
Thanks, all!  I really appreciate the suggestions.  I'll let you know 

how it goes. 

Tracy 

On Aug 18, 8:18 am, David J Bland <Da...@7thpixel.net> wrote: 

 

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