Given a desire to improve our software development endeavours, we tend to apply models and frameworks like Scrum, Kanban, LeSS, SAFe, even a custom implementation of Agile itself, without really understanding what our current model is, or what we value. This approach leads us to do things and reject things in an ad-hoc way; not knowing whether the change will actually result in improvements in the areas where we need it most. At an organisational level, we often don’t even want or value “agility”. We default to notions of “making the organisation agile” or “scaling agile” without confirming if that is what is actually desired. This talk will take the audience (minus an agenda) through three simple steps to improvement, by: 1) Understanding goals; 2) Understanding desired cultural values on key dichotomy scales; and 3) Synchronising in iterations. At a small company/single product level, following these steps might result in a group of people synchronising to product goals as a Scrum team. At a larger company/multiple product level (aka “at scale”), it might result in teams across departments being synchronised to organisational goals via organisational sprints/iterations. The audience will come away with practical steps to effecting team, multi-team or full organisational change, in the area of product development. Underpinning these steps will be the key message that Agile, Scrum, Kanban and Lean Principles can aid the improvement journey: but none of these things should be a goal in itself.

2. What do you
want to
improve?
Being/doing/scaling Agile
isn’t the point
@neil_killick

3. Improve

4. I’m gonna
have to
Agile the
shit out of
this!

5. – feelings of anxiety and discomfort resulting from simultaneously
holding contradictory or otherwise incompatible attitudes, beliefs, or sets
of assumptions”
Source: https://flowchainsensei.wordpress.com/2012/04/29/the-nine-principles-of-organisational-psychotherapy/
Photo: Contradiction by wornish
“Many organisations, particularly
in times of stress or change, suffer
acutely from ‘organisational
cognitive dissonance’

6. How does
your work
work?

7. Where we are
Collective Mindset Sliders

8. Collective Mindset Sliders
Where we should be

10. Vision

11. Synchronise

12. Capability 3
Capability 4
Capability 5
Capability 6
Capability 7
Capability 8
Capability 9
Capability 10
Backlog Doing
Capability 2
Capability 1
Next
Team 1
Team 2
DONE
No. 1 priority capability - which teams are required to deliver it
end-to end?
Teams 1 and 2, in this case
Capability 11
Capability 12
Backlog of customer capabilities, ordered by value

13. Capability 1
Team 1
Team 2
Capability 2
Team 1
Team 3
Capability 3
Capability 4
Capability 5
Capability 6
Capability 7
Capability 8
Capability 9
Capability 10
Capability 11
Capability 12
Backlog DoingNext DONE
Next priority capability also requires Team 1, but Team 1 is
focused on a higher priority capability - leave them alone!
If Team 3 starts without Team 1, they may end up either having
to interrupt Team 1 (who are working on a higher priority
feature), or leaving Capability 2 unfinished to start another
Let’s put a blocked sign on the capability to signify that a lower
priority capability is being selected

14. Capability 1
Team 1
Team 2
Capability 2
Team 1
Team 3
Capability 3 Team 3
Capability 4
Capability 5
Capability 6
Capability 7
Capability 8
Capability 9
Capability 10
Capability 11
Capability 12
Backlog DoingNext DONE
Team 3, and every team in fact, should pull in the highest
priority capability for which they have no dependency on a
team working on a higher priority capability

15. Capability 1
Team 1
Team 2
Capability 2
Team 1
Team 3
Capability 3 Team 3
Capability 4
Team 4
Capability 5 Team 6
Team 5
Capability 6
Capability 7
Capability 8
Capability 9
Capability 10
Capability 11
Capability 12
Backlog DoingNext DONE
Capability 4
Team 4
Capability 5 Team 6
Team 5
Capability 3 Team 3
Teams pull in work

16. Capability 3
Capability 1
Capability 4
Capability 5
Capability 6
Team 4
Team 5
Team 6
Capability 1 is “Done”, so
teams 1 and 2 are available to
pull in the next highest priority
capability that they have the
ability to work on
Team 3
Capability 2
Team 1
Team 3
Capability 7 Team 2
Capability 8
Capability 9
Capability 10
Capability 11
Capability 12
Backlog DoingNext DONE
Team 1 should work on top priority
(blocked) capability
Teams 1 and 3 should now co-
ordinate to put focus on the higher
priority capability

17. Capability 3
Capability 1
Capability 4
Capability 5
Capability 6
Team 4
Team 5
Team 6
Team 3
Capability 2 Team 1
Capability 7 Team 2
Capability 8
Team 1
Team 4
Capability 9
Team 2
Team 6
Capability 10 Team 3
Capability 11 Team 5
Capability 12
Backlog DoingNext DONE

19. Iterate

20. Focus on
the goal

21. ★ Company vision
★ Customer capabilities
★ “How the work works”
★ Synchronise as a company
★ Iterate as a company
Improve
= Get better at meeting the goal