The document outlines the top 10 dos and don'ts for agile offshoring in Sweden based on a study conducted by the Agile Offshoring network in Stockholm. The study involved interviews and discussions with companies in Sweden with experience in agile offshoring. The top categories identified were culture, processes, organization, tools, and mindset. The number one do was to get to know offshore team members to understand their skills and capabilities. The number one don't was adopting a "we vs them" mindset between onshore and offshore teams and instead promoting a united team approach.
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The sticky notes that were the output of this interactive session did not come out in the photos, so I quickly had to type them up. As such this is not so much a presentation and I apologise for the boring ‘bullet point’ slides.
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Distributed Agile - Agile Tour Sydney 2013Ziggyggiz
This pack is a record of an interactive session I facilitated for the 2013 Sydney Agile Tour on 29 November.
The sticky notes that were the output of this interactive session did not come out in the photos, so I quickly had to type them up. As such this is not so much a presentation and I apologise for the boring ‘bullet point’ slides.
Sieger de Vries
Sydney
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A challenging economy demands reduced costs and better results. This is all the more apparent with the Small and Medium sized businesses (SMB). Synerjix "Core Teams" is a proven consulting methodology that was derived in the late nineties, utilized by a few fortune 500 firms in the U.S.
Synerjix' 2013 strategy is to co-locate with businesses across the U.S by having partnerships and representations around major U.S business hubs. A consulting methodology that benefited leading U.S corporations is being made available to the SMB with the same levels of attention and care.
Please contact sales@Synerjix.com or visit www.Synerjix.com for more details
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To us, building an effective team is like building a house. You can’t build a reliable house without a sound foundation. Review this webinar presentation to see Tom Hileman's tactics to building and maintaining an effective team.
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Want to ensure everything you do adds value to your business? Want to make a real difference to business performance and customer satisfaction?
This challenge was taken up by London underground’s Sub Surface Upgrade Programme (SUP) 18 months ago amidst a time of cost savings, programme review and ever increasing expectations and scrutiny from our stakeholders and customers.
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This deck explains the principles of developing a kickass engineering team. Several real world examples are provided to explain how to apply the principles.
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OK, I’m ready to DevOp. Now what?
We’ve heard a lot about the technologies behind DevOps, and even a bit on the processes that some DevOps shops employ. What we haven’t heard too much about directly is a fundamental matter of bootstrapping. If you’re a leader or influencer in a software or IT shop, you’re sold on this DevOps idea but overwhelmed by the difference between where you are now and where you need to be, you’ve come to the right place. We’ve heard all about the unicorns of the movement, and what they are doing. Much time is spent talking about their innovative technologies. But how did they get there? Moreover, how can YOU get there? We’re going to spend some time discussing how to get started and find success on the rocky road to DevOps. We’re going to talk about the roles of executives, middle managers, front line managers, and individual contributors in this transformation. We’ll talk about the layered approach to transforming your culture, and building the processes and tool chains on top of it. At the tactical level, we’re going to talk about an example team and what their first year looks like, what are the major milestones they will reach, and how to measure their success along the way.
UX planning is a journey on which you must contemplate four elements in order to achieve harmony. It is only then that you will have mastered Zen and the Art of UX Planning. This deck was created for the 2012 Midwest UX Conference in Columbus, OH.
1. Top 10 do’s and don’ts when doing
Agile offshoring in Sweden
• Ove Holmberg, OHC
• Odd Sivertzen, Rumbline
• Hannes Fries, H&M Hennes & Mauritz
• Johan Berneskog, Don't Stop Believin'
• John Cannerborg, Bridge Global IT Staffin
2. The Agile Offshoring network in
Stockholm
• Founded during the spring of 2012
• IT professionals with different backgrounds and
industries, based in the Stockholm region
o Seven members in the core team
o Total of 25 members accessing our discussions
• Host regular meetings to discuss around the
topics of Agile, Offshoring and the combination
of them
3. The study 10 Do's and Don'ts -
Agile Offshoring in Sweden
• Last decade's increased interest in Offshoring and
Agile processes in Sweden
o Successful, cost effective projects?
• Agile requires tight team work
o How can it be combined with offshoring where team members in
different cultures and timezones?
• Study of companies and organizations in Sweden
actively working with agile offshoring initiatives
• Aim to define a number of important categories and
complete a list of 10 Do's and 10 Don'ts to guide
Swedish organizations
4. How the study was done
• Based on open discussions - common interest in
understanding what makes agile offshoring
initiatives successful
o Focus on Sweden
• Started with survey to find companies and
organizations with experiences to share
o Survey
• In depth interviews
• The core team's own experiences
• Experiences were given scores in voting
o Top 10 Do's and 10 Don'ts
5. Offshore Categories
• The following categories have been identified during
the work:
o Culture
o Geographical distance
o Learning curve
o Processes
o Organization & Roles
o Expections
o Mindset
o Tools
• For each of the items on the Top 10 lists, the
corresponding category is presented
6. #10 - Do - Organization & Roles
Clarify team loyalties
• If the offshore team has a manager setting their bonus
based upon quantity and a you as a project manager
wants other focus, such as good quality - the offshore
manager always will out-rule you.
• Make sure that you are synchronized with the offshore
manager on the expectations of the team.
7. #9 - Do - Processes
Delimit the scope
• Do not rely too much on others' experiences
- each organization is unique
o Delimit the efforts until enough experience is gained to invest
more
• Identify one or a few systems that are most suitable for
offshoring to begin with
o Get it all to work in a small scale first
8. #8 - Do - Tools
Same development tools allover
• Use same development tools offshore as you use
onshore.
o If you use JIRA, GitHub or Leankit internally also let
the offshore team do the same.
• There are a lot of great tools out there, use them!
9. #7 - Do - Mindset
"Big Picture"
• Make sure the offshore team understands the "big
picture" of the project and not only understand the task
they have been assigned.
o Not fun to execute tasks without purpose and
meaning...
o More motivating to be part of something big
o Fair setting to make a good job
o DN.se
10. #6 - Do - Mindset
Long term vision
• If you have the vision of working long term with an
offshore team - Treat the offshore team in the same
way as you treat your onshore team
o Part of intranet
o Internal newsletter
o Let them live by your companies values
o Outcome will be: motivated team members, people
that stay long
11. #5 - Do - Tools
Working infrastructure
• Make sure that you have a infra structure that are on
the same level offshore as you have onshore.
(Good quality of WIFI.)
• "Reduce the distance" with help of good Internet
connections.
• Get rid of all technical barriers
o Video conference system
12. #4 - Do - Processes
Let members of the offshore team work onsite
• Will make the offshore team members feel important
and valuable
• Gain better understanding of the business
• Two teams will get to know each other and become
friends, which benefit the actual work
• Very good incentive as having onsite experience in CV
is valuable and could help for extra motivation
o Onsite rotational program with leads as well as team
members
13. #3 - Do - Processes
Visit the offshore site regularly
• Make sure to meet the development team as well as the
management team.
• The dialogue with the development team should be
made by a technical skilled person (e.g. Solution
Architect) in order to really understand the developers
situation.
• Involve end client
14. #2 - Do - Processes
Establish common values & terminology
and a learning culture
• Establish common values
o Define and exemplify the values that are to be followed
Examples:
• The resources should propose improvements if possible and not just
implement according to the specification
• It is ok to deliver later then planned (in dialogue with the project
manager) if the quality requires
• Establish a common terminology
o Define the entities within the business domain and make shore the offshore
resources understands them
o Define routines for how projects are implemented in your organization align them
with the offshoring part
• Establish a culture of continuous learning in the Agile way of working
o Get the resources used to continuous improvement where they are an important
source for the improvements
15. #1 - Do - Culture, Geographical distance
Get to know the team members
• As with all teams, each member is an individual
• Important to get to know the offshore team members to
learn who does what and to which quality
o Good for assessing what responsibility to give to
whom
• Best way is to spend time with the team, preferably at
the offsite location
16. The final score top 10 Do's
No Description Category
Culture,
#1 Get to know the resources
Geographical distance
Establish common values & terminology and a
#2 Processes
learning culture
#3 Visit the offshore site regularly Processes
#4 Let members of the offshore team work onsite Processes
#5 Working infrastructure Tools
#6 Long term vision Mindset
#7 "Big Picture" Mindset
#8 Same development tools allover Tools
#9 Delimit the scope Processes
#10 Clarify team loyalties Organization & Roles
17. #10 - Don´t - Processes
Don't start any development without defined
criteria's being in place
• Don't allow the development of a Feature to start unless there are:
o Proper specifications
The more complex a Feature is, the more important the specification
is
o Detailed estimates
The bigger a Feature is, the more an estimate needs to be broken
down
o A common understanding between the business side
(requirements owner) and the development team
Could be secured via:
• a short "handover meeting" between the developer and the
requirements owner before the development starts
• a short "handover meeting" between the developer and the tester
before the testing starts
18. #9 - Don´t - Culture
When problems occur, don't focus on who
was responsible
• Present what the problem was and exemplify and
discuss how to avoid the problem in the future
o Speak in general terms instead of focusing on the
individual
• Promote asking as problems occur
o Could be against their culture
o "Very good you asked! This saved us 20 hours as
we now do not have to rewrite this piece of code!"
19. #8 - Don´t - Processes
Don't outsource before internal team is "on
the boat"
• Don't take a management decision to outsource before
internal team is "on the boat". Everyone need to
understand the motive, the benefits and the reason for
doing it.
o Risk for internal conflicts
o Risk that internal team works against the situation
o Workshop
o Interesting input from operations
o Result: motivated staff - successful offshore initiative
20. #7 - Don´t - Processes
Don't underestimate the extra time needed
for admin work
• Team leads will most certain have to spend time in
additional status meetings etc. to get the remote team
up and running
o Easy to underestimate the actual time needed
• The team lead role can potentially be very different from
when only working with local teams
o More regularly checking team status
o Control questions to verify progress is according to
plan
21. #6 - Don´t - Learning curve, Processes
Don't scale up too quickly
• Don't increase the number of projects until the routines are
established and the offshoring team is working well
o Start with one or two pilot projects that are limited in
size and complexity
The planning should allow the project to be successful
o Train the offshoring team regularly in the routines and
the Agile way of working
Get them used to continuous improvement where they are an
important source for the improvements
22. #5 - Don´t - Organization & Roles
Don't forget the business side
• Don't forget to involve the business side (requirements
owner) in the work made by the development team.
• They need to be involved daily and learn to know the
people who work offshore
23. #4 - Don´t - Processes
Don't underestimate the importance of
physical meetings
• "Internal english" takes time to understand
• Body language
• Hard to understand over the phone
24. #3 - Don´t - Culture
Don't assume things
• Don't assume things - instead ask the extra question to
build consensus
o If you have not met
o Different cultures
o Please repeat
25. #2 - Don´t - Culture
Don't underestimate employee resistance
• Organizations that do not have English as their
corporate language or (experience of international
cooperation) will most likely see resistance from
employees
o Linguistic and cultural barrier
Both day-to-day interactions with the remote team
Speaking in front of the team in daily stand-up meetings
• Work with the HR department
• Communicate the motives and goals with the offshoring
initiative
26. #1 - Don´t - Mindset
We and them
• Don't embrace a mindset of "we and them". It should be
us together as a team.
• Teambuild
• Visit a home
• Agree on and communicate the common goal
27. The final score top 10 Dont's
No Description Category
#1 We and them Mindset
#2 Don't underestimate employee resistance Culture
#3 Don't assume things Culture
#4 Don't underestimate the importance of physical meetings Processes
#5 Don't forget the business side Organization & Roles
#6 Don't scale up too quickly Learning curve, Processes
#7 Don't underestimate the extra time needed for admin work Processes
#8 Don't outsource before internal team is "on the boat" Processes
#9 When problems occur, don't focus on who was responsible Culture
Don't start any development without defined criteria's being
#10 Processes
in place
28. Thanks for listening
• Contact us on LinekdIn:
http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=4404631