It’s true: We design, develop, and support complex enterprise solutions.
It’s also true that we’re looking to expand our team. We’re seeking software developers and programmers who want to become part of the punkt.de team and grow with us. So we thought it was high time to take a look behind the scenes: What sets our software development methodology apart? How do we work?
1) Agile.
For us, software development means Scrum. We’ve been using agile development for two years now. Sure, it’s no big deal to understand the different roles of Product Owner, ScrumMaster, and developer teams—as well as the Scrum process as a whole—in theory. But internalizing it and putting it into practice every day remains a challenge. At least if, like us, you have a goal: to continuously work on the development process and, through that, to get better and better and better…
2) Communicative.
We’re team players. We don’t just write that in our job postings because it sounds nice—we really mean it. Working in fixed teams is perhaps the clearest example of how software development with Scrum turns traditional ways of working on their head. Meetings, for example, are on our daily agenda—literally, by the way. Coordination among team members and regular communication are essential for functioning as a team. That’s why our workday begins with the daily standup, a 15-minute team meeting where all team members sync up on the status of development and discuss which tasks are pending and who will take them on. Viewed from the outside, this meeting culture can quickly seem like a waste of time, but in fact, the opposite is true: As a Scrum team, we have far-reaching responsibilities, but also a great deal of creative freedom. In short: working together makes all the difference. Communication is therefore a key success factor in our software development—both among ourselves and with our customers.
3) Responsible.
As a team, we bear responsibility for the project, set our own work processes and deadlines, and must therefore always be able to rely on one another. Here’s a simple example of how this plays out in everyday life, even on a small scale: Vacation time isn’t approved “from above” by a boss; instead, vacation plans are negotiated within the team. This idea—that the team forms a “functional unit”—ultimately offers very practical advantages for each and every one of us. For example, difficult tasks that developers used to have to tackle on their own are much easier and faster to handle as a team, because multiple minds contribute their approaches to the solution and feel equally responsible for its success. In Scrum, taking responsibility also means, not least, being courageous. Courage is one of the core agile values, alongside respect, openness, commitment, and focus. Two examples: It takes courage to be open with my colleagues—and perhaps even to face their criticism. It also takes courage to advise a client well and share our assessment with them when we believe their requirement isn’t what will lead to the best solution. But the fact that our clients value us highly precisely for this proves only one thing: the decision to adopt Scrum has paid off for all of us...
