This document discusses improving project estimation and predicting delivery dates. It begins by noting that detailed estimation does not strongly influence lead times due to typically low flow efficiencies in systems. Lead time histograms are proposed as a better approach to predict completion dates with confidence levels, as they incorporate all system factors without personal bias. Class of service and work item characteristics can identify the most accurate histogram. Considering cost of delay functions alongside histograms helps determine when work should start to balance timely delivery and optimization of resources. The document advocates predicting customer expectations rather than effort or duration and focuses on statistical prediction over detailed planning.
Continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD) are practices that allow developers to integrate code changes frequently and reliably while automating the process of building, testing, and deploying the code. With CI/CD, code changes are validated through automated builds and tests before being deployed to staging environments and potentially production. The CI/CD workflow involves committing code to a repository, running automated tests, building if tests pass, deploying to staging for further testing, and deploying to production if all tests are passed, with the ability to rollback changes if needed. Tools used in CI/CD include those for version control, building, testing, and deploying code changes across environments.
There in an obsessions to jump to implementation of CI, CD tools when we talk about DevOps. In this talk, I focus on the many aspects that one needs to focus on when going on a DevOps journey
Jonathan Alexander, CTO of QASymphony and other Product Leaders from QASymphony walked through some of the exciting product features and enhancements coming in 2016 during Quality Jam 2016.
Agile Transformation: People, Process and Tools to Make Your Transformation S...QASymphony
Many companies are currently going through Agile Transformation or thinking about making the transition to agile. While moving to agile can create great opportunity for organizations, the journey to get there can be highly challenging. If you don’t have the right people, process and tools in place, the true benefits of agile may not be recognized. In this webinar, Andrew Stickland, Head of Client Services, for Clearvision and Kevin Dunne, VP of Business Development and Strategy for QASymphony will discuss the best practices for making the agile transformation. In this webinar, we will try to answer the following questions:
- Who are the people I need in place?
- What are the core processes that I need to change?
- What tools do I need?
View the On-Demand webinar here: http://pi.qasymphony.com/agile-transformation-best-practices-webinar-lp060?utm_source=slideshare&utm_medium=slideshare&utm_campaign=Agile%20Transformation%20Webinar
This document summarizes a webinar by Allan Kelly on Agile basics. It discusses 5 key Agile concepts: quality, visualization of work, iterations, working in small batches, and vertical teams. For each concept, it provides details on practices like test-driven development, burn down charts, 2-week iterations, small stories and tasks, and fully staffed cross-functional teams. It emphasizes that following even one of these basics can improve outcomes, and following all 5 provides greater benefits to managing software projects in an Agile way.
For numerous large enterprises, the alignment of hardware and software processes is critical to managing an Agile environment. Agile Hardware implementations can be put in place by using the same framework as our typical Agile Software Development transformations. Start off with assessing the organization’s current state, then move to planning and preparing by and putting together a transition backlog, start execution with training and coaching, spread the cultural shift with change management and maintain and scale the transformation.
The document discusses shifting the focus of internationalization (i18n) efforts earlier in the software development process. Traditionally, i18n was seen as the responsibility of localization teams and tested later in the cycle. However, with faster release cycles and the need to reach global customers quicker, i18n needs to be integrated as a core part of the initial development process. Static analysis tools can help developers test for i18n issues proactively during development rather than waiting until localization. Catching i18n bugs earlier saves significant time and costs compared to fixing them late in the cycle during localization. The presentation advocates making world-ready software a priority from the start through processes, guidelines and tools that verify i18n compliance
Continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD) are practices that allow developers to integrate code changes frequently and reliably while automating the process of building, testing, and deploying the code. With CI/CD, code changes are validated through automated builds and tests before being deployed to staging environments and potentially production. The CI/CD workflow involves committing code to a repository, running automated tests, building if tests pass, deploying to staging for further testing, and deploying to production if all tests are passed, with the ability to rollback changes if needed. Tools used in CI/CD include those for version control, building, testing, and deploying code changes across environments.
There in an obsessions to jump to implementation of CI, CD tools when we talk about DevOps. In this talk, I focus on the many aspects that one needs to focus on when going on a DevOps journey
Jonathan Alexander, CTO of QASymphony and other Product Leaders from QASymphony walked through some of the exciting product features and enhancements coming in 2016 during Quality Jam 2016.
Agile Transformation: People, Process and Tools to Make Your Transformation S...QASymphony
Many companies are currently going through Agile Transformation or thinking about making the transition to agile. While moving to agile can create great opportunity for organizations, the journey to get there can be highly challenging. If you don’t have the right people, process and tools in place, the true benefits of agile may not be recognized. In this webinar, Andrew Stickland, Head of Client Services, for Clearvision and Kevin Dunne, VP of Business Development and Strategy for QASymphony will discuss the best practices for making the agile transformation. In this webinar, we will try to answer the following questions:
- Who are the people I need in place?
- What are the core processes that I need to change?
- What tools do I need?
View the On-Demand webinar here: http://pi.qasymphony.com/agile-transformation-best-practices-webinar-lp060?utm_source=slideshare&utm_medium=slideshare&utm_campaign=Agile%20Transformation%20Webinar
This document summarizes a webinar by Allan Kelly on Agile basics. It discusses 5 key Agile concepts: quality, visualization of work, iterations, working in small batches, and vertical teams. For each concept, it provides details on practices like test-driven development, burn down charts, 2-week iterations, small stories and tasks, and fully staffed cross-functional teams. It emphasizes that following even one of these basics can improve outcomes, and following all 5 provides greater benefits to managing software projects in an Agile way.
For numerous large enterprises, the alignment of hardware and software processes is critical to managing an Agile environment. Agile Hardware implementations can be put in place by using the same framework as our typical Agile Software Development transformations. Start off with assessing the organization’s current state, then move to planning and preparing by and putting together a transition backlog, start execution with training and coaching, spread the cultural shift with change management and maintain and scale the transformation.
The document discusses shifting the focus of internationalization (i18n) efforts earlier in the software development process. Traditionally, i18n was seen as the responsibility of localization teams and tested later in the cycle. However, with faster release cycles and the need to reach global customers quicker, i18n needs to be integrated as a core part of the initial development process. Static analysis tools can help developers test for i18n issues proactively during development rather than waiting until localization. Catching i18n bugs earlier saves significant time and costs compared to fixing them late in the cycle during localization. The presentation advocates making world-ready software a priority from the start through processes, guidelines and tools that verify i18n compliance
Agile Gurgaon 2016 | Thinking Beyond :: Marry Agile and DevOps for Phenomenal...AgileNetwork
This document discusses marrying Agile and DevOps approaches to get phenomenal results. It begins with an introduction of the author and their experience. It then poses common questions around when to adopt Agile vs DevOps and how they relate. The document outlines differences between traditional and Agile/DevOps mindsets and practices. It provides examples of lessons learned and challenges overcome during one organization's transformation journey. Finally, it discusses steps to get started with a DevOps approach and lists examples of effective DevOps practices.
The concept of “shifting testing left” in the software development lifecycle is not new. Shifting testing from manual to automated and then upstream into engineering is a driving factor in DevOps and agile software development. However, Michael Nauman wonders why test automation, DevOps, and agile software development still frequently fail to deliver on their promises? Aligning and hardening your DevOps and test automation—along with streamlining your agile processes—is critical to your project. Michael shares how AutoCAD’s shifting testing left enabled improvements within their engineering team. Learn how the team increased engineering reliability and velocity, and forced process changes upstream into design and research all the way through to product support. Leave knowing why the concept of separation of concerns with regards to quality is as fundamental as the separation of code quality from product quality. Learn how the AutoCAD web team used process dogma and ruthless prioritization to combat metric idolatry and the host of other evils that hold teams back from fully realizing their potential and going beyond agile.
Lemi Orhan Ergin - Code Your Agility: Tips for Boosting Technical Agility in ...Agile Lietuva
This document provides tips for boosting technical agility in an organization, including developing a culture of agility, becoming proficient with tools, sharing knowledge, prioritizing testing and continuous improvement. It emphasizes establishing practices like test-driven development, code reviews, and code retreats to improve software quality and development skills over time.
This document discusses lean software development principles. It introduces agile software development processes and the agile manifesto. Lean software development is then discussed, which comes from the Toyota Production System and uses a set of principles and tools to achieve quality, speed and customer alignment. The 7 principles of lean thinking are outlined: 1) eliminate waste, 2) amplify learning, 3) decide as late as possible, 4) deliver as fast as possible, 5) empower the team, 6) build integrity in, and 7) see the whole. Each principle is then explained in more detail with examples related to software development.
Shift left, shift right the testing swing.
This deck shows the testing framework we use today in our agile & Devops team. We do Behavior Driven Development (Shift left) and test in production as well (shift right).
In Agile Development, Testing is meant to be a part of the development process, right along with coding, but many “Agile Teams” are missing this vital component and experiencing degregated quality. In this presentation, we will discuss how to integrate Agile Testing in Kanban processes by discussing the following:
• Introduction to Agile and Lean
• How testers add value to cross-functional Agile Development Teams
• How testers participate in Agile ceremonies
• How to test in an Agile Environment
• The Four Environments (Dev, Test, Stage, Production)
• The types of testing that occurs in each environmen
Agile Testing: The Role Of The Agile TesterDeclan Whelan
This presentation provides an overview of the role of testers on agile teams.
In essence, the differences between testers and developers should blur so that focus is the whole team completing stories and delivering value.
Testers can add more value on agile teams by contributing earlier and moving from defect detection to defect prevention.
This document discusses Agile vs traditional project management methods. It provides an overview of Scrum, the most popular Agile framework, outlining its key roles, events and artifacts. Scrum emphasizes iterative development, early delivery of working software, transparency, collaboration and continuous improvement. It aims to eliminate waste and focus on delivering the highest business value. The document also discusses how Lean, Agile and Scrum philosophies relate, with all aiming to eliminate waste and increase customer value.
DevOps/Flow workshop for agile india 2015Yuval Yeret
This document discusses implementing DevOps flow by leveraging lean/agile practices across development, deployment, and operations. It emphasizes establishing continuous integration and delivery workflows to enable frequent, reliable releases through automation. Kanban techniques are presented as a way to visualize work and limit work-in-progress to improve collaboration between teams.
This document discusses best practices for using agile product development for hardware projects. It provides differences between hardware and software development such as hardware being more difficult to change after manufacturing. It recommends using scrum with a focus on technical stories for hardware. An example project at Thermo Fisher Scientific developing analytical chemistry equipment is described that successfully used scrum. Key lessons learned include the product owner also being a team member, most deliverables being behind the scenes technical work rather than user-facing, and estimation and velocity being more challenging for hardware projects.
Continuous Delivery in a Legacy Shop—One Step at a TimeTechWell
Not every continuous delivery (CD) initiative starts with someone saying “Drop everything. We’re going to do DevOps.” Sometimes, you have to grow your process incrementally. And sometimes you don’t set out to grow at all—you are just fixing problems with your process, trying to make things better. Gene Gotimer discusses techniques and the chain of tools he has used to bring a DevOps mindset and CD practices into a legacy environment. Gene discusses how his team started fixing problems and making process improvements in development. From there, they tackled one problem after another, each time making the release a little better and a little less risky. They incrementally brought their practices through other environments until the project was confidently delivering working and tested releases every two weeks. Gene shares their journey and the tools they used to build quality into the product, the releases, and the release process.
Agile introduction for the American Chamber of Commerce membersAndy Brandt
This document provides an overview of Agile and Scrum. It begins with introducing Agile and its core values as outlined in the Agile Manifesto. It then provides a quick introduction to Scrum, describing the basic components of Scrum including roles, artifacts, and events like Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, and Retrospective. The document discusses the goals and purpose of each Scrum component and ceremony.
Join agile coaches Bob Galen from RGCG and Michael Cooper from the QASymphony Board of Advisors as they explore key aspects of the 3-Pillars of Agile Quality & Testing framework that Bob and Mary Thorn developed. In this dynamic panel discussion Bob and Michael will tackle what it takes to be a balanced and effective tester in today’s agile world. We’ll talk about tools, techniques, attitudes, and adjustments. There will be no “one size fits all” strategies here, just real-world experience sharing stories about what works and what doesn’t.
Integrating hardware development processes (using the Waterfall method / V-model) and Agile software development. This presentation explains the basics of the V-model and how it has evolved into an iterative model, but also tells you about managing hardware and software lifecycle processes in a single release. Then, a live demonstration shows you how to integrate these lifecycles (xLM) in practice.
Webinar: Demonstrating Business Value for DevOps & Continuous DeliveryXebiaLabs
The document discusses DevOps and continuous delivery. It begins with an introduction and agenda. It then discusses transforming IT operations for greater business value, challenges for businesses and IT that DevOps addresses, what DevOps is in terms of people, processes, and tools. It discusses continuous delivery and provides examples of goals and metrics for DevOps initiatives like release frequency, throughput time, and idle time. Finally, it discusses how DevOps tools can work with other tools and processes.
Continuous Integration Is for Everyone—Especially DevOpsTechWell
Continuous delivery and deployment are taking center stage in the DevOps conversations. Neither continuous delivery nor deployment are easy to jump into, and both make a lot of assumptions about the applications being released. Continuous integration (CI), however, is for everyone who wants higher development velocity and better quality. CI can be implemented in development shops from brand new to large enterprise teams. When implemented, CI helps the organization take a giant leap into modern development. With the ever-growing expectation for DevOps teams to produce faster, high-quality software releases, continuous testing—a key CI driver—must occur at all stages of the software delivery chain. Chris Riley covers the important tenets of CI metrics, key CI components, testing, infrastructure, and end-to-end testing. Learn how CI can fit into all development shops, and take back strategies for tackling the challenges of a new system including change control, management, and sustainability.
Quality Jam 2017: Jesse Reed & Kyle McMeekin "Test Case Management & Explorat...QASymphony
Jesse Reed, QA Director at Questar, and Kyle McMeekin discuss how Questar made the switch to qTest and the key factors you should consider in test case management and exploratory testing.
Modern Professional Scrum using Flow and Kanban - Agile and Beyond Detroit 2019Yuval Yeret
Should you use Scrum or Kanban? You don’t have to choose: Scrum teams improve when they look at flows inside and outside their sprints from a Lean/Kanban perspective. In this session we will talk about Kanban-related myths prevalent in the Scrum world and identify common ground between them. We will look at ways to bring Kanban flow into your Scrum: the Kanban-based Sprint/product backlog, flow-based daily Scrum, visualizing aging work, and flow-based Sprint planning .We will describe ways to wrap Scrum with a Kanban flow system, and how DevOps fits into this picture.
You’ll leave with a better understanding of how Scrum, Kanban, and DevOps relate to each other and with ideas for experiments to try when back at work.
Post-agile approaches - agile for the real world and how to avoid agile failureYuval Yeret
The document discusses various Agile and Lean concepts and frameworks. It begins with an overview of Agile principles and the Agile Manifesto. It then discusses some of the challenges with implementing Agile approaches in reality, including in large legacy organizations. It introduces several frameworks for implementing Agile at scale, including Kanban, Scrum, SAFe. It analyzes the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of each approach. It also discusses ways the different approaches can be combined or evolved to better address real-world challenges. The document advocates for focusing on principles over practices and evolving approaches over time based on learning and experimentation.
Lean Kanban India 2017 | Damn… we missed the date again! | Sudipta LahiriLeanKanbanIndia
Session Title : Damn… we missed the date again!
Session Overview:We have experienced the embarrassment of missing our planned dates. Ironically, this cycle doesn’t end with one instance. We re-commit to another date and miss than again! We are all experienced people, we have been in this business for a long time. Why then do we keep missing our dates again and again?
Scrum makes a sincere attempt in changing this pattern. By making the team estimate how much it can deliver within a Sprint and by mandating that the team should be not be disturbed with changing scope within a Sprint, it attempts to increase the probability of hitting the dates. Yet, it isn’t uncommon for teams to be burnt out by the time the Sprint ends OR for unfinished scope spilling over to the next Sprint.
Clearly, something is wrong at the core. Why is this so difficult? Is it reasonable to keep blaming the team or the people managing the project? This experience isn’t the exception! It is the norm in most teams.
In this session, we discuss what is wrong at the core. What are we missing in our planning? If this does not work, what will? Does Kanban have a solution for this?
At the end of this session, you should be able to learn how not to fall into this trap again!
Lean Kanban India 2019 Conference | Scrumban comes to the rescue: A Case Stud...LeanKanbanIndia
Session Title: Scrumban comes to the rescue: A Case Study
Abstract: In this case study, we discuss the challenges faced by the customer and the project team and how Scrumban helped the customer navigate through these challenges. We highlight how Metrics helped the team in its planning, forecasting and identifying their Continuous Improvement steps.
Agile Gurgaon 2016 | Thinking Beyond :: Marry Agile and DevOps for Phenomenal...AgileNetwork
This document discusses marrying Agile and DevOps approaches to get phenomenal results. It begins with an introduction of the author and their experience. It then poses common questions around when to adopt Agile vs DevOps and how they relate. The document outlines differences between traditional and Agile/DevOps mindsets and practices. It provides examples of lessons learned and challenges overcome during one organization's transformation journey. Finally, it discusses steps to get started with a DevOps approach and lists examples of effective DevOps practices.
The concept of “shifting testing left” in the software development lifecycle is not new. Shifting testing from manual to automated and then upstream into engineering is a driving factor in DevOps and agile software development. However, Michael Nauman wonders why test automation, DevOps, and agile software development still frequently fail to deliver on their promises? Aligning and hardening your DevOps and test automation—along with streamlining your agile processes—is critical to your project. Michael shares how AutoCAD’s shifting testing left enabled improvements within their engineering team. Learn how the team increased engineering reliability and velocity, and forced process changes upstream into design and research all the way through to product support. Leave knowing why the concept of separation of concerns with regards to quality is as fundamental as the separation of code quality from product quality. Learn how the AutoCAD web team used process dogma and ruthless prioritization to combat metric idolatry and the host of other evils that hold teams back from fully realizing their potential and going beyond agile.
Lemi Orhan Ergin - Code Your Agility: Tips for Boosting Technical Agility in ...Agile Lietuva
This document provides tips for boosting technical agility in an organization, including developing a culture of agility, becoming proficient with tools, sharing knowledge, prioritizing testing and continuous improvement. It emphasizes establishing practices like test-driven development, code reviews, and code retreats to improve software quality and development skills over time.
This document discusses lean software development principles. It introduces agile software development processes and the agile manifesto. Lean software development is then discussed, which comes from the Toyota Production System and uses a set of principles and tools to achieve quality, speed and customer alignment. The 7 principles of lean thinking are outlined: 1) eliminate waste, 2) amplify learning, 3) decide as late as possible, 4) deliver as fast as possible, 5) empower the team, 6) build integrity in, and 7) see the whole. Each principle is then explained in more detail with examples related to software development.
Shift left, shift right the testing swing.
This deck shows the testing framework we use today in our agile & Devops team. We do Behavior Driven Development (Shift left) and test in production as well (shift right).
In Agile Development, Testing is meant to be a part of the development process, right along with coding, but many “Agile Teams” are missing this vital component and experiencing degregated quality. In this presentation, we will discuss how to integrate Agile Testing in Kanban processes by discussing the following:
• Introduction to Agile and Lean
• How testers add value to cross-functional Agile Development Teams
• How testers participate in Agile ceremonies
• How to test in an Agile Environment
• The Four Environments (Dev, Test, Stage, Production)
• The types of testing that occurs in each environmen
Agile Testing: The Role Of The Agile TesterDeclan Whelan
This presentation provides an overview of the role of testers on agile teams.
In essence, the differences between testers and developers should blur so that focus is the whole team completing stories and delivering value.
Testers can add more value on agile teams by contributing earlier and moving from defect detection to defect prevention.
This document discusses Agile vs traditional project management methods. It provides an overview of Scrum, the most popular Agile framework, outlining its key roles, events and artifacts. Scrum emphasizes iterative development, early delivery of working software, transparency, collaboration and continuous improvement. It aims to eliminate waste and focus on delivering the highest business value. The document also discusses how Lean, Agile and Scrum philosophies relate, with all aiming to eliminate waste and increase customer value.
DevOps/Flow workshop for agile india 2015Yuval Yeret
This document discusses implementing DevOps flow by leveraging lean/agile practices across development, deployment, and operations. It emphasizes establishing continuous integration and delivery workflows to enable frequent, reliable releases through automation. Kanban techniques are presented as a way to visualize work and limit work-in-progress to improve collaboration between teams.
This document discusses best practices for using agile product development for hardware projects. It provides differences between hardware and software development such as hardware being more difficult to change after manufacturing. It recommends using scrum with a focus on technical stories for hardware. An example project at Thermo Fisher Scientific developing analytical chemistry equipment is described that successfully used scrum. Key lessons learned include the product owner also being a team member, most deliverables being behind the scenes technical work rather than user-facing, and estimation and velocity being more challenging for hardware projects.
Continuous Delivery in a Legacy Shop—One Step at a TimeTechWell
Not every continuous delivery (CD) initiative starts with someone saying “Drop everything. We’re going to do DevOps.” Sometimes, you have to grow your process incrementally. And sometimes you don’t set out to grow at all—you are just fixing problems with your process, trying to make things better. Gene Gotimer discusses techniques and the chain of tools he has used to bring a DevOps mindset and CD practices into a legacy environment. Gene discusses how his team started fixing problems and making process improvements in development. From there, they tackled one problem after another, each time making the release a little better and a little less risky. They incrementally brought their practices through other environments until the project was confidently delivering working and tested releases every two weeks. Gene shares their journey and the tools they used to build quality into the product, the releases, and the release process.
Agile introduction for the American Chamber of Commerce membersAndy Brandt
This document provides an overview of Agile and Scrum. It begins with introducing Agile and its core values as outlined in the Agile Manifesto. It then provides a quick introduction to Scrum, describing the basic components of Scrum including roles, artifacts, and events like Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, and Retrospective. The document discusses the goals and purpose of each Scrum component and ceremony.
Join agile coaches Bob Galen from RGCG and Michael Cooper from the QASymphony Board of Advisors as they explore key aspects of the 3-Pillars of Agile Quality & Testing framework that Bob and Mary Thorn developed. In this dynamic panel discussion Bob and Michael will tackle what it takes to be a balanced and effective tester in today’s agile world. We’ll talk about tools, techniques, attitudes, and adjustments. There will be no “one size fits all” strategies here, just real-world experience sharing stories about what works and what doesn’t.
Integrating hardware development processes (using the Waterfall method / V-model) and Agile software development. This presentation explains the basics of the V-model and how it has evolved into an iterative model, but also tells you about managing hardware and software lifecycle processes in a single release. Then, a live demonstration shows you how to integrate these lifecycles (xLM) in practice.
Webinar: Demonstrating Business Value for DevOps & Continuous DeliveryXebiaLabs
The document discusses DevOps and continuous delivery. It begins with an introduction and agenda. It then discusses transforming IT operations for greater business value, challenges for businesses and IT that DevOps addresses, what DevOps is in terms of people, processes, and tools. It discusses continuous delivery and provides examples of goals and metrics for DevOps initiatives like release frequency, throughput time, and idle time. Finally, it discusses how DevOps tools can work with other tools and processes.
Continuous Integration Is for Everyone—Especially DevOpsTechWell
Continuous delivery and deployment are taking center stage in the DevOps conversations. Neither continuous delivery nor deployment are easy to jump into, and both make a lot of assumptions about the applications being released. Continuous integration (CI), however, is for everyone who wants higher development velocity and better quality. CI can be implemented in development shops from brand new to large enterprise teams. When implemented, CI helps the organization take a giant leap into modern development. With the ever-growing expectation for DevOps teams to produce faster, high-quality software releases, continuous testing—a key CI driver—must occur at all stages of the software delivery chain. Chris Riley covers the important tenets of CI metrics, key CI components, testing, infrastructure, and end-to-end testing. Learn how CI can fit into all development shops, and take back strategies for tackling the challenges of a new system including change control, management, and sustainability.
Quality Jam 2017: Jesse Reed & Kyle McMeekin "Test Case Management & Explorat...QASymphony
Jesse Reed, QA Director at Questar, and Kyle McMeekin discuss how Questar made the switch to qTest and the key factors you should consider in test case management and exploratory testing.
Modern Professional Scrum using Flow and Kanban - Agile and Beyond Detroit 2019Yuval Yeret
Should you use Scrum or Kanban? You don’t have to choose: Scrum teams improve when they look at flows inside and outside their sprints from a Lean/Kanban perspective. In this session we will talk about Kanban-related myths prevalent in the Scrum world and identify common ground between them. We will look at ways to bring Kanban flow into your Scrum: the Kanban-based Sprint/product backlog, flow-based daily Scrum, visualizing aging work, and flow-based Sprint planning .We will describe ways to wrap Scrum with a Kanban flow system, and how DevOps fits into this picture.
You’ll leave with a better understanding of how Scrum, Kanban, and DevOps relate to each other and with ideas for experiments to try when back at work.
Post-agile approaches - agile for the real world and how to avoid agile failureYuval Yeret
The document discusses various Agile and Lean concepts and frameworks. It begins with an overview of Agile principles and the Agile Manifesto. It then discusses some of the challenges with implementing Agile approaches in reality, including in large legacy organizations. It introduces several frameworks for implementing Agile at scale, including Kanban, Scrum, SAFe. It analyzes the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of each approach. It also discusses ways the different approaches can be combined or evolved to better address real-world challenges. The document advocates for focusing on principles over practices and evolving approaches over time based on learning and experimentation.
Lean Kanban India 2017 | Damn… we missed the date again! | Sudipta LahiriLeanKanbanIndia
Session Title : Damn… we missed the date again!
Session Overview:We have experienced the embarrassment of missing our planned dates. Ironically, this cycle doesn’t end with one instance. We re-commit to another date and miss than again! We are all experienced people, we have been in this business for a long time. Why then do we keep missing our dates again and again?
Scrum makes a sincere attempt in changing this pattern. By making the team estimate how much it can deliver within a Sprint and by mandating that the team should be not be disturbed with changing scope within a Sprint, it attempts to increase the probability of hitting the dates. Yet, it isn’t uncommon for teams to be burnt out by the time the Sprint ends OR for unfinished scope spilling over to the next Sprint.
Clearly, something is wrong at the core. Why is this so difficult? Is it reasonable to keep blaming the team or the people managing the project? This experience isn’t the exception! It is the norm in most teams.
In this session, we discuss what is wrong at the core. What are we missing in our planning? If this does not work, what will? Does Kanban have a solution for this?
At the end of this session, you should be able to learn how not to fall into this trap again!
Lean Kanban India 2019 Conference | Scrumban comes to the rescue: A Case Stud...LeanKanbanIndia
Session Title: Scrumban comes to the rescue: A Case Study
Abstract: In this case study, we discuss the challenges faced by the customer and the project team and how Scrumban helped the customer navigate through these challenges. We highlight how Metrics helped the team in its planning, forecasting and identifying their Continuous Improvement steps.
I gave this presentation at Lean Kanban Asia-Pacific conference in Bangalore, India on December 11th, 2014 and at AgileDC on Washington, USA on October 21st, 2014.
I have several recent blog posts on this topic, This search link should get most of them: http://connected-knowledge.com/?s=lead+time. If you need one "best" post, here it is, Inside a Lead Time Distribution: http://connected-knowledge.com/2014/09/07/inside-lead-time-distribution/
Presentation at the SAFe Summit 2022.
PI Planning is in the bag and the train has left the station, at last, you can relax. Or so you thought…. The first iteration is fairly quiet, the second seems smooth as well and then it happens, without warning you are over halfway through the PI and your train has derailed without any warning. How did this happen?! You held all the PI Execution events as described in the textbook but your train looks like it won't be delivering the cargo to the next station on time. What else could you have done?
What if you applied the Extreme Programming mantra to PI Execution, by taking proven good SAFe practices and then took them to the extreme or as we say turn up the good?
In this long-awaiting sequel to their 2021 SAFe Summit session about “Turning up the magic in PI Planning”, Em & Adrienne will show you how they take PI Execution to the next level by turning up the flow.
Learning outcomes:
- Recognise how the SAFe Principles can be applied to “turn up the flow” in SAFe PI Execution.
- Adapt the batch size of SAFe PI Execution Events to improve flow.
- Introduce new PI Execution patterns that enable greater flow.
This document discusses lead time and how measuring and understanding it can help forecast projects. It defines lead time as the time between one event preceding another. Lead time data can be more useful than just average times since it accounts for variability. The document also discusses using distributions to model different types of work instead of single numbers, as processes are probabilistic rather than deterministic. Measuring lead time and understanding its distribution is important for planning delivery rates and work in process.
This document discusses using a Kanban/Scrum mashup approach to execute fixed price projects. It proposes using Kanban boards to visualize work in progress, limiting work in progress, and tracking progress through burndown charts. It also discusses adapting earned value management techniques to track budget and schedule by defining productivity factors that account for team ramp-up. The approach aims to bring benefits of agile and lean thinking to fixed price projects while addressing needs for budget control and commitment to timelines.
Метрики, которые приносят пользу
Следующие вебинары:
In Search for Team's Efficiency https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/471689760712542978?source=slideshare
Best Tools to Develop Soft Skills in Scrum and Agile Development https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3974870146644735746?source=slideshare
Svetlana Mukhina discusses various metrics that are gathered on agile projects at Luxoft, including capacity, velocity, requirements stability index, burn-down charts, and daily work logs. She explains how each metric is calculated and how they are used to improve planning, track performance, discover issues, and ensure projects are delivered on time. Examples are provided of how metrics have helped Luxoft teams identify bottlenecks and make process improvements.
How to Better Manage Technical Debt While Innovating on DevOpsDynatrace
Forget the “Unicorns.” There is a lot to learn from “DevOps Unicorns” such as Etsy or Facebook, but for enterprises dealing with technical debt in legacy systems developed by teams no longer with the company, copying the unicorns is not an option.
Richard Dominguez, Operations Developer at Prep Sportswear, needed to “keep the lights on” for their legacy systems, while enabling his DevOps teams to launch new features much faster. Today Prep Sportswear releases more updates to their legacy systems than ever before by reducing MTTR (Mean Time To Repair), giving them more time to innovate on DevOps and Continuous Delivery on their new platform. You’ll learn:
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• Tips to manage technical debt in legacy code caused by dev teams long gone
• Efficient ways to close loops while providing input to DevOps so they can optimize innovation and releases
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Learn to see, measure and automate with value stream managementLance Knight
This document discusses using value stream management to see, measure, and automate software delivery processes. It begins by explaining that traditional value stream maps can physically show material and information flows, but software delivery value streams are less tangible. The presentation then demonstrates how to map different flows in a software value stream, including request, development, and operations flows. It also discusses the importance of measuring key metrics in each flow in order to identify improvement opportunities. Finally, it explains how applying lean principles like reducing waste and creating flow can help optimize the software delivery value stream to improve outcomes like quality, speed, and productivity.
Delight Your Customers: The #noestimates Waytroytuttle
This document discusses moving away from estimation practices in software development and instead focusing on delivering value to customers frequently through iterative development. It notes challenges with estimation such as durations often exceeding estimates and the "estimation game" where developers are pressured to provide unrealistic estimates. Instead of estimates, it recommends tracking lead time and throughput to manage workload and using probabilistic forecasts to set expectations on completion times. The document advocates for prioritizing work, analyzing tasks at a high level, and delivering in small batches to get feedback and adapt quickly.
Scrum is a framework for managing product development that emphasizes iterative work cycles, frequent inspection points, and adaptation to change. It consists of sprints, daily stand-ups, sprint planning, reviews, and retrospectives. Benefits include increased responsibility, reduced risk, motivation, and continuous improvement. However, it can also be verbose with meetings and interrupt development flow if not implemented properly.
This document discusses key performance indicators (KPIs) for measuring agile projects. It begins by defining metrics and KPIs, noting that KPIs should be tied to strategic objectives and have defined targets. It then discusses characteristics of good KPIs and provides examples of both traditional and agile KPIs related to time, effort, scope, and quality. The document cautions that too many KPIs can be useless and advocates keeping metrics simple. It also discusses challenges like cheating on metrics and provides tips for using tools and dashboards to effectively measure agile performance.
Have your Agile practices become stale or redundant? Does it feel like your team is just going through the motions? Have team members asked to discontinue “critical Agile practices” and ceremonies?
In Lean product development, the minimum viable product or MVP, is defined as the product with the highest return on investment versus risk. It’s a strategy to avoid building products that customers don’t need or want by maximizing our learning of what is valuable to the customer.
Agile is typically learned through exposure to a series of Agile practices, a recipe of sorts. But what if that recipe goes beyond minimal? Have we replaced heavy waterfall process with heavy Agile process?
This session will interrogate the thinking behind some of the Agile sacred cows like detailed sprint planning, detailed release planning, and even some popular estimation techniques. We will try to identify what is truly needed to be Agile, based on needs instead of prescribed recipes. What is minimally sufficient to start realizing the benefits of Agile?
What is your MVA? It might be different than you think!
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In this slidedeck, we help explain how our messaging to the Leadership team, that is largely experienced in conventional ways of software development, must change to help them understand how Lean-Agile thinking drive Business Agility. This specific presentation is focussed on how the messaging around Requirements needs to change!
The document discusses agile and lean practices used at MediaGeniX, a product company that develops planning software for TV broadcasters. It introduces Extreme Programming (XP), Scrum, Kanban, and lean thinking approaches. MediaGeniX has found value in XP practices like user stories and collective code ownership. Scrum's focus on project management and velocity tracking also provides benefits. Kanban's emphasis on limiting work-in-progress and transparency resonates. Overall, the company aims to continuously improve processes by applying agile and lean principles to better deliver value to customers.
Kanban India 2023 | Sudipta Lahiri | Deliver MVV from your Kanban System.ppsm...LeanKanbanIndia
This document provides tips for delivering value from a Kanban system, beginning with the basics. It recommends using the STATIK method to structure the Kanban system and define the workflow. It suggests distinguishing between upstream and downstream work, with upstream focused on clarifying work and removing impediments. Tips include enforcing user work-in-progress limits to improve flow, monitoring card aging to address slippage, conducting meaningful retrospectives, and humanizing work by celebrating individuals and milestones. For software development teams, it recommends following INVEST principles for user stories, automating where possible, and stopping estimating in favor of prioritizing completed work. The overall message is to start with the basics of Kanban and focus on continuous improvement over
This slidedeck how Program Management as teams and organizations Agile thinking. It helps understand both qualitative and quantitative aspects of Program Management.
Flow - the secret sauce for business agilitySudipta Lahiri
We discuss how Flow is essential to improving an organization's ability to improve its Agility. We discuss two dimensions of flow - flow of work and people experiencing flow. We discuss some of the impediments for both these dimensions and how one could work through them.
Digital transformation for the next decadeSudipta Lahiri
In this talk, I cover the Digital Transformation trends that we will see in the next decade in the context of the changes that we can expect to see in the environment around us. We then talk about how do organizations need to prepare to be able to take advantage of these trends.
Estimation - Delivering Business Agility without EstimationSudipta Lahiri
In this presentation, we explain how Estimation used to be done, its futility, what insights do we learn from the Lean-Agile BoK and how Agility can be delivered without Estimation. Business Leaders still need an understanding of effort, cost and timeline... and all these can be delivered without wasting time on Estimation.
There is a lot of discussion around changing the team mindset! Its become boring... question is - how do you go about doing it. In this presentation that I did at ANI's Online Conference for Team Mindset, I highlight some of things that we did at Digite to help individuals (and teams) make that shift. I am sure different organizations have tried many other things but if you try these, I am confident it would take you a small step forward.
Upstream: Shifting-left towards organization agilitySudipta Lahiri
In this talk, I explain how focusing on Upstream helps the team's move forwards it's objective of Organization Agility. I start by explaining Upstream (vs Downstream), some of it characterestics, the criteria of a good Upstream execution. I finish the talk with prioritisation techniques that can be used in the Upstream process.
Flow Debt is a concept for Kanban systems to understand why CT histograms do not get better despite taking a lot of the obvious steps. Hope you find this useful.
In this Keynote given at Agile Gurugram 2018, I discuss the importance of VSM to Lean/Agile transformation. I explain common areas of confusion and highlight best practices around application of VSM to Knowledge Services.
1. The document discusses how the game has changed for agile and lean adoption and implementation. It highlights how the nature of applications, planning approaches, requirements gathering, testing paradigms, and metrics have fundamentally changed from past practices.
2. Key shifts mentioned include moving from detailed upfront estimation and planning to relative planning approaches like planning poker, embracing feedback and changing requirements over fixed requirements documents, shifting testing to be everyone's responsibility through practices like TDD and continuous integration.
3. The overall message is that merely doing agile ceremonies or practices does not equal true agile adoption - the underlying mindsets, tools, and metrics used must fundamentally change to match the new paradigms.
I gave this presentation at Agile Noida 2016. Toyota Kata, as articulated by Mike Rother, is an approach to establish a culture of Continuous Improvement. In this talk, I have tried to identify a few simple practices that Lean/Agile teams can adopt to help establish a Continuous Improvement culture.
The document discusses Kanban and Kanban boards. It explains that Kanban boards help visualize work, limit work-in-progress, manage flow, make process policies explicit, and facilitate collaborative improvement. This contrasts with traditional project management approaches where tasks often slip and new work is unplanned and causes stress. Kanban principles aim to provide faster value to customers through continual improvement habits and early feedback from demonstrations.
This document introduces the concept of personal kanban, a lean principle for visualizing and limiting work-in-progress to simplify one's workload. It discusses how the presenter used a kanban board to map out tasks from to-do lists and emails into different categories, priorities, and stages to gain control over their work. Applying concepts like recurring tasks, a value stream, and regular cleaning helped establish a sustainable personal workflow. The document encourages readers to try these lean techniques to better execute on what matters and say no to unnecessary work.
Limited WIP Society Bangalore Chapter - Jun 6 2014 MeetupSudipta Lahiri
1) Lean/Kanban principles focus on delivering value to customers, limiting work in progress, and continuously improving processes. Methods like Scrum, Kanban, and lean thinking aim to increase efficiency and flexibility.
2) Traditional software development prioritizes scope, time, and cost, while agile focuses on achieving business goals. Agile principles emphasize individuals and interactions, working software, customer collaboration, and responding to change.
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Training - Introducing Agile, Lean and KanbanSudipta Lahiri
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I recently spoke at Symbiosis University on how WCM (World Class Manufacturing) is being applied to the software industry.
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This presentation shares how the software industry and been adopting many practices from the above techniques over the last decade.
This document discusses adapting kanban methods to fixed-size projects. It proposes using earned value management (EVM) techniques like tracking planned value, earned value, and actual costs to monitor project progress. Cumulative flow diagrams (CFDs) are recommended to visualize work flow and ensure the team is delivering at the desired throughput. When scope changes occur, multiple options should be evaluated using CFDs to determine their impact on capacity, timeline, and planned value before agreeing on an approach with stakeholders.
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2. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Agile/Lean Practitioner and Student
Head of Products @ Digité
ex-Head of Engineering and Professional Services @ Digité
Development of SwiftKanban, SwiftALM products
Organize the LimitedWIP Societies in India
Sudipta Lahiri (Sudi)
2.5+ decades in the industry
2
3. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let us do a quick poll…
All those who have not missed a project deadline, please sit
All those have not missed the same project deadlines more than
once… please sit
All those have not missed the same project deadlines more than
twice... please sit
All those have not missed the same project deadlines more than
thrice… please sit
3
4. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Why does it happen?
Estimates => Deadlines!
Requirement clarity
Often, needs many more
iterations
Turnaround time to sign-offs!
Estimation
Complexity
Experience
of person estimating
of person developing
Hidden work/invisible work
Test Cycles/# of test iteration
90-10% Syndrome
Why does this happen?
Work getting pushed downstream
before it was really ready!
Other reasons…
4
5. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
What do we estimate?
Customers want to know by when something will
get done
We estimate how long its going to take…
… and then we match the two…
… but they don’t match!
5
6. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
What’s our typical reaction to this?
Wish we had planned more!
Wish we had spent more time in estimation!
Wish we had more detailed requirements OR
we had designed in greater detail
Wish we had…
6
8. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Why?
The time that a work item takes to get completed is only
“LITTLE” influenced by its real effort!
SURPRISED…?
You Bet!
For the last 50-60 years, we have spent countless hours in trying
to estimate how much effort the work item takes…
It’s a classic waste/non-value add (in lean language)!
8
11. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
F
F
FF
F
F F
Defining Customer Lead Time
UAT
E
I
Dev
Ready
Delivery
Ready
G
D
5
∞
Pull
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done3 3
Test
Ready
5 ∞
Customer Lead Time
Discarded
J
Pool
of
Ideas
Done
∞
Frequency of batch transfers
needs to be calculated and
added to kanban system lead
time to calculate customer lead
time
Frequency of batch transfers
needs to be calculated and
added to kanban system lead
time to calculate customer lead
time
The clock still starts ticking
when we accept the customers
order, not when it is placed!
Slide from LKU Training Deck
11
13. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Test
Ready
Flow Efficiency
F
E
I
G
D
GY
PB
DE MN
P1
AB
Customer Lead Time
Waiting Waiting WaitingWorking
* Zsolt Fabok, Lean Agile Scotland, Sep 2012, Lean Kanban France, Oct 2012
** Hakan Forss, Lean Kanban France, Oct 2013
Ideas
Dev
Ready
5
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done
3 35
UAT
Release
Ready
∞ ∞
Flow efficiency measures
the percentage of total
lead time is spent
actually adding value
(or knowledge) versus
waiting
Flow efficiency % = Work Time x 100%
Lead Time
Working WaitingWorking
Multitasking means time spent in
working columns is often waiting
time
Slide from LKU Training Deck
Flow efficiencies of 1-5% are
commonly reported. *, **
> 40% is good!
13
14. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Even in a Kanban team like SwiftKanban
Our flow efficiency over a 7 year period < 50%
14
15. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Waiting Waiting WaitingWorking Working WaitingWorking
Test
Ready
Implications of low Flow Efficiency
F
E
I
G
D
GY
PB
DE MN
P1
AB
Ideas
Dev
Ready
5
Ongoing
Development Testing
Done
3 35
UAT
Release
Ready
∞ ∞
Low flow efficiency means that most of lead time is influenced
by environmental factors that are unlikely to change soon
Customer Lead Time
In a low flow efficiency
environment, Class of
service is much more
likely to influence lead
time than any other
factor
As a result, lead time is
not very sensitive to the
size or complexity of a
single work item, or to
the specific people
involved or their
individual capabilities
Slide from LKU Training Deck
15
16. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
This profoundly changes our thinking
of the last 5 decades!
The estimate that we made with a lot effort and diligence isn’t a real factor!
Further… how many assumptions to get to the estimate?
Requirement assumptions
Design assumptions
People skill assumptions
No business interruption/dedicated resource assumptions
Contingency assumptions
Management acceptance of that contingency assumptions…
Estimation bias of the person doing the estimation!
In short, there are simply TOO MANY SYSTEM variables in a system that are NOT in our
control… yet, we estimate with confidence (with buffers)
16
17. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
The odds were always stacked against you to win this game
If you did manage to deliver on time, has someone ever told
you:
You must have buffered your estimates like crazy!”
You got lucky!
… and… you did a good job!
17
19. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Understanding Distributions 19
Most of us think of distributions as a “Bell Curve”
Extremely common in natural domain
A legacy of our appraisal discussions… ?
In a Normal Bell Curve, also called Gaussian Distribution,
Mean(or Average) = Modal
CLT applies (from Wikipedia):
When independent random variables are added, their properly normalized sum tends
toward a normal distribution (a bell curve) even if the original variables themselves are not
normally distributed.
20. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Lead Time & Weibull Distributions
Lead time histograms observed to
be Weibull distributions typically
with shape parameter 1.0 < k <
2.0
This example is a Weibull
distribution with a scale
parameter equal to 65
and shape parameter equal
to 1.4
Outliers with known
special causes at 87 &
105 are omitted from the
“best fit” curve
Slide from LKU Training Deck
20
21. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Lead Time Distribution
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
1 8 15 22 29 36 43 50 57 64 71 78 85 92 99
106
113
120
127
134
141
148
Days
CRs&Bugs
SLA expectation of
44 days with 85% on-time
Mean of 31
days
SLA expectation of
105 days with 98 % on-time
Lead Time Histogram
Slide from LKU Training Deck
21
22. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Lead Time Distribution
0
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
1 8 15 22 29 36 43 50 57 64 71 78 85 92 99
106
113
120
127
134
141
148
Days
CRs&Bugs
SLA expectation of
44 days with 85% on-time
Mean of 31
days
SLA expectation of
105 days with 98 % on-time
This is multi-modal data!
The work is of two types:
Change Requests (new features);
and Production Defects
This is multi-modal data!
The work is of two types:
Change Requests (new features);
and Production Defects
Lead Time Histogram
Slide from LKU Training Deck
22
23. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
85% at
10 days
Mean
5 days
98% at
25 days
ProductionDefects
ChangeRequests
85% at
60 days
Mean
50 days
98% at
150 days
Mode
Median
45 days
Filter by Type/Class to get Single Modal
Data
Slide from LKU Training Deck
23
24. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
ChangeRequests
60 days, SLE (customer expectation)
Use Lead Time Distribution to Evaluate
Service Delivery Effectiveness
22-150 day
spread of variation
85%
on-time
15% late
Due Date
Performance
(DDP)
Predictability
Slide from LKU Training Deck
24
25. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let’s recap
Given the flow efficiency that most systems experience (in low
teens or single digits)…
… to somehow think that more planning and more detailed
estimation will help us predict better when we can deliver our
work item to your customer/end user is “mathematically” flawed!
25
26. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
So… how do stop making wrong commitments?
1. Don’t answer the wrong
question…
How long will this get done?
When will this get done?
How much time this will
take?
How many resources do you
need?
2. The correct question is…
When do you need it?
What is the Cost of Delay?
26
27. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
So… how do make accurate predictions?
We use mathematical basis – Lead Time Histograms
Lead Time Histograms guide us to predict a completion date WITH
ASSOCIATED LEVEL OF CONFIDENCE
27
28. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let’s improve our hit rate… Step 1
Class of Services
If you are not following Kanban, you might commonly call it as
“Priority”
David calls CoS as the “Sonic Screwdriver” for a Kanban System
Use CoS to better meet Due Dates
If a work item gets closer to its Due Date, escalate its CoS to Expedite
The getKanban games gives a good example of how this could work!
28
29. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let’s improve our hit rate… Step 2
Classify your work items with greater clarity/refinement , for
e.g.:
For our SwiftKanban product:
T-shirt sizing: quick and effective
A level of accuracy enough for most cases!
Modules
Nature of work: Defect vs Enhancements
Unit level defect vs Core Scenario Defect
Version No(s): Older versions inherently take more time for us!
29
30. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let’s improve our hit rate… Step 3
Can we reduce the long tail of this distribution….?
Reduce the gap between Modal and Mean
Yes:
By pushing for greater flow (reducing WIP)
Keeping an eye on the age of the work items
Keep some visual indicators when the work items is close the modal value
(Amber) OR when it is closer to the mean value (Red)
30
31. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let’s improve our hit rate… Step 4
Risk Management trims
the tail
31
Identify risks, their likelihood &
impact (delay that extends lead
time).
Eliminating risks or reducing
their impact trims the tail on
the distribution.
Trimming the tail moves the
mean to the left, increasing
delivery rate!
Slide from LKU Training Deck
85th
percentile
mean
Risks often
cause long
lead times
32. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Let’s improve our hit rate… Step 5
Let start the work at the right time… not too early and not too
late!
Not too early… because in the normal environment where Demand >
Supply, you, you could work on something else now, knowing that a
delay in starting will not risk your Completion Date
Not too late…
32
34. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
CoS mapped to Delay Cost Functions
Slide from LKU Training Deck
Class of service and its policiesColor Func
Expedite – white; critical and immediate cost of delay;
can exceed other kanban limit (bumps other work);
limit 1
Fixed date – orange; cost of delay goes up
significantly after deadline
Standard - yellow; increasing urgency, cost of delay is
shallow but accelerates before leveling out
Intangible – blue; cost of delay may be significant but
is not incurred until significantly later, if at all
timeimpact
time
impact
time
impact
time
impact
34
35. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
How easy it is to define the CoD
function?
You know what’s an Expedite work
items!
Product Management should be able
to help you define the “Fixed Date” or
“Intangible” work items
You might struggle to define the
curve for Standards but relative
scaling might be easy
35
40. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
We explained why detailed estimation or planning is unproductive in low
Flow Efficiency systems
End dates predictions aren’t deterministic
They should always be accompanied by a % of confidence
A practical, statistical, fast approach using Lead Time histograms
Lead Time histograms assimilate all system characteristics and eliminates personal
bias
Use CoS and work item characteristics to identify histogram that reflects your work
item most accurately
Use CoD functions, in combination with Lead Time histograms, to understand when
you should start your work
40
41. #LKIN17
@sudiptal
Thank you….
Reach me at:
@sudiptal
slahiri@digite.com
sudiptalahiri.wordpress.com
“Absorb what is useful, discard
what is useless and add what is
specifically your own”
Bruce Lee
Editor's Notes
“Customer Lead Time” is not the same as “System Lead Time”. Customer Lead Time starts when we pull the work (commit to do the work) and includes batch transfers on the delivery end.
Lead time is also affected by Flow Efficiency (see next slides)
Flow efficiency tells us how much of the time the work is moving (flowing) rather than waiting in some sort of delay.
When there is low flow efficiency, class of service can help improve lead time.
We can recognize Lead Time distribution in a curve. Learning to read and interpret the distribution curve is one way to understand opportunities for improvement. This shape is like saying, “Most of the time we deliver fairly quickly but sometimes it takes us much longer, and then gives us our range of predictability”.
Lead time histograms typically exhibit a Weibull distribution curve. Weibull is not a single distribution shape rather it is a family of distribution curves shaped by a parameter referred to as “little k”. A typical value for k is 1.5. The example shown here is from real data for software engineering of telecom-grade equipment and exhibits a k approximately equal to 1.4.
Knowing that lead time typically follows a Weibull distribution is a convenient shorthand for risk management and planning decisions. It is not important to obsess over specific shapes or values of k.
Knowing Lead Time allows for conversations about different delivery expectations and capabilities, based on actual data.
A lead time histogram provides us insight into service delivery capability. For a single service processing a single type of work, we would expect a single mode in the data regardless of how many classes of service are offered. This example has 2 clusters and hence appears multi-modal. The explanation for this is that 2 distinct types of work were being processed through the same workflow.
Our management challenge is that the risk is in the tail of the distribution.
Median is always less than the mean and lies between the mode and the mean. Median is less sensitive to the tail on distribution and hence less variable in the presence of assignable/special cause variation causing a long tail. However, it is the mean that is used in Little’s Law and therefore we do care about risks that affect the tail in the distribution when using Little’s Law to forecast.