| Agile Certified Practitioner | ACP |
| A method used to communicate with business customers, developers, and testers before coding begins. | Acceptance Test Driven Development |
| To focus on what is said and provide feedback to communicate understanding | Active Listening |
| A leadership style that helps teams to thrive and overcome challenges throughout a project. | Adaptive Leadership |
| A method used to quickly place user stories into a comparable-sized group. | Affinity Estimation |
| To develop a goal through periodic experimentation in order to fulfill the need of a complex decision. | Agile |
| To adapt the project plan continuously through retrospectives in order to maximize value creation during the planning process. | Agile Adaption |
| To help achieve goals that is either personal or organizational. | Agile Coaching |
| To use the empirical process, observation, and spike introduction while executing a project to influence planning. | Agile Experimentation |
| A statement that reflects Agile Philosophy that includes: individuals and interactions over processes and tools, working software over comprehensive documentation, customer collaboration over contract negotiation, and responding to changes over following a plan. | Agile Manifesto |
| A document that describes the twelve principles of the Agile Manifesto. | Agile Manifesto Principles |
| To satisfy customers through early and continuous delivery of products, to test and receive feedback, to inform customers on progress, and to fulfill the customer’s value by completing priority requirements. | Agile Manifesto: Customer Satisfaction |
| To have individuals work together daily on a project to implement osmotic communication, focus, and receive instant feedback to achieve a common goal. | Agile Manifesto: Collocated Team |
| To help team members establish a healthy work-life balance, remain productive, and respond to changes swiftly for progress during a project. | Agile Manifesto: Constant Pace |
| To enhance agility and time spent on work requirements in order to retain a well-balanced work environment. | Agile Manifesto: Continuous Attention |
| To deliver software frequently to the customer, allowing for a quicker product release, faster provision of value to the customer and shorter delivery timeframe. | Agile Manifesto: Frequent Delivery |
| To give individuals the empowerment, environment, support, and trust needed to complete a task successfully. | Agile Manifesto: Motivated Individuals |
| This allows a team to learn how to become more effective, what changes need immediate implementation, and behavior that needs adjustment. | Agile Manifesto: Regular Reflection |
| A team that knows how to complete tasks effectively, has dedication to the project, and is expert on the process and project. | Agile Manifesto: Self-Organization |
| Allows team members to focus on what is necessary to achieve the requirements needed to create and deliver value to the project and customer. | Agile Manifesto: Simplicity |
| To allow quick responses to changes in the external environment, and late in development to maximize the customer’s competitive advantage. | Agile Manifesto: Welcome Changes |
| Working software enables the measurement of progress, enhance customer satisfaction, and maintain and improve the quality of the software to help support project goals. | Agile Manifesto: Working Software |
| To pass on and teach based on experience, knowledge, and skills to other individuals in the team or that work for the organization. | Agile Mentoring |
| The most efficient and effective way to communicate in order to receive direct feedback and influence osmotic communication. | Agile Manifesto: Face-to-Face Conversation |
| A way to complete a goal effectively and efficiently. Examples of Agile Methodologies include XP, Scrum, and Lean. | Agile Methodologies |
| A workflow depiction of a process or system a team can review before it is turned into code. Stakeholders should understand the model. | Agile Modeling |
| The most important aspect of the Agile project. Planning happens at multiple levels such as strategic, release, iteration, and daily. Planning must happen up-front and can change throughout the project. | Agile Planning |
| To make use of the Agile principles through activities. | Agile Practices |
| A project that occurs based on the Agile Manifesto and Agile Principles. | Agile Projects |
| Symptoms of problems that affect Agile teams and projects. | Agile Smells |
| A space that allows team members to establish collaboration, communication, transparency, and visibility. | Agile Space |
| Themes used to help the team focus on the functions of iteration. | Agile Themes |
| To increase team morale with software or artifacts. | Agile Tooling |
| To develop possible solutions by studying the problem and its underlying need and to understand the information provided. | Analysis |
| After the deadline of iteration is reached, the team and stakeholders conduct a meeting for approval. Stakeholders approve the iteration if the backlog used supports the product increment. | Approved Iterations |
| Spikes that relate to any area of a system, technology, or application domain that is unknown. | Architectural Spikes |
| A process or work output Ex. Document, Code | Artifact |
| Exhibits continuous adaptation to the project and its processes with characteristics that include: mission focused, feature based, iterative, time-boxed, risk driven, and change tolerant. | ASD |
| These tools allow for efficient and strong testing. Examples: Peer Reviews, Periodical Code-Reviews, Refactoring, Unit Tests, Automatic and Manual Testing. | Automated Testing Tools |
| To work in a responsive way to deliver the products or services a customer needs and when they want the products or services. | Being Agile |
| An effective and efficient way of gathering ideas within a short period of time from a group. | Brainstorming |
| The rate of resources consumed by the team; also cost per iteration. | Burn Rate |
| A chart used to display progress during and at the end of iteration. “Burning down” means the backlog will lessen throughout the iteration. | Burn-Down Chart |
| A chart that displays completed functionality. Progress will trend upwards, as stories are completed. Only shows complete functions, it is not accurate at predicting or showing work-in-progress. | Burn-Up Chart |
| An acronym to measure the goals and mission of the project with each letter meaning: Criticality, Accessibility, Return, Vulnerability, Effect, and Recognizeability. | CARVER |
| A meeting conducted during an Agile project that consists of daily stand-up, iteration planning, iteration review, and iteration retrospective. | Ceremony |
| To change requirements that increase value to the customer. | Change |
| A document created during initiation that formally begins the project. The document includes the project’s justification, a summary level budget, major milestones, critical success factors, constraints, assumptions, and authorization to do it. | Charter |
| An individual involved but not committed to an Agile project. | Chicken |
| A team role that keeps the team focused on learning and the process. | Coach |
| A method of cooperation among individuals to achieve a common goal. | Collaboration |
| The entire team together is responsible for 100% of the code. | Collective Code Ownership |
| The entire team is physically present, working in one room. | Collocation |
| Decisions created by higher up individuals in the organization and handed over to the team. | Command & Control |
| An issue solved through trend analysis because the issue is systematic. | Common Cause |
| To share smooth and transparent information of needs. | Communication |
| To meet regulations, rules, and standards. | Compliance |
| An environment for the team that is free of distractions and interruptions. | Cone of Silence |
| Disagreements in certain areas between individuals. | Conflict |
| An agreement made after a conflict. | Conflict Resolution |
| To ensure that self-assessment and process improvement occurs frequently to improve the product. | Continuous Improvement |
| To consistently examine a team member’s work. To build, and test the entire system. | Continuous Integration |
| To organize work with the goal of higher productivity and teamwork. | Coordination |
| To measure the cost spent on a project and its efficiency. Earned Value / Actual Cost = CPI | Cost Performance Index (CPI) |
| Teams that consist of members who can complete various functions to achieve a common goal. Team members are able to do more than one role in a project. | Cross-Functional Team |
| An adaptable approach that focuses on interaction between people and processes that consists of families that vary based on team size, system criticality, and project priorities. | Crystal Family |
| A chart that displays feature backlog, work-in-progress, and completed features. | Cumulative Flow Diagram |
| The end-user who determines and emphasizes business values. | Customer |
| To deliver the maximum customer value early in order to win customer loyalty and support. | Customer-Valued Prioritization |
| The time needed to complete a feature (user story). | Cycle Time |
| A brief meeting where the team shares the previous day’s achievements, plans to make achievements, obstacles, and how to overcome the obstacles. | Daily Stand Up |
| To postpone decisions to determine possibilities and make the decision when the most amount of knowledge is available. | Decide As Late As Possible |
| The qualities of a product backlog which include: detailed, estimate-able, emergent, and prioritized. | DEEP |
| A tangible or intangible object delivered to the customer. Ex. Document, Pamphlet, Report | Deliverables |
| To separate epics or large stories into smaller stories. | Disaggregation |
| The lack of satisfaction among workers such as, work conditions, salary, and management-employee relationships. Factors known as demotivators. | Dissatisfaction |
| To reach a deal through tactics so both parties receive the highest amount of value possible. | Distributive Negotiation |
| When work is complete, and meets the following criteria: complies, runs without errors, and passes predefined acceptance and regression tests. | Done |
| A system of voting where people receive a certain number of dots to vote on the options provided. | Dot Voting |
| A model that provides a comprehensive foundation for planning, managing, executing, and scaling agile and iterative software development projects based on nine principles that involve business needs/value, active user involvement, empowered teams, frequent delivery, integrated testing, and stakeholder collaboration. | Dynamic Systems Development Model (DSDM) |
| Earned Value Management, works well at iteration. It is a method to measure and communicate progress and trends at the current stage of the project. | Earned Value Management (EVM) |
| Stories that grow and change overtime as other stories reach completion in the backlog. | Emergent |
| An individual’s skill to lead and relate to other team members. | Emotional Intelligence |
| A large story that spans iterations, then disaggregated into smaller stories. | Epic Story |
| Defects reported after the delivery by the customer. | Escaped Defects |
| An individual chooses to behave in a particular way over other behaviors because of the expected results of the chosen behavior. | Expectancy Theory |
| To inquire how software works with the use of test subjects using the software and asking questions about the software. | Exploratory Testing |
| A team-manufactured persona that exaggerates to induce requirements a standard persona may miss. | Extreme Persona |
| A methodology in Agile with one-week iterations and paired development. | eXtreme Programming (XP) |
| A group of stories that deliver value to the customers. | Feature |
| A comprehensive model and list of features included in the system before the design work begins. | Feature-Driven Development (FDD) |
| Information or responses towards a product or project used to make improvements. | Feedback |
| A sequence of numbers used in Agile estimating, 0, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 20, 40, 100. | Fibonacci Sequence |
| Tasks must be finished in all iterations to meet the “Definition of Done” requirements as a way to track progress and allow frequent delivery. | Finish Tasks One by One |
| A root cause diagram. | Fishbone Diagram |
| The root causes analysis technique that asks WHY five times. The problem is looked into deeper each time WHY is asked. Toyota developed this technique. | Five Whys |
| Assigned tasks prioritized for completion based on an estimated number of days. Top priorities are usually completed first. | Fixed Time Box |
| To stay on task, and is facilitated by the scrum master or coach. | Focus |
| To analyze forces that encourages or resists change. | Force Field Analysis |
| An action the customer must see and experience from a system, which will add value to the customer. | Functionality |
| To clean up the product backlog by removal of items, disaggregation of items, or estimation of items. | Grooming |
| Unwritten rules decided and followed by team members. | Ground Rules |
| A theory that states factors in the workplace create satisfaction and dissatisfaction in relation to the job. | Herzberg’s Hygiene Theory |
| This team reaches maximum performance by creation of clear, detailed goals, open communication, accountability, empowerment, use of the participatory decision model, and the team consists of twelve dedicated members or less. | High Performing Team |
| Face-to-face communication that also includes non-verbal communication. | High-Bandwidth Communication |
| The amount of time needed to complete an assignment without distractions or interruptions. | Ideal Time |
| Functionality conveyed in small phases. | Incremental Delivery |
| To build upon the prior release of a goal, outcome, or product, not all requirements are met, but after all releases, the requirements will be met. | Incremental Project Releases |
| Artifacts used to help maintain transparency of a project status to team members and stakeholders. | Information Radiator |
| Information that is not transparent or useful to the team and stakeholders. | Information Refrigerator |
| Practice used to induce requirements from product, owners, users, and stakeholders. | Innovation Games |
| To reach an agreement collaboratively that creates more value for both parties by a win-win solution. | Integrative Negotiation |
| Face-to-Face communication | Interaction |
| To inspect within, during a meeting with the Agile team to review practices, usually when a problem or issue occurs. | Intraspectives |
| Poor estimation that occurs at the beginning of iteration. | Intrinsic Schedule Flaw |
| The benefits of good user stories, which include: Independent, Negotiable, Valuable, Estimate-able, Small, and Testable. | INVEST |
| Internal Rate of Return- a discount rate that makes the net present value of all cash flows from a project equal to zero. Used to determine potential profitability of project or investment. | IRR |
| Work cycle, Scrum uses 2-4 weeks, XP uses 1 week. | Iteration |
| Iteration to complete tasks before the development work occurs, for technical and architectural spikes and to gather requirements into the backlog. | Iteration 0 |
| The known features for an iteration. | Iteration Backlog |
| Iteration used to prepare the launch of software, and to test software. | Iteration H |
| A meeting used in Scrum, the team discusses ways to improve after work is completed. | Iteration Retrospective |
| Used to minimize inventory cost by materials delivered before they are required. | Just-In-Time |
| Based on Japanese management philosophy, to continue improvement through small releases. | Kaizen |
| A signal used to advance transparency of work-in-progress, a new task can begin once a previous one is complete. | Kanban |
| A chart that shows workflow stages to locate work-in-progress. | Kanban Board |
| An analysis of product development and customer satisfaction based on needs fulfilled/not fulfilled vs. satisfaction/dissatisfaction. | Kano Analysis |
| To make decisions as late as possible in order to preserve all possible options. | Last Responsible Moment |
| To eliminate waste, an Agile method derived from manufacturing. | Lean Methodology |
| This methodology focuses on the “Value Stream” to deliver value to customers. The goal is to eliminate waste by focusing on valuable features of a system and to deliver the value in small batches. Principles of Lean include: elimination of waste, amplify learning, to decide late as possible, deliver as fast as possible, empowerment of the team, to build in integrity, and to see the whole. | Lean Software Development (LSD) |
| The law that limits work-in-progress efficiently with development of an appropriate cycle time. | Little’s Law |
| This team has a lack of trust, no accountability, fear of conflict, less commitment, and less attention to details and results. | Low Performing Team |
| This theory suggests the interdependent needs (motivators) of people based on five levels in this order: Physiological, Safety & Security, Social, Esteem, and Self-Actualization. | Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs |
| To explain how a project will be completed successfully to stakeholders by use of real-world examples of systems and components. | Metaphor |
| The smallest feature of a product that provides value to the end-user. | Minimal Marketing Feature (MMF) |
| A product with only the essential features delivered to early adopters to receive feedback. | Minimal Viable Product (MVP) |
| To give fake money to business features in order to compare the relative priority of those features. | Monopoly Money |
| An analysis used to help stakeholders understand the importance of each requirement delivered. MoSCoW is the acronym for Must have, Should have, Could have, and Would like to have. | MoSCoW Analysis |
| Anything opened to discussion. | Negotiable |
| To reach an agreement between two or more parties to resolve a conflict. | Negotiation |
| Net Present Value- A value that compares the amount invested today to the present value of future cash receipts from the investment. | NPV |
| To communicate by sharing an environment. | Osmotic Communication |
| When developers work together in XP Practice | Pair Programming |
| Known as the 80/20 rule. For Agile projects, it means that 80% of all development should be spent on the top 20% of the features the customers need. | Pareto Principle |
| A storage place for ideas that distract from the main goal during a meeting. | Parking Lot |
| To have stakeholder’s involvement in decision making with techniques such as a simple vote. | Participatory Decision Models |
| A depiction of the customer of system with applicable details about usage. | Persona |
| When an employer faces the loss of a human resource through death, injury, or disability of an employee. | Personnel Loss |
| A committed individual impacted by the outcome. | Pig |
| A cause that occurs once because of special reasons. | Special Cause |
| A chart that displays risk and success with feature vs. time. | Risk Burn Down |
| A consistent iteration that lasts from one week to one month in order to measure velocity in Scrum. | Sprint |
| A curved test used to measure knowledge and understanding, but constructed so the same test-taker will perform similarly each time. | Standardized Test |
| A diagram that correlates different factors and the symptom. | Root Cause Diagram |
| A document that describes the timeline of a product release. | Release Plan |
| A document that describes what the product is, who will use the product, why the product will be used, and how the product supports the strategy of a company. | Product Vision |
| A document that explains sprint goals, tasks, and requirements and how the tasks will reach completion. | Sprint Plan |
| A geographically distributed group that does not meet physically. | Virtual Team |
| A group of individuals charged with the responsibility of delivery and value of a project. | Team |
| A group of stories, iteration, or release’s idea determined by the customer and the team agrees with the idea. | Theme |
| A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge | PMBOK Guide |
| A lightweight non-functional UI design that shows the customer the vital elements and how they will interact before coding. | Wireframe |
| A list of all user stories and features ordered by highest priority to the lowest priority. | Relative Prioritization |
| A maintainable pace of work that is intense yet steady. | Sustainability |
| A meeting that occurs after each sprint to show the product or process to stakeholders for approval and to receive feedback. | Sprint Review |
| A method that allows customers to score (total 100 points) different features of a product. | 100-Point Method |
| A model originated in Japan to describe a team with values that include self-organization, empowered to make decisions, belief in vision and success, a committed team, trust, participatory decision making, consensus-driven, and construction disagreement. | Tabaka’s Model |
| A model to rate each feature with the calculation of weighted formula defined by the team. | Requirements Prioritization Model |
| A model used to perfect requirements. | Prototyping |
| A person’s description that includes their function in an Agile project. | Role |
| A popular Agile methodology. | Scrum |
| A prioritization tool that backlogged stories made smaller and organized by user functionality. | Story Map |
| A product backlog adjusted to help balance the risk and value factors of product. | Risk-Adjusted Backlog |
| A role in XP that measures the team’s progress, and communicates the measurements to the team. | Tracker |
| A series of phases or stages the team has agreed to execute for a project. | Traditional Management |
| A space where the team can work and collaborate effectively. | War Room |
| A statement that defines the purpose and value of the product. | Product Vision Statement |
| A team that is empowered has collaboration, responsibility, and self-sufficiency. | Team Empowerment |
| A team-member meeting that occurs after each sprint to evaluate the product and process to improve efficiency and effectiveness. | Sprint Retrospective |
| A tool used to analyze a chain of processes with the desired outcome of eliminating waste. | Value Stream Mapping |
| A tool used to estimate team effort on user stories. | Planning Poker |
| A top-down approach that consists of long cycles, heavy planning, and minimal customer involvement. | Traditional Management |
| A unit of measurement to estimate the difficulty of a user story. | Story Point |
| A way to calculate the time value of money. | Present Value |
| A written acceptance test for a module with the code built to pass the tests in order to ensure correct performance. | Test-Driven Development (TDD) |
| An approach for planning that occurs in cycles instead of upfront, which happens frequently. | Progressive Elaboration |
| An area for team members to collocate, usually a physical location, in some cases a virtual location is created. | Team Space |
| An artifact that displays planned project functionality. | Product Road Map |
| An enterprise planned and designed to create a product, service, or result. | Project |
| An estimation technique for user stories. The PO presents user stories & discusses challenges. Each story’s estimates plotted, and then the team comes to an agreement on the range of points. | Wide-Band Delphi Estimating |
| An experiment that helps a team answer, a particular question and determine future actions. | Spike |
| An exploratory test which uses a test subject to understand the usability of software. | Usability Testing |
| An index card that displays the user story. | Story Card |
| An individual with an interest in the outcome. | Stakeholder |
| At least one business requirement that increases the value for the user. | User Story |
| Communication used conveniently to receive instant feedback, ideas, and requirements from a particular community. | Social Media-Based Communication |
| Descriptive data used for analysis. | Qualitative |
| Explains acceptance test to the customers then consistently measures the product against the test and records results for the team. (XP Role) | Tester |
| Formation happens when a team creates ground rules and processes to build bonds and shared goals. | Team Formation |
| How much the risk’s consequences will influence the success or failure of a project. Risk Probability (%) x Risk Impact ($) = Risk Severity | Risk Severity |
| Iteration outcomes delivered to customers (end-users). | Release |
