Agile 2012 - An Agile Adoption and Transformation Survival Guide

@MichaelSahota

Agile 2012Grapevine, TX

About Michael

17 years IT11 years Agile

STRATEGIC PLAY®

Session Outline

Agile Failure

Company Culture

Pick the Right Tool

Big PictureMindset

Agile Transformation

Agile Adoption

Agile Failure

http://www.flickr.com/photos/akeg/2230862848/

Quick Survey – What Agile Adoption Success have you seen?

• 5 = Every time a success

• ...• 0 = Every time a

failure

• Raise your hand when your number comes up… Photo CC

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lindsey_catherine/5808320129

Agile Tour Toronto 2011

XP Toronto Mtg 2011

Agile New England 2011

148 People PolledAverage: 2.8 out of 5

Causes of Agile Failure

Copyright VersionOne 2011

Barriers to Further Agile Adoption

Company Culture

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lokner/4164251472

Why is Culture Important?

Edgar ScheinProfessor MIT Sloan School of Management

“The only thing of real importance

that leaders do is to create and manage

culture.”

“If you do not manage culture, it manages you, and you may not even be aware of the extent to which this is happening.”

Photo courtesy: http://leadership-tdoerffer.blogspot.com/2010/11/enjoy-interview-with-prof-edgar-schein.html

Your Turn to Play

Agile Tour Toronto 2011

Agile New England 2011

Example Survey Question

When all is said and done, the way we accomplish success in this organization is to:

1. Create an organization that has the highest possible level of competence and capitalize on that competence.

2. Get and keep control.3. Provide the conditions whereby the people within

the organization can develop and make valuable accomplishments.

4. Put a collection of people together, build them into a team, and charge them with fully utilizing one another as resources.

Graphic © Jurgen Appelo

Kanban Principles (Anderson)

First adopt the foundational principles

• Start with what you do now

• Agree to pursue incremental, evolutionary change

• Respect the current process, roles, responsibilities & titles

Then (use the 5 Core Properties)

1. Visualize the workflow2. Limit WIP3. Manage Flow4. Make Process Policies

Explicit5. Improve Collaboratively

(using models & the scientific method)

http://agilemanagement.net/index.php/Blog/the_principles_of_the_kanban_method/

Pick the Right Tool

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lenore-m/2515800654

Working with Existing Culture

Kanban is Like an Oreo Cookie!

Outside: Crunchy Control

Inside: Sweet White Agile Goodness (collaboration, cultivation and craftsmanship)

Craftsmanship as a starting place

Agile as a Starting Place?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kalavinka/4617897952

What are your goals?

Pascal Van Cauwenberghe

Photos©http://www.flickr.com/photos/pascalvancauwenberghe/3053517274

My main focus is to stop companies from doing Agile.

Namiya.be

Agile Mindset

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tza/3214197147

Doing Agile

Being Agile

Agile Practices

Thanks, Bob Hartman

Adoption of Agile Practices in a Mismatched Culture

Agile Transformation

Adoption in a Supportive Culture (the Squishy Middle)

http://www.wanderingthought.com/2012/01/squishy-balls.html

Adoption

Transformation

Adoption of Agile Practices in a Mismatched Culture

Adoption - Practices Doing AgileWhen culture is not compatible with Agile Incremental Adoption

Look at Context Pain Practice

Avoid Scrum Agile Manifesto

See “Agile Adoption Patterns: A Roadmap to

Organizational Success” by Amr Elssamadisy “Becoming Agile in an Imperfect World” provides a

lot of practical advice on adopting Agile [Smith & Sidky].

Agile Transformation

NOT Well Understood

Agile Is Not Enough

Adoption in a Supportive Culture (the Squishy Middle)

http://www.wanderingthought.com/2012/01/squishy-balls.html

Plan for Hard Conversations

Photos©http://www.flickr.com/photos/pascalvancauwenberghe/3053517274 and The Innovation Games Company

Johnny Scarborough

Agile is about people, and as such they will

tend to be largest obstacles, we will need

to have serious conversations at some point if we really want

to go Agile.

Some Interesting Patterns of Transformation

#1 Build Adapters

http://www.flickr.com/photos/exothermic/2547162058

WARNING: This will fail eventually*

#2 Incubate Transformational Leadership

• Live the values• Lead by example• Seek to truly understand their culture• Be as transparent as the teams they leadSee presentation: Agile From the Top Down:

Executives & Leadership Living Agile by Jon Stahlhttp://www.slideshare.net/LeanDog/agile-from-the-top-down

Leaders go first!

#3 Develop Transformational Leadership Team

Deep alignment between leadership teams’ personal visions and organizational compelling shared vision

Continued commitment to maintaining integrity and sacredness of leadership team

See Temenos retreat @Siraju

Ref: http://adaptivecollaboration.com/2012/04/23/temenos-retreat-a-journey-of-change/

Agile in the Big Picture

http://www.flickr.com/photos/_brilho-de-conta/400937249

Transforming the World of Work

Session Outline

Agile Failure

Company Culture

Pick the Right Tool

Big PictureMindset

Agile Transformation

Agile Adoption

Resources• These slides are available on

slideshare• Free eBook:

http://www.infoq.com/minibooks/agile-adoption-transformation

• Videos, Blog Postshttp://agilitrix.com/2011/04/agile-culture-series-reading-guide/

CC @MichaelSahota