IS YOUR ORGANIZATION ON A JOURNEY TO AGILE ADOPTION (SCRUM)

OR AGILE TRANSFORMATION??

AGILE TRANSFORMATION

Technology

Product

Owner

Business, Product

Owner/Business Analyst

& Technology

all need to be on the Same Axis

for Agile Transformation to

happen..

BENEFITS OF AGILE• Major

• Focus on Maximizing Value.• Improved Quality• Opportunity to do a Correction mid-way.• Improved Stake-Holder Satisfaction.• Improved Time to Market.• Better Alignment of Business and IT.

• Minor• Empowered Teams.• Highly Engaged Product Owner.• Reduced Risks

THE BIG QUESTION…AGILE ADOPTION OR AGILE TRANSFORMATION• What are we looking at? Agile Adoption or Agile Transformation !!!!

• Agile Adoption is about practices, tools and ceremonies.• Agile Transformation is about changing the Culture, reflected by

change in Organization Structures, Change in behaviour.

• A very simple example would be:Agile Adoption Agile Transformation1. Daily Stand-up.2. Stories3. Story Grooming4. Sprint Retrospective

1. Flatter Structures2. DevOps Mentality.3. CI/CD.4. Next steps from Sprint Retrospective

Actioned upon….

FIRST STEPS TO AGILE TRANSFORMATION

• At the Organization Level.. Answer the Following Question.• What’s the need for Agile Transformation?

• You and the Organization can answer this question best, rather than any consultants.

Every Organization should think that their need to ‘Agile Transformation’ is different than other organizations and work out an answer out for this question.

• Spend reasonable amount of time on answering this question… This could be answered in some workshops. The participants to the Workshops should include Business Leaders, Technology Leaders and Business Analyst Leaders.

Agile Transformation starts with Organizations answering this question Appropriately, Accurately and

Honestly !!!!

THE BEGINNING• Communicate• Derive a Vision for Agile

Transformation.• Communicate it Loud and Clear to the

Team…• DO NOT Make it Mandatory for

everybody to adopt to Agile… The teams should feel a “DESIRE” to adopt Agile, rather than PRESSURED to adopt Agile.

Aim for AGILE TRANSFORMATION,

Start with AGILE ADOPTION !!!

The Foundation to “Self Managed

Teams” cannot be set by forcing “AGILE”

down their throat…

TEAM AND TRAINING• Identify or Hire some “Agile Coaches”…………..• Identify “Agile Champions”….• Identify “Fire Starters”….. In each Business

Area/Business Unit….• Organize “Agile Trainings”, and make it voluntary for

people to enrol for the training…

AT THE BUSINESS-UNIT LEVEL• At the BU Level..

• Organize a Workshop to do a need-analysis for Agile Transformation….. Participants should include the Technology Team Leader, Product Organization (Product Owner/Business Analyst) and the Business Unit Representatives…

• Answer the Following Questions.• What do we need to change in our current ways of working?• What’s going well and what needs to change…• If you could change any process, what would you change….

• Finally, what’s the need for an Agile Transformation???

DO NOT embark upon Agile Transformation, if the answer to the question is any of the following:1. We need to do Agile Transformation, since the whole organization is doing so.

2. We need to do Agile Transformation, since the Senior Management wants us to do so.3. We need to do Agile Transformation, as it is the Next In-Thing….

Gain Commitment for everybody, Team, Team Leaders, Product Owners, Stake Holders for an Agile Transformation…

Burn All Bridges.. Once a Commitment to Agile Transformation is made, there should be no looking back.. If the team encounters a problem, they should take help from the Coach and get it

resolved……

AGILE TRANSFORMATION: ACTION TIME

• Salient Feature of the Workshop:• Roles would start getting defined at the Workshop.• Some Natural Leaders would emerge out of the Workshop.• Along with the Business Stake Holder• Some Key Members should take an accountability.

Did the Team assign a Business

Value to the various items

in the Backlog???

Start with “Agile Adoption”..

“Agile Transformation”

will follow

• The team should implement the first lessons on Agile Right Away….• Do the Backlog on what needs to be done to

transform the organization.• Do a High Level Prioritization as a part of the

workshop.

• Assign a coach to the Team undertaking the journey…. As much as possible, the coach should be co-seated with the Team and be ready to resolve any queries/questions that the Team has “As soon as possible”.

Agree upon Agile Goals

with the Team…

While you “Celebrate Success”, remember

Do Not Forget to “Celebrate

Failure”, as well.

AGILE TRANSFORMATION: CHECK-POINTS

• Review the Progress….• Next Steps from Sprint Retrospective.. Normally, the First Sprint

Retrospective will throw out the Biggest Challenges that the Team is Facing, as everybody is over-enthusiast and honest in the First Retrospective.

• Review the time it has taken for the next steps to be closed…• Feedback from Scum Master, Team Members, Product Owner and the

Stake Holders. Round up the feedback with the Agile Coach • These feedbacks should be collected individually and not as a

Group..• Focus on Feedback should be ways of working, rather than on the

results….• Feedback should be focussed more on Process and should not

touch upon people…IF

there is resistance to change,HAVE FACT BASED DISCUSSIONS…

ELSEReview the Team’s Agile Goals with the Team.

AGILE TRANSFORMATION: THE JOURNEY CONTINUES

• Relook at the Structures and Role of Individuals in the Organization…• Continuous Integration Continuous Delivery Continuous Deployment• DevOps : Culture and Structures.

• ChangesProject Manager, a Controller “Enabler of Self Organizing

Teams”.Hierarchical Structures Flatter Structures.

Deliver to Plan Deliver ValueRequirement Stability Changes in Requirements is not a cause

of worry…Command and Control Adult Conversations.

AGILE TRANSFORMATION

……The Journey Continues