The Disciplined Agile Enterprise: Harmonizing Agile and Lean

The
Disciplined
Agile
Enterprise:
Harmonizing
Agile
and
Lean
Scott W. Ambler
scott@scottambler.com
Twitter: @scottambler
SARAJEVO, 27.10.2014

Before we
begin…
© Scott Ambler + Associates 3

© Scott Ambler + Associates
4
We’re going to
cover a lot of
ground

The Surveys
• Results of survey-based research will be shared throughout this
deck
• Availability:
– Detailed results are available free of charge at Ambysoft.com/
surveys/
– Includes all questions as asked, source data, and summary slide
decks
• Types of surveys:
– DDJ: Cross paradigm survey sponsored by Dr Dobb’s Journal
– Ambysoft: Agile-oriented survey sponsored by Ambysoft Inc.
– SA+A: Agile oriented survey sponsored by Scott Ambler + Associates

The Story I’m About
to Tell

• An agile enterprise is able to
anticipate and respond
swiftly to changes in the
marketplace.
• It does this through an
organizational culture and
structure that facilitates
change within the context of
the situation that it faces.
• Agile enterprises require a
learning mindset in the
mainstream business and
underlying lean and agile
processes to drive
innovation.
Agile
Enterprise

• An Agile IT
organization must be
responsive to the
needs of the rest of the
enterprise while
“keeping the lights on”.
• An Agile IT
organization does this
via three ongoing
efforts:
– Plan
– Build
– Run
Agile Enterprise
Agile
IT

• Disciplined agile
delivery teams produce
consumable solutions
often and early
• Agile delivery teams
must tailor their
approach to address
the situation that the
find themselves in,
particularly when
working at scale –
Context counts
Agile
Dev
Agile Enterprise
Agile IT

Let’s explore
five important questions….
What is the current state of agile?
What is an agile enterprise?
What does agile IT look like?
How does agile delivery work in enterprises?
How do you transition to enterprise agility?
10

The
Current
State of
Agile

How Would You Characterize Your Team’s
Development Process?
Ad Hoc, 13%
Iterative, 19%
Lean, 7% Other, 2%
Traditional, 8%
Agile, 52%
Source: DDJ State of the IT Union 2014 Q2 Survey
12

I would rate my organization’s adoption of
agile as…
Great success,
11%
Success, 33%
Great failure,
Failure, 5%
Neither, 40%
2%
Too early to
tell, 11%
Source: SA+A 2014 Agile Adoption Survey
13

Organizations Are Successfully Applying Agile at
Levels of Scale
Team Size
Two Hundreds
Geographic Distribution
Co-located Global
Organizational Distribution
Single division Outsourcing
Compliance
None Life critical
Domain Complexity
Straightforward Very complex
Technical Complexity
Straightforward Very complex
Source: DDJ Summer 2012 State of the IT Union Survey
14

What Scaling Factors Do Software
Development Teams Face?
61%
44%
Team Size > 10
Geographically Distributed
Organizationally Distributed
Compliance
Complex Domain
Copyright 2014 Scott W. Ambler www.ambysoft.com/surveys/
92%
70%
61%
43%
68%
48%
90%
50%
66%
42%
Complex Technology
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
All Teams Agile Teams
Source: DDJ State of the IT Union 2014 Q2 Survey

Common Enterprise Challenges to Agile
• Bureaucratic cultures
• Differing IT and business goals
• Short term investment horizons
• Inflexible governance
• Little support for learning and
experimentation
• Organizational dependencies

The Agile
Enterprise

Let’s assume
that agile software
development
is the center
of the universe
for your organization…

Agile/Scrum is a Good Starting Point
19
• Construction focus
• Value driven lifecycle
• Self-organizing teams
• Prescriptive
• Project team aware

DAD Solidifies the Foundation
• Delivery focus
• Risk-value driven lifecycle
• Self-organization with
appropriate governance
• Goal driven
• Enterprise aware
20

• Large teams
• Geographically distributed
teams
• Compliance
• Domain or technical
complexity
• Cultural issues
• Organizational distribution
21

Individuals must become a truly
agile practitioner within the
evolving context of the situation
that they face
They will require training,
education and coaching
22

Teams will self organize their
work strategy, their structure,
and their collaboration paths
to reflect the context of the
situation that they find
themselves in
They will require guidance to
do so effectively
23

IT departments are often
sophisticated entities with teams
addressing a wide range of
situations and a wide range of
goals
Agile delivery teams are just part
of the overall mix, as are
operations teams, architecture
teams, portfolio management
teams, and many more
IT organizations will need to
adopt a wide range of strategies
that reflect the challenges that
they face
24

An agile enterprise is able to
anticipate and respond swiftly to
changes in the marketplace.
It does this through an
structure that facilitates change
within the context of the situation
that it faces.
Agile enterprises require a
processes to drive innovation.
25

The Agile IT
Department

Why Many IT Departments Are Moving to Agile
70%
10%
20%
Plan
Build
Run
Current
50%
40%
Desired
10%
Plan
Build
Run
Plan – Guide the organization in IT-related manners
Build – Software teams provide consumable solutions on a regular
basis following lifecycles reflecting the context they face
Run – Operate and support the IT ecosystem

The Agile IT Department: Plan
People Management
Portfolio Management
Program Management
Enterprise Architecture
Reuse Engineering
Data Management

The Agile IT Department: Build
Continuous Delivery
Exploratory/Lean Startup
Lean/Kanban
Agile/Scrum
Other

The Agile IT Department: Run
Release Management
Operations
Support
Continuous Improvement
Governance

What Does DevOps
Mean to Your
Organization?
Continuous delivery?
+ streamlined operations
and support?
Streamlined build (dev) +
streamlined run (ops)?
Your DevOps strategy will
reflect your organizational goals

What Does “Agile at
Scale” Mean to Your
Organization?
Large-scale Scrum?
Build for large agile/lean teams?
Agile for the IT department?
There is no one right answer for
how to scale agile to the IT
level.

Disciplined
Agile
Delivery
(DAD)

Disciplined Agile Delivery
(DAD) is a process decision
framework
The key characteristics of DAD:
– People-first
– Goal-driven
– Hybrid agile
– Learning-oriented
– Full delivery lifecycle
– Solution focused
– Risk-value lifecycle
– Enterprise aware

The DAD framework fully
addresses the agile and lean
portions of Build…
Continuous Delivery
Exploratory/Lean Startup
Lean/Kanban
Agile/Scrum

High Level Lifecycle
There’s more to solution delivery than construction

Basic/Agile Lifecycle
A full Scrum-based agile delivery lifecycle.

Exploratory “Lean Startup” Lifecycle
Sometimes it takes time to identify what your
stakeholders actually need

Lean Lifecycle
A full lean delivery lifecycle

Lean Continuous Delivery Lifecycle
Your evolutionary
end goal?

DAD is Goal-Driven, Not Prescriptive

DAD Teams Are Enterprise Aware
• DAD teams strive to
leverage and enhance the
existing organizational
eco system wherever
possible
• Implications:
– Work closely with
enterprise groups
– Follow existing
roadmap(s) where
appropriate
– Leverage existing assets
– Enhance existing assets

Governance is Built Into DAD
• Governance strategies built into DAD:
– Risk-value lifecycle
– Light-weight milestone reviews
– “Standard” opportunities for increased visibility and to steer the team
provided by agile
– Enterprise awareness
– Robust stakeholder definition

The DAD framework is now being
extended to address Plan and Run
People Management
Portfolio Management
Program Management
Enterprise Architecture
Reuse Engineering
Data Management
Release Management
Operations
Support
Continuous Improvement
Governance

Our Claim: The DAD
framework provides
a solid foundation
from which to scale
agile

52
Transforming
your
Organization

The Usual Transformation Strategy
Dev
Team 1
Dev
Team 2
Dev
Team 3
Dev
Team 4
The Plan:
Dev
Team N
…
Dev
Team 1
Dev
Team 2
Dev
Team 3
Dev
Team 4
What Often Happens:
Fail
53
Observation:
You must address more than just the build aspects of IT.

An Enterprise Aware Transformation Strategy
Dev
Team 1
Dev
Team 2
Dev
Team 3
Dev
Team 4
Dev
Team N
…
Enterprise
Architecture
Data
Management IT Governance …
54
Observation:
Plan and Run have different adoption time frames than Build.

Your Transformation Strategy Needs to Address…
People &
Culture
Process
Tools
55
Observation:
All three categories are
important and
interconnected. 70%
20%
10%

How difficult were the following issues to
address during your Agile Adoption?
Changing our business culture
Adopting agile technical practices
Changing our IT culture
Using our existing tools in an agile manner
Adopting new agile development tools
Adopting agile management practices
Most
Difficult
Least
Difficult
56

How important were the following issues to
address during your Agile Adoption?
Changing our business culture
Adopting agile management practices
Changing our IT culture
Adopting agile technical practices
Adopting new agile development tools
Using our existing tools in an agile manner
Most
Important
Least
Important
57

Some Realities of Agile Transformation
• Coaches are very easy to find, good coaches experienced in enterprise
agile are not
• Transforming a few delivery teams is easy, transforming an organization
is not
• Effective coaches engage concurrently with:
– Delivery teams
– IT teams
– With the rest of the business
• Transformation takes:
– Years
– Ongoing investment
– Ongoing sponsorship

The Story I Told

• Disciplined agile
delivery teams produce
consumable solutions
often and early
• Agile delivery teams
must tailor their
approach to address
the situation that the
find themselves in,
particularly when
working at scale –
Context counts
Agile
Delivery

• An Agile IT
organization must be
responsive to the
needs of the rest of the
enterprise while
“keeping the lights on”.
• An Agile IT
organization does this
via three ongoing
efforts:
– Plan
– Build
– Run
Agile
Delivery
Agile IT

• An agile enterprise is able to
anticipate and respond
swiftly to changes in the
marketplace.
• It does this through an
structure that facilitates
change within the context of
the situation that it faces.
• Agile enterprises require a
processes to drive
innovation.
Agile
Delivery
Agile Enterprise
Agile IT

My parting advice….
Your organization is unique.
You need to tailor your
approach to reflect the evolving
context of the situation that you
face.
One “process size” does not fit
all, one organizational strategy
does not fit all, nor does one
tooling strategy.

Got Discipline?
DisciplinedAgileConsortium.org
DisciplinedAgileDelivery.com
ScottAmbler.com

Thank You!
scott [at] scottambler.com
@scottwambler
AgileModeling.com
AgileData.org
Ambysoft.com
DisciplinedAgileConsortium.org
DisciplinedAgileDelivery.com
ScottAmbler.com

Would You Like This Presented
to Your Organization?
Contact us at ScottAmbler.com

Scott Ambler + Associates is the thought leader behind the Disciplined
Agile Delivery (DAD) framework and its application. We are a boutique
IT management consulting firm that advises organizations to be more
effective applying disciplined agile and lean processes within the
context of your business.
Our website is ScottAmbler.com
We can help

Additional Slides

Shuhari and Disciplined Agile Certification
At the shu stage you are beginning to learn
the techniques and philosophies of
disciplined agile development. Your goal
is to build a strong foundation from which
to build upon.
At the ha stage you reflect upon and
question why disciplined agile strategies
work, seeking to understand the range of
strategies available to you and when they
are best applied.
At the ri stage you seek to extend and
improve upon disciplined agile techniques,
sharing your learnings with others.
© Disciplined Agile Consortium 69

DAD is a Hybrid Framework
DevOps …and more
Outside In Dev. “Traditional” Agile Data
Extreme
Programming
Unified Process Agile Modeling
Scrum
Kanban Lean
DAD leverages proven strategies from several sources,
providing a decision framework to guide your adoption and
tailoring of them in a context-driven manner.
SAFe

Disciplined Agilists Take a Goal Driven Approach
* Option
Goal Factor
Advantages
Disadvantages
Considerations
Default Option
*
Explore the Initial
Scope
Form the
Initial Team
Address
Changing
Stakeholder
Needs
Source
Team size
Team structure
Team members
Geographic distribution
Supporting the team
Availability
Indicates a preference for
the options towards the
top
Co-located
Partially dispersed
Fully dispersed
Distributed subteams

Collaboration Pattern: Enterprise IT Team
• Individuals are members of both a delivery team
and an enterprise team
• Common examples include:
– Architecture Ownership Team (Enterprise
Architecture)
– Product Ownership Team (Product Management)
– Product Delivery Office (Portfolio Management)
• The delivery teams determine who will be in the
enterprise role for them
• Potential scheduling challenges for the people
in the enterprise roles due to multi-team
commitments
• The leaders of each enterprise team may be a
full time position
72
Enterprise
Team
Delivery
Team

Example: Architecture Ownership (AO) Team
73
• Responsible for developing
the architecture/technology
roadmap
• Delivery teams determine
who the architecture owner
(AO) is, and that person
becomes part of the AO
team
• The AO team meets
regularly to evolve the
roadmap based on the
hands-on learnings from the
AOs
• Ecommerce organization: 7
person AO team (of 250 IT
people)
• Software product org: 10
person AO team (of 130 IT
people)

Collaboration Pattern: Services Team
• Specialized services teams fulfill requests
from delivery teams
• Common examples of specialized services:
– Infrastructure/network
– Database administration
– Security
– Facilities
• The specialized services team will often
have a service level agreement (SLA) that
the work to
• Potential for the services team to become a
bottleneck
• They may supply specialists on a short
term basis to some delivery teams
74
Service Request
Delivery
Team
Service
Team
Service

Example:
Database Administration (DBA) Team
• Responsible for supporting database development and database operation
75
in production
• The delivery team submits a request, the DBA Team prioritizes it and then
fulfills it
• Ecommerce org: 5 person team (of 250 IT people)
• Software org: 2 person team (of 40 IT people)

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