1.
Tracie Winbigler
winbigler@ngs.org
National Geographic Society
October 7, 2013

2.
Agenda
§ History of National Geographic
§ National Geographic Products
§ Membership as a Key Initiative
§ Agile learning with Membership example
§ Agile Actions and Improvements

3.
“The
advisability
of
organizing
a
society
for
the
increase
and
diffusion
of
geographic
knowledge.”

4.
storytelling

5.
Key Initiatives for the Society
§ Financial Health
§ Products, Services & Experiences
§ Market Reputation
§ Organization & Culture
§ Sustainable Business

6.
Products, Services and Experiences
§ NG shares the work of top scientists, explorers
and storytellers
§ The content needs to engage an younger and
broader audience
§ Encourage everyone to participate as
contributors, members and supporters
§ Leverage new technology to create a community
§ Infrastructure to facilitate the consumer
experience and test new business models

7.
Re-envisioning Membership
1888
2013

8.
Agile Adoption for Membership Infrastructure
§ Shorter iterative development desired
§ Large development team created
§ Sprint work flow concept adopted
§ PMO managed the process
§ Minimal Viable Product concept introduced

9.
Membership Platform Launch
§ What we did wrong:
– Agile Methodologies applied incorrectly
– Unclear business priorities and planning
– Backlog of unaddressed requests
§ Actions:
– Agile Assessment performed
– Company wide training (starting with Executives)
– Membership Team Reset
– Collaboration Space

10.
Agile Assessment Results
IMPROVEMENT PLAN
KEY FINDINGS
Pluses
• Baseline Scrum Practices and Processes
•
Roles and Responsibilities
• Movement towards Product-Based Delivery
• Defined Teams
•
Deltas
•
Set up an Agile Program Office
•
Set up an Executive Portfolio Management
Council
• Maturity of Agile Practices and Processes
• Execution Across Organizational Silos
•
•
• Business Engagement in Agile
Fast Track the Adoption of the new SDLC
Process
• Integration and Deployment
• Product Discovery
Employ Kanban for Maintenance and
Operations
• 3rd Party Onboarding
• Collaborative Team Workspaces
Extend SDLC with Engineering and Release
Management Discipline
• Optimum Time for Change
• Management Support for Agile
Formalize Agile Improvement Teams w/ clear
•
Set up Product Innovation Teams

11.
Agile Training Plan
• Executive Orientation
Ø 1 Session Completed
Ø 2nd offering due to successful results
• Organization Orientation
Ø 3 Sessions
• In Depth Training
Ø Certified Scrum Master
‒ Developer Leads and Project Managers
Ø Certified Scrum Product Owner
‒ Product Team

12.
Membership Team Reset
Original Team Structure
Core Team
Data Team
Header Team
Revised Team Structure
Team 1
Team 2
New Structure
provides:
- addresses features
and functionality
Team 3
- cross platform
vision with leads to
assure dependencies
are addressed
Scrum of
Scrum
- provides for more
integrated teams, not
separated by
products / projects

13.
Collaborative Workspace Floor Plan
• Huddle Rooms
• Lower cube walls
• Collaborative tools
• Integrated Teams
• Co-located Teams

14.
Tracie Winbigler
winbigler@ngs.org
National Geographic Society
October 7, 2013