Agile development in the old economy

As part of the delivery an automated hub for a postal operator, the Solystic company has to build a complex and feature rich information system that supports a highly automated process with multiple intricate sub-processes and exceptions. The effort has several challenges: 1) it is business critical for the customer, and the output of the project will give the customer a leading position; 2) it is the first time Solystic is managing a complete system project, although its mother company Northrop Grumman had previous experience of this business; 3) the program is one of the first business of the Solystic company in the international field; 4) it is a fixed price, fixed time contract with a short time frame. To face all these challenges, the software development group in charge of the information system has adopted a number of agile practices and techniques to manage the project. The major project settings are adapted from Alistair Cockburn´s crystal set of methodologies, SCRUM and Jim Coplien´s work on organizational patterns. We present the findings and lessons learned by the team and its manager.