goodbye scope anxiety hello agility: kanban implementation case study at amdocs

Information Security Level 1 – Confidential© 2012 – Proprietary and Confidential Information of Amdocs

Goodbye Scope AnxietyHello Agility

An agile implementation case study

Yaki Koren

Amdocs

“Amdocs has a proven track record with demonstrated transformation capabilities in various service provider accounts around the world.”

Amdocs Delivery

4000PROFESSIONALS

Global foot print with develoDev Managerent centers around the world (inc. Israel, India, Brazil)

100+ PROJECTS running in parallel

Proven track record of 95% successful project delivered on budget, on time, with quality and at large scaleIndustry standard 60% -

“Amdocs has shown it has the size, scale and stability to reliably supply telecom software professional services to CSPs.”

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Our projects are complex

Typical project, developing over 8 weeks• 1 Delivery manager• 2 program managers• ~ 7 develoDev Managerent directors• ~ 13 project managers• ~ 20 team leaders• ~ 80 Developers/Testers• ~ 8 products

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Scoping Anxiety - Amdocs

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rabih/

Scoping Develop SST System Test UAT

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Scoping Anxiety – Our Customers

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Kanban

XIT

BBC

Corbis

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Yuval Yeret

Information Security Level 1 – Confidential© 2012 – Proprietary and Confidential Information of Amdocs

Our Kanban Journey

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Where do we start?

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The Kanban Core Practices

●Visualize the flow● Manage the flow

● Limit the WIP

● Make policies explicit

● Implement feedback loops

● Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

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Creating the flowP

erse

vere D

igest

Creating the flow

● Initially there is no pace

● Some managers do with the board, some use EVM

V1 V2

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V3V4

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● Slowly yet surely

● Identify board substitutions

● Notice questions in daily meetings

● Adapt policies

● Adapt board

2 Releases5 Drops16 Products(Card color represents product/product group)90 card assignees (Team leads / experts)200 users

A specific release

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Infra Board

Environments boardInfra: revolution!

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The Kanban Core Practices

● Visualize the flow

●Make policies explicit● Manage the flow

● Limit the WIP

● Implement feedback loops

● Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

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Make policies explicit

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New Conversations

● Dev Manager: Task 123’ detailed design is done.

● Delivery Manager: Were test cases designed?

● Dev Manager: Test cases? That’s testing.

● Delivery Manager: Right. It should be completed with design.

● Dev Manager: Why?

● Delivery Manager: Test design may impact design. You can’t start dev.

● Dev Manager: But they don’t have anyone available. They’re up their neck testing the previous release.

● Delivery Manager: OK, then we should help them. If we help them they will probably have someone to help you.

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The Kanban Core Practices

● Visualize the flow

● Make policies explicit

●Manage the flow● Limit the WIP

● Implement feedback loops

● Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

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Managing the flow:

The Daily Meeting Challenge

● Getting away from micro management● What do you do with all these blockers?

● Are all these cards moving anywhere?

● Focusing the team

● How do I know I’ll get there?

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Managing the Flow

Knowing where you are

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464437

266

Drop 2 Drop 3 Post

Delay

Pace is predictable

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The Kanban Core Practices

● Visualize the flow

● Make policies explicit

● Manage the flow

●Limit the WIP● Implement feedback loops

● Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

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Limiting WIP

Our Core Issue

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The Kanban Core Practices

● Visualize the flow

● Make policies explicit

● Manage the flow

● Limit the WIP

●Implement feedback loops● Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

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Implement feedback loops

● Formal retrospectives are still scarce

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The Kanban Core Practices

● Visualize the flow

● Make policies explicit

● Manage the flow

● Limit the WIP

● Implement feedback loops

●Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

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Improve collaboratively, evolve experimentally

Back to Leadership

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Our Coaching Strategy

PULL4 coachers in Israel………2 in India……..1 external consultant

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Where are we today?St

artin

g ag

ile s

copi

ng/U

AT

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Results!

● Major release in production, unprecedented quality*

● Easier to accept scope changes

● Drastically reduced program management technical effort

● Sustainable develoDev Managerent: reduced HR peaks and valleys

● People filled with new energy

● Less micromanagement, more empowerment

● Too early for the numbers…

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Summary – Key success factors

● Strong leadership with a good reason to change

● Courage

● Discipline to keep evolving

● Patience, letting things evolve slowly but surely

● Understanding of Lean/Agile

Thank you