Talk I gave at VersionOne's AgilePalooza in Minneapolis, MN April 11 & 12, 2013.

1. A Group of Agile Teams ≠
Organizational Agility
Angela Johnson, PMP, PMI-ACP, CST
Certified Scrum Trainer & Agile Transformation Coach
http://angelajohnsonscrumtrainer.com
@AgileAngela

2. Angela Johnson
PMP, PMI-ACP, CST
• 18+ years Information
Technology - traditional
SDLC and Scrum/Agile
• Facilitator PMI-MN Agile
Local Interest Group
• Based in Minneapolis,
MN

3. Why Agile?
Any Agile Adoption should start out by
asking, “Why do we want to use Agile”?
Being “Agile” is not the Goal!
Agile is about delivering Business Value

4. 2012 VersionOne State of Agile Survey

5. Organizational Agility
“A group of agile teams does not an agile
organization make…”

6. Organizational Agility
“The new goal for the
organization must be to
delight the customer.”
•“Making money” is not the
goal
•“Being agile” is not the
goal.
•“Working software” is not
the goal
•Agile, Scrum & working
software are means to
achieving the goal

7. Organizational Agility
What is Organizational Agility?
• The capacity of a company to rapidly
change or adapt in response to
changes in the market
• A high degree of organizational agility
can help a company to react
successfully to the emergence of new
competitors, the development of new
industry-changing technologies, or
sudden shifts in overall market
conditions
www.BusinessDictionary.com

8. Shared Vision or Current Reality?
Adapted from The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization by Peter M. Senge

9. Shared Vision or Current Reality?
Adapted from The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization by Peter M. Senge

10. Potential Obstacles

11. Potential Obstacles

12. Potential Obstacles

13. Potential Obstacles

14. Potential Obstacles

15. Potential Obstacles
New Quality Practices
• Testers are part of the team
• Tests drive coding
• Testing a user story is done within an iteration – not after
• Quality is not a role, a person or a department – it’s
everyone’s job
• Testing is not something performed by a “tester”
• Test automation is critical to long-term effectiveness

16. Potential Obstacles
Personnel Considerations
• Focus is on Cross Functional Teams
• Delivery is Value Based on the Customer
• What support or training do our teams need to make the
paradigm shift in collaboratively working in a cross
functional way?
• What happens to our individual incentives in asking
people to work in teams?
• What happens to our hiring practices in asking for cross
functional behavior and skills?
• What about career path considerations?

17. Confronting Current Reality

18. Realizing the Vision
Use a Management or Organizational Backlog to
Prioritize Next Steps

19. Shift in Leadership Characteristics
• Inclusive, Collaborative
• Flexible, Adaptive
• Possibly-Oriented
• Facilitative
• Self-reflective
• Courageous
• Observant
Adapted from Leadership Agility, Bill Joiner & Stephen Josephs and Action Inquiry, William Torbert

20. How Long Does this Take?
It Depends…
• Size of the Organization
• Organization Culture
• Flexibility and Adaptability
• Commitment of
Organization Leadership
• Commitment to Automation

21. A Case Study
• Privately held organization that provides contract
and support services to a worldwide franchise
• Moved from project structure to product structure
enabling faster delivery of business value
• Teams are empowered, co-located and high
performing
• Better alignment with the Business

22. 10 Reasons I Love My Job
3. Integrated teams. Product owner, QA, operations,
infrastructure, developers – we’re all on the same team.
We work together, and are committed to each other.
There is opportunity for growth. Just one month in, I can
already sense it. And many times I’ve already seen where
wins are celebrated by the entire team, and mistakes
are owned by the entire team. It’s awesome.
http://silvanolte.com/blog/2013/02/09/10-reasons-i-love-my-job/

23. 10 Reasons I Love My Job
2. Agile. Weekly sprints. Sprint goals. The ceremonies. The
daily meetings. The sprint planning. The sprint
retrospectives. The sprint board. The stickies. Weekly
deployments into Production. Having a clear sense of what
our focus is this week. Commitment to the work at hand.
Establishing a velocity and trusting in the team to perform.
Similar to feeling at home with Apple products and OS X, I
also feel incredibly at home in this environment.
http://silvanolte.com/blog/2013/02/09/10-reasons-i-love-my-job/

24. 10 Reasons I Love My Job
1. People care. This is the most important thing to me. I
work in an environment where people really care about what
they do. Shades of gray, I acknowledge, between just being
somewhere for the paycheck and having a passion for what
you do. At my new workplace, I find that people care about
what they do. To do well for their customer because it’s the
right thing to do. Because there’s a sense of pride in doing
good. I can get a paycheck anywhere. But I can only do what I
do, and with the people I do it with, where I’m at right now.
http://silvanolte.com/blog/2013/02/09/10-reasons-i-love-my-job/

25. A Case Study
The CIO’s email to me in sharing the blog post:
“One more thing. Check out this blog from one of our
developers. I can die and go to CIO heaven now.
Thanks for all you did to help us get to where we are.”
http://silvanolte.com/blog/2013/02/09/10-reasons-i-love-my-job/

26. Questions