1 © 2008 - 2013 Scaled Agile, Inc. and Leffingwell, LLC. All rights reserved.
© 2008 - 2013 Scaled Agile, Inc. and Leffingwell, LLC.
Scaled Agile Framework ® is a trademark of Leffingwell, LLC.
Finding the Value Stream
and Launching Agile
Release Trains
July 16th, 2013
Dean Leffingwell
East Coast Scaled Agile Meetup Sponsored by:
2 © 2008 - 2013 Scaled Agile, Inc. and Leffingwell, LLC. All rights reserved.
About Dean Leffingwell
Founder and CEO ProQuo, Inc., Internet
identity
Senior VP Rational Software
Responsible for Rational
Unified Process (RUP) &
Promulgation of UML
Founder/CEO Requisite, Inc.
Makers of RequisitePro
Founder/CEO RELA, Inc.
Colorado MEDtech
Creator: Scaled
Agile Framework
Agile Enterprise
Coach To some of the
world’s largest
enterprises
Agile Executive Mentor BMC, John Deere
Chief Methodologist Rally Software
Cofounder/AdvisorPing Identity, Roving Planet,
Silver Creek Systems, Rally
Software
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About the Scaled Agile
Framework® (SAFe )
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The Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe)
The Scaled Agile Framework is a proven, publicly-facing framework
for applying Lean and Agile practices at enterprise scale
Synchronizes alignment,
collaboration and delivery
Well defined in books
and now on the web
Scales successfully to large
numbers of practitioners and
teams
Core values:
1. Code Quality
2. Program Execution
3. Alignment
4. Transparency
®
http://ScaledAgileFramework.com
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Agile Teams
Empowered, self-organizing, self-managing teams with
developers, testers, and content authority
Teams deliver valuable, fully-tested software increments every
two weeks
Teams apply Scrum project management practices and XP
technical practices
Teams operate under program vision, system, architecture and
user experience guidance
Value description via User Stories
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Scale to the Program Level
Common sprint lengths and normalized estimating
Face-to-face planning cadence provides development
collaboration, alignment, synchronization, and assessment
Value description via Features and Benefits
Self-organizing, self-managing team-of-agile-teams committed
to continuous value delivery
Continuously aligned to a common mission around enterprise
value streams
Deliver fully tested, system-level solutions every 8-12 weeks.
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Scale to the Portfolio
Centralized strategy, decentralized execution
Investment themes provide operating budgets for release trains
Business and architectural epic kanban systems provide visibility
and work-in-process limits for product development flow
Enterprise architecture is a first class citizen
Objective metrics support governance and kaizen
Value description via Business and Architectural Epics
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Where Do You Begin?
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Where Do You Begin?
So...
You want to scale...
You’ve selected
SAFe...
Where do you begin?
Portfolio
Level?
Program Level?
Team
Level?
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Should You Start at the Portfolio Level?
Requires lean-thinking
leaders and an Agile
PMO who understand
lean economics
Can be delayed due to
the complex
organizational and
cultural changes needed
for a full enterprise
transformation
Difficult to manage
software “assets” in a
Lean|Agile portfolio if
asset development isn’t
agile
Portfolio
Level?
Program Level?
Team
Level?
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Should You Start at the Team Level?
It’s easy (of course it is!)
Implementing team-by-team
typically begins with your
simplest systems and stand-
alone teams (“a “pilot”) but do
we know how to address...
– Teams with disparate
practices?
– Managing dependencies?
– Alignment and guidance?
You can measure
efficacy of a process
at a small scale...
But who cares?
Delays dealing with the
real challenges of
implementing agile at scale
Portfolio
Level?
Program Level?
Team
Level?
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Should You Start at the Program Level?
Requires more organization
than going team-by-team,
but significantly
less effort than a “big
bang” enterprise
transformation
Makes visible the real
challenges of agile at scale
Bigger, better results get
more attention
Gives true, fact-based
measures of enterprise
agility... the ability to quickly
deliver quality software
incrementally in a large,
complex enterprise
Portfolio
Level?
Program Level?
Team
Level?
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Agile Release Trains
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The Agile Release Train
A virtual organization of 5 – 12 teams (50-100 individuals) that
plans, commits, and executes together
Common cadence and normalized story point estimating
Aligned to a common mission via a single program backlog
Operates under architectural and UX guidance
Produces valuable and evaluate-able system-level Potentially
Shippable Increments (PSI) every 8-12 weeks
The ART is a long-lived, self-organizing team of agile teams
that delivers solutions
Define new functionality
Implement Acceptance
Test Deploy
Repeat until further notice. Project chartering not required.
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Develop on Cadence. Deliver on Demand.
Development occurs on a fixed cadence. The business decides when
value is released.
Deliver on Demand
Major
Release Customer
Upgrade
Customer
Preview
Major
Release New
Feature
Develop on Cadence
PSI PSI PSI PSI PSI
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Rules of the Release Train
PSI dates for the solution are fixed
Estimating, planning and asset integration coordinated with
two-week sprint length, aligned cadence and normalized
estimating
Fortnightly (every two weeks) system integration and system
demo milestones are enforced
All “cargo” (code, docs, supplemental) goes on the train
The system always runs
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Designing Your ARTs:
First Find the Value Stream
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What is a Value Stream?
A Value Stream is a sequence of activities
intended to produce a consistent set of
deliverables of value to customers
Questions to identify value streams
– What products and services does the enterprise
deliver?
– How do the customers view the flow of value to
them?
Claims processing
solution
Define new functionality
Implement Acceptance
Test Deploy
R E P E A T
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Value at Scale is Distributed
Teams may or may not be agile, and are likely to be
geographically dispersed
Agile teams
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Finding The Kidney
“Finding the kidney” is a thinking tool to identify the value stream
within which we can build one or more Agile Release Trains
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Questions to Help Find the Value Stream
General Questions
What are the larger, ongoing or anticipated
software-based business objectives, themes,
or initiatives that will differentiate the business
in the market for years to come?
How do the external customers describe or
perceive the flow of value to them? (Hint, look
at the categories on the companies website).
What current initiatives have 30-50-70 or more
devs and testers working together already, or
have a high degree of interdependencies of
their features and components?
Though value streams may be hard to find, there are powerful
questions which can help identify them
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Specific Questions
Questions for the Independent Software Vendor
What products, systems, services, solutions, suites or
packages does the enterprise sell now?
Questions for IT
What key business processes do you enable?
What internal departments do you support?
What internal or external customers do those departments
serve? How do those departments describe the value they
receive from you?
What key process, cost, KPI, or business improvement
initiatives are targeted in the upcoming year?
Questions for Embedded Systems
What key system operational capabilities are you enabling?
What critical nonfunctional requirements are you
implementing or addressing?
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Questions to Help Identify the ART Opportunity
What program might adopt the new
process the fastest?
Which executives are ready for a
transition?
What are the geographical locations
and how are the team members
distributed?
What programs are most challenged,
or represent the biggest
opportunities?
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How Big Can Agile Release Trains Be?
Effective Agile Release Trains typically consist of 50 - 125 people
Dunbar’s number “…a suggested cognitive limit to
the number of people with whom one can maintain
stable social relationships”*
Empirical evidence. Beyond 125, logistics and inter-
team dependencies are more difficult. Alignment is
harder to achieve.
Queue size and WIP. Larger numbers of teams create
more dependencies (per team), longer delay queues,
and more work in process
* – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunbar%27s_number
Dunbar’s number – a range of 100-230
people Optimum ART size is based on:
BO
Internal
queue
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When You Find It..
GO!
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Standard Quickstart Training Program
When you find a value stream, go “All In” and “All at Once” for that
train
Training:
SAFe ScrumXP Release
Planning
SAFe Scrum
Master
Quickstart
SAFe
Product
Owner
Quickstart
Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri
Train everyone at
the same time
Same instructor,
same method
Most cost effective
Align all teams to
common objectives
Commitment
Continue training
during planning
Orientation for
specialty roles
Open spaces
Tool training for
teams
To
ol tra
inin
g
GO.
AGILE.
NOW.
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Release Planning
Two days every 8-12 weeks
Everyone attends in person if at all possible
Product Management owns feature priorities
Development team owns story planning and high-level estimates
Architects, UX folks work as intermediaries for governance,
interfaces and dependencies
Result: A committed set of program objectives for the next PSI
Cadence-based PSI/Release Planning meetings are the “pacemaker”
of the agile enterprise
Sign up for the next webinar!
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Questions?
Next Steps
Browse the Framework
ScaledAgileFramework.com
Join the community and
download this presentation
community.ScaledAgile.com
Sign up for the next Webinar:
Running and ART Planning Meeting
July 18th, 10 am MDT
ScaledAgileAcademy.com
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