effective agile teams
DESCRIPTION
In the deck I share some nifty secrets on building effective Agile teams,scaling teams for large, distributed projects and delivering business value leveraging the team synergy. As they - you are as good as your team!TRANSCRIPT
Effective Agile Teams
Self – Organizing Teams
“ Agile processes employ self-organizing teams to handle the complexity inherent in systems development projects. A team of individuals is formed. They organize themselves into a team in response to the pressure of a deadline, reminding me of the saying, "Nothing focuses the mind like a noose!" (Schwaber 2001)
Key Characteristics of an Agile Team• Whole, Self-Contained.
Does not require external experts
• Generalizing Specialists. Cross-functional
• Stable. Change your mind! Do not change the team!
Agile Teams Are…..
• Autonomous
• Adaptive
• Accountable
And they have loads of FUN ……………………..Well Almost Always
Team Composition
Agile Teams – The Core Supporting Pattern
Technical ExpertDomain Expert
Independent Tester
Scrum MasterTeam
Product Owner
Large Teams – Work within a universe
Scrum MasterTeam
Product Owner
Managing Large/ Distributed Teams
The ‘Ideal’ Team
• Co-located
• Between 3 and 10 people
• Cross-functional, Self-Contained
• Reporting to a single Product Owner
The Realities• In real world you work
with a larger eco-system
• Geographically dispersed
• Multiple Component Teams
Team A Team B Team C Team D Team E
Product Backlog
Scaling ScrumProduct Owner
Chief Product Owner
PO PO POPO PO
Scaling Scrum
Team A Team B Team C Team D Team E
Integration Management• Product architecture identifying
interfaces and dependencies
• User stories explicitly recognizing dependencies- Example new ordering system should interface with X billing system
• Synchronize iterations through consolidated release planning
• Scrum of Scrums
• Integration testing13
Continuous Integration
Team A Team B Team C
Release Backlog
Distributed teams• Communication Technology – video conferencing, chat tools
• Establish communities of practice, wiki, blogs – shared knowledge
• Deploy local scrum masters – Scrum of scrums to synchronize global teams
• Move from a verification based approach to a result driven, value based approach
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Scaling the Scrum Rituals• Daily Scrum: Each team has a daily scrum. Updates posted
to common dashboard
• Iteration Planning: Shared understanding of highlevel stories
• Each team does first level of planning. Joint review to validate dependencies
• Release planning: Essential to get atleast all the scrum masters and lead developers together. Rest of team on-phone support
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Collaborating across teams• Distribute coherent set of
functionalities based on location
• Each team has needed skills. Self-sufficient and self-
organising
• Teams in different locations work independently but collaborate to coordinate their work
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Scaling Agile – Best practices• Shared code repositories
• Wikis/ blogs to replace physical white boards
• Online communities of practice
• Disciplined approach to continuous integration. Plan for an integration environment
• For complex projects allow for a follow-on end to end test sprint
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People Management
Agile People Management: Key Role
• Plan Staffing – Resource Mobilization
• Manage Staffing
• Guide Careers
• Plan Succession
Agile Resource Management Challenges
• Recruiting specializing generalists
• Sensitizing HR to the Agile Culture. Less Reshuffle
• Agile is highly challenging. Only the most motivated will stay on
• How do you fit in trainings, knowledge sharing sessions
• Half-baked Agile practices can cause dissatisfaction. Watch Out!
Servant Leadership - The Invisible Leaders
• Managers recede to the back-ground
• Move away from allocating tasks to people. Tasks choose people
• Team members decide who and what
• Protect the team. Be the guiding angel. Servant Leader
Secret Recipe for Great Teams• Trust. Inspire trust. Promote trust among the team
• Communicate often. And without fear
• Make it a fun place. Decorated work places. Fancy titles. Chief Imagination Officer, Managing Dreamer, Bug-Seeker
• Reward. Agile Stars. Badges of Honor.
• Nurture. Give everyone a pet project. Guide careers. Promote growthAnd the best team award goes to….
Thank You
http://in.linkedin.com/in/rimjhimray