Session Title: Managing Shared Services in SAFe with Kanban Session Overview: This experience sharing will help SAFe practitioners understand how Kanban helps to address the challenges of Scrum while working with Shared services. How the shared services works along with multiple big Agile Release Train in synchronization to Deliver Values. This Experience report will also Talk about following: How we arrived at Kanban, Kanban Boards and WIP Limits Why well defined neighbor agreements How we are using Expedite lane How management of variability has reduced stress on Teams Frequent Prioritization Mechanism to track any ad-hoc request that team handles Well defined strategy/risk review meetings with necessary stakeholders Metric and process improvement meetings Increased Team collaboration Increased Through put and well maintained cycle/lead time Roles identified for Kanban Metrics used for continuous improvement.

1. Managing an enterprise Shared Services
with Kanban in Scaled Agile Framework
(SAFe)
The Scaled Agile Framework® (SAFe®) approach combines the simplicity of the Kanban method with the governance that is necessary to
run a large enterprise.
SAIKAT DAS
SPC, KMP, CSP, CSD, CSM, CDA
Linkedin - https://in.linkedin.com/in/saikatdas16
Twitter - @dsaikats

2. What is Shared Services/ Components
Construct
People
Technology
Governance
 Shared Services represents :
 specialty roles, components and people
 Services and support necessary for the success of an Agile Release Train
(ART) or Solution Train but that cannot be dedicated full-time.
 These resources may include security specialists, information architects, DBAs,
technical writers, quality assurance, IT operations personnel, and more.
 Each ART and Solution Train must plan to engage the resources it needs, when it
needs them.
 Component owned by individual component teams
 These component teams implemented Agile/Scrum at their own individual team
level, and had to also deliver their components into project integration streams,
 multiple project delivery timelines overlapping simultaneously using a common
iteration heartbeat of six week cycles.
 Independent Teams: Waterfall and Agile programs are completely independent
 Low Dependency : Some dependencies exist but, no constant synchronization
 High Dependency: Substantial dependencies exist throughout development,
therefore a high level of interaction and integrtions
What’s required for Alignment
 Split the work into small
pieces,
 Use named columns to
illustrate where each item is
in the workflow
Visualize
 Based on the priority and
readiness the team picks
pulls the highest priority
item to work
 Assign Explicit Limits to how
many items may be in
Progress
 Optimize the process to
make Lead time as small
and predictable as Possible
Pull Work
Manage WIP
Measure
Lead Time
Read more at: http://www.scaledagileframework.com/shared-services/
Copyright © 2010-2017 Scaled Agile, Inc.

3. 1
2
3
4
5
Kanban Fitment in SAFe
• SAFe Kanban is a lean, just-in-time arrangement.
• It Helps decision-makers to make tough choices
• Gives visibility to priority setting
• Takes a high-level view of the interdependencies of teams
• Doesn't waste time on work that no one can start yet
• Respects the teams' workloads.

4. Kanban Fitment in SAFe

5. Kanban Fitment in SAFe – example (Portfolio Kanban)

6. Why Kanban in Shared Services in SAFe
New stories/ Work Unit are constantly
added to the Scope of work
Integrated with many upstream and
downstream systems (neighbors)
Too many stakeholders for source of
work as it is a enterprise wide system
No process to engage (Business, IT, QA,
neighbors, business operations)
Unclear “Definition of Done” for many
backlog items.
Delay in finalizing requirements and
business signoff
Team roles & responsibilities overlap
Various skillset involved More time
spent on hand over and take out lead
to leakages
Work is often started but not always
finished or Implemented
Start-Stop phenomenon between work
in hand new work
1
2 5 6
3 Poor quality leading to high defect
rates – lots of rework
Non process to derive the appropriate
metrics, realize the budget and forecast
6 Unable to meet the deliverable dates
No visual tools to track the work item
from initiation to implementation
which added more difficulties
9
Business Need Utilization and
Rationalization
Governance
Constant task-switching and reduced
productivity.
No visibility on other Apps and their
delays and impacting changes
4 Project resources are distributed
across 3 geographic location locations
which lead to communication gaps
and delays in sharing inputs
7

7. How Kanban Helped
Card were created to track all the
ad-hoc requests. To help team
visualize spending on unplanned
work
Work Agreement ensured that
work is not coming from different
sources but always channeled
through one source.
Creation Column to have only
reviewed and prioritized items
regularly helped creating healthy
backlog
The roles are defined and
responsibilities clearly
articulated.
Expedite lane helped the team
handle requests that come in as
blockers for others
1
2 5 6
3 Reduction in work pressure helped
the team to focus on ad-hoc as
well as other requests which in
turn reduced defect density
6 Well defined explicit Value
ensured that the team is not
pulling the cards without meeting
DODs f previous Columns
9
Business Need Utilization and
Rationalization
Governance
Team ensured that they are not
over burdened with work that
they cannot handle by agreeing
upon WIP limit
4
Kanban Board gave the team a
good virtual view of the work the
team is handling
7

8. How Kanban Transformation
Training and
Enablement Output of STATIK
• Work Item, Work Item
Type, Classes of Services
• Kanban Board needed for
this program,
• Working agreement, Entry
and Exit criteria for each
stage and swim lanes,
• Segregated the roles and
responsibilities of each
roles and their access level
Hours Good sync up amongst
Distributed Teams
For Effective communication
teams were collocated only
at 2-3 locations
Followed best practices to be Customer Centric
• Daily connect with Business
• Regular VC connect
• Rewards and Recognition
Connect, Developers Forums
• Rally is used as one
shop for everything .
• QC, Remedy,
SharePoint are
connected to Rally
• Focused Training in
SAFe for team and
Leader by SPCs
• Team Trained on
Kanban by AKTs or
KMPs
• Internal group activities
were conducted to
emphasize team
collaboration
Miles Stones Defined
to improve maturity
of Kanban
ALM Tools Communication Agility Mindset
• Agile Roadshow
• ABLE Training
• Penny, KAKKA games
• Fun Retrospection
“Focused workshop Using STATIK”
Great community of Practice was
setup for cognitive learning

9. Sustain using Kanban Metrics
Suggested Measures
No: of work
items in
each state
(CFD)
Lead time Cycle time Time elapsed
(control
chart)
Throughput

10. Benefits Realized
Efficiency
Realized
 Advancement in new product/feature delivery
 Critical/High defects completion rate is increased .
 Increase in business clarification turn around time
 Increase in Throughput
 Increase in defect backlog reduction
 Reduction in overall aging of work item
Business
Objectives
 Faster implementation of new product feature
 Accommodate critical business priorities
 Achieve more business values with same budget
 Non disruptive product availability
 Realize up-front/current business values for given budget
 Visibility of each portion of feature delivery.
Ability to
Forecast
 Just enough investment exists to eliminate wasted resources as an
idea moves to the next phase
 Economic thinking is practiced by using WSJF
 Evaluation is based on ROI to analyze the effort that is required and
the value
 Relative ranking favors lower investment in analysis over precision
until later

11. D
E
P
T
H
Shallow
Depth
Core practices for successful Kanban adoption
1 Visualize
2 Limit Work-in-Progress
3 Manage Flow
4 Make Policies Explicit
5 Implement Feedback Loops
6 Improve Collaboratively, evolve
experimentally
(using models & scientific method)

13. Linkedin - https://in.linkedin.com/in/saikatdas16
Twitter - @dsaikats