on a three year large scale agile adoption · agile adoption be entertained enough time for...

retrospectiveOn a three year large scale agile adoption

Ahmad Fahmy

Definition of Done

Let me know if I met my DoD

@fahmyboy or contact@ahmadfahmy.com

Get an

“idea” of

why true

agile

adoptions

are so hard

4 things to

remember

for your

agile

adoption

Be

entertained

Enough

time for

questions

Scale

London NYC/NJ Chicago

• Began in 2011• Large financial

*services* institution• 7 Cities• 60+ teams (500+

People)

• Focus on education first. CSM, Lean, CleanCode, etc

• Invest in engineering & CI capability up front

• Team self selection• Co-Location• Feature team self managed• Focus on visual management and

lean principles• No ScrumBut baked in at the start• We set out to do this right• Many successes & some failures• 100’s of lessons

Adoption ApproachBackground

Business

Management

Business Analysts

Project Management

QAComponent Development Teams Architecture

Product Owner

Feature team

Feature team

Feature team

Why are Agile adoptions so difficult

Lipstick on a pig adoptions

Business

Management

Business Analysts

Project Management

QAComponent Development Teams Architecture

• True agile adoptions are about changing culture. There is nothing harder.

• You are giving true transparency where there once was magic.

• You are giving developers greater accountability where they were once told what to do

• Ignore at your own peril• Cypher vs Mr Smith vs Mr Anderson

Lesson 1 You are changing culture not process

Lesson 2 Eat your own dog food

Agile

1. Create a team2. Create a backlog of the

organization3. Pick the right slice4. Ready for sprint. The red

pill test5. Define the problem you

are trying to solve.6. Pick the right

methodology for the problem

7. Create a definition of done. (e.g. 3 successful sprints releasing valuable high quality code)

8. Create success early. This creates pull.

• Doing Scrum/Kanban are not wins. Shipping software is. Don’t declare success too early

• Billy Bean introduced a new way of selecting players and was shunned by the baseball establishment

• 20 game win streak despite having one of the lowest pay rolls in the industry

• Changed the way baseball is played

Lesson 3 Get *real* wins early

Lesson 4 Hire the best

• Process is not enough• Hire the best engineers• Hire great product people• Hire great coaches

Definition of Done

Let me know if I met my DoD

@fahmyboy or contact@ahmadfahmy.com

Get an

“idea” of

why true

agile

adoptions

are so hard

• Culture

• Dog food

• Baseball

• A-Team

Be

entertained

Enough

time for

questions