Lessons learned

Agile and Telco projects

Agile management in MVNO project - GaduAIR

During launch - January 2008 until May 2009, and maintenance and development later on

so what's this about ?

who are we ?Grzegorz Machniewski

• Until July 2010 Telco dept. @ Gadu-Gadu

• Before: IBM, Outbox

• After: Voiceware S.J., Moberia sp. Z o.o., XEO Games sp. Z o.o.

Dawid Mielnik

• Until July 2010 Telco dept. @ Gadu-Gadu

• Before: Citi, DRSA

• After: Voiceware S.J., Moberia sp. Z o.o.

Internet vs. Telco services

typical..

software is only a small part

• 5 teams, about 15 people

• Software teams

• BSS, VAS

• Non software teams

• Core Network, VoIP, Operations

External providers and partners

• Huawei

• AMG

• Polkomtel

• Gemalto

• Arvato

• Call Center Poland

• Kolporter, Billbird, Euronet, Polski Tytoń, Sprint, ... (distribution channels)

• Allegro, Effortel

internal departments• "clients"

• Business

• Marketing

• Sales

• Board

• Accounting

• Security

• "providers"

• Admins

• Server dev

• Web dev

• GG client dev

• Mail dev

• QA

SCRUM didn't work

Sprint planning was a challenge

• Organisational - 5 teams with totally different tasks

• Defining the scope with so many variables, dependancies not controlled by the teams

SCRUM didn't work

Problems with deliverables from external vendors

• Deadlines - frequent delays

• Functionality - does not work or works not according to specs, or is unstable

SCRUM didn't work

Other problems with vendors• Communication

• Long time for problem resolution

• Rotation of team members

SCRUM didn't work

Problems with schedules of internal providers

• Need to fit into other schedules not fully consistent with our

• Fight for compromises and giving higher priority to our tasks

SCRUM didn't work

Changing requirements from business and internal clients

SCRUM didn't work

Lot of unexpected 'fires' which broke sprints

SCRUM didn't work

(additional afterthought)

Agile methodology means less paperwork and

formalities which unfortunately works to our disadvantage

with vendors

SCRUM didn't work

...the outcome was:• Sprint plannings were long and boring for most

people (the same with retrospections)

• None of the sprints were finished in time and in some none of the backlogs were done

• Frustration - our, in our teams and internal clients, strained relations with vendors

• Deadlines not met

We decided to do something about it...

Step 1• We stopped Sprint planning in favour of quick planning in

individual teams

• Every team had individual backlog and sprint

• We losened a little the sprint concept and everything related to it

• We started to prioritise tasks on daily bases according to what was more urgent

• We started to define new states for tasks which waited for something independent of the team

...as it later turned out we were approaching ScrumBan• Breakthrough at first Agile Warsaw meeting

entitled Scrum vs. Kanban

• It turns out this is the tool which we need

• We have noticed that we started using certain practices naturally

• Pity that we discovered Kanban so late

SrumBan worked much better

Step 2 - migration to ScrumBan• We stopped sprints and planning in favour of ad-hoc

planning and estimation on daily basis

• Limit to number of WIP tasks per person

• Highest priority for fuckups and errors

• Reorganising the teams - 3 teams: devel, telco, operations

• Individual task states for each team

Task board - Telco

Task board - Devel

Task board - Operations

ScrumBan - observations• We had the pleasure of working in the new arrangement

for 2 months

• Decreased level of frustration with the process was evident

• Increase in productivity and quality of work of the teams

• Shorter time from submission to delivery of task

• ScrumBan did not solve all of our problems but it did solve most of the problems associated with the process, increasing the comfort of work

Questions ?

Thank you.