"Delivering a Win-Win-Win Workforce with Agile Programming Methods"

Ron Lichty
Co-Chair, Emerging Technology SIG
SVForum
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What are the wins in your mission to "enable students to meet ICT workforce needs"?
-Students in demand in the workplace
-Workplaces meeting their most difficult to fill needs
-Your ICT programs lauded

The answer: teach Agile methods

Workplace adoption of Agile has expanded much more rapidly than the workforce has transitioned. Students with Agile are dramatically more hirable. Industry would be enormously grateful. Your programs would change quality and productivity across our region.

Win-Win-Win.

Experienced programmers will always have advantage over new grads. Experience counts. But there are too few programmers with Agile-methods experience. And retooling programmers to adopt Agile practices like Test Driven Development and Pair Programming is tough.

We seek out coders who were hands-on with:
-pairing
-TDD
-sprints
-emergent design
-retrospecting

These skills are hard to teach experienced developers.

As a hiring manager in increasingly Agile organizations, I comb resumes for even hints of understanding of best practices like these. Candidates at any level who are able to list these kinds of skills on their resumes get attention. College is the place to teach these practices, before counterproductive habits are "set" and become difficult to retool. More hirable students. Grateful industry. Programs that change quality and productivity across our region.