"For many IT managers, the most compelling reason for the
company to sponsor a sprint is financial, because you just might be
able to cover the costs out of petty cash.
"That's because a sprint's basic logistics are fairly simple.
For example, the sprint organized by Brightcove's Whatcott was held
at the online video platform company's offices in Cambridge, MA.
Brightcove, which wanted to help the Drupal community improve its
video support in the content management system, gave the open
source developers a conference room, provided a projector and
Internet access - and then mostly got out of the way. Brightcove
gave the team coffee, drinks, and lunch, but left them on their own
for dinner.
"As another example, ONE/Northwest, a Seattle nonprofit that
provides technology and communications strategy assistance to
environmental advocacy organizations, organized a two-day sprint to
focus on adding specific functionality to an add-on module for the
Plone content management system. The half-dozen or so developers
were local, with one exception. "We covered travel expenses to
bring lead PloneFormGen developer Steve McMahon to Seattle from his
home in Davis, CA," says Jon Stahl, director of web solutions at
ONE/Northwest. "Our total 'hard' cost was on the order of $300."
ONE/Northwest provided the office space and beer."
