Finding the Value Stream and Launching Agile Release Trains (ARTs)

1 © 2008 - 2013 Scaled Agile, Inc. and Leffingwell, LLC. All rights reserved.

© 2008 - 2013 Scaled Agile, Inc. and Leffingwell, LLC.

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Finding the Value Stream

and Launching Agile

Release Trains

July 16th, 2013

Dean Leffingwell

East Coast Scaled Agile Meetup Sponsored by:


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


About the Scaled Agile

Framework® (SAFe )


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

http://scaledagileframework.com/



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


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.


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


Where Do You Begin?


Where Do You Begin?

So...

You want to scale...

You’ve selected

SAFe...

Where do you begin?

Portfolio

Level?

Program Level?

Team

Level?


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?


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?


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?


Agile Release Trains


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.


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


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


Designing Your ARTs:

First Find the Value Stream


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


Value at Scale is Distributed

Teams may or may not be agile, and are likely to be

geographically dispersed

Agile teams


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


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


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?


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?


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


When You Find It..

GO!


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.


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!


Questions?

Next Steps

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download this presentation

community.ScaledAgile.com

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Running and ART Planning Meeting

July 18th, 10 am MDT

ScaledAgileAcademy.com

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Finding the Value Stream and Launching Agile Release Trains (ARTs)