Bejoy Jaison's talk at Last Conference, Brisbane, 2017. Looks at microagility (team level) and macroagility (business level) to bring out how good agile leadership is essential to facilitate business agility.

1. Friday 29th September 2017
Queensland University of Technology
LAST Conference Brisbane
lastconference.com
#LASTconf
#GetOnBoard

2. Unlocking business agility
Bejoy Jaison
The experience of
business agility shouldn’t
be like operating a bank
vault

3. Unlocking business agility
Rather, business agility should be like a window to enjoy the world around us.
Personally, I’ll be chuffed if I am able to change your perception of business agility.

4. When do you need an agile approach?
• Creating complex adaptive systems
• Solving complex problems
First things first, there are certain kind of problems which benefit from an agile approach.
“I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it
were a nail.” Abraham Maslow

5. Agile looks like this
Product
Backlog
Delivery Sprints
MVP1 MVP2 MVP3
Product development teams are used to doing agile in a much different way than..

6. or, more commonly, like this
Product
Backlog
Development Sprints Integration Hell! Testing Delivery
Agile could look a bit different in organisations where
• Technology and business teams are separate, or
• Agile transformation has not progressed beyond development teams

7. agility
How quickly can you spot agility within your organisation?
Sometimes it is like finding Wally!

8. Microagility
Microagility is agility that is visible only through a magnifying device.
Or only in executive presentations and reports!

9. The end-to-end delivery value chain
Benefits
Realization
DeliveryStrategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
The most common scenario is when agility is constrained to technology delivery teams.

10. Benefits
Realization
DeliveryStrategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
BUSINESS TECHNOLOGY BUSINESS
TECHNOLOGY
technology-based organizations
technology-enabled businesses
• Technology product organisations have homogenous teams which understand technology across all stages
of the delivery life cycle.
• The value creation chain in technology-enabled businesses often involve transitioning value drivers across
teams that think and work very differently.

11. Factors for successful agility
Is there something that could be done? Maybe, there are…

12. Factors for successful agility

13. A X U LF M
N E R AV G
V A L U E

14. VALUE
Factors for successful agility

15. Y B U CV M
E S A OF X
F O C U S

16. VALUE
Factors for successful agility
FOCUS

17. B
K U E BV A
S E A DF C
F E E D A C K

18. VALUE
Factors for successful agility
FOCUS FEEDBACK

19. VALUE
Prioritize to maximize value.
FOCUS
FEEDBACK
Break down creates focus; focus drives quality.
Collaboration and visibility promotes and accelerates feedback.
Feedback improves value.

20. So, at a high level, what should we focus on?

21. Benefits
Realization
Delivery
Strategic planning
Strategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
• Estimating value - Finger-in-the-air estimates for sizing
• Maximizing value – Prioritize, align, schedule
• Providing focus - Breakdown into projects/initiatives
ESTIMATE, ALIGN, PRIORITIZE

22. Benefits
Realization
Delivery
Orchestrating delivery
Strategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
• Further breakdown for execution
• Traceability from requirements through to deployment
BREAKDOWN, COVERAGE, TRACEABILITY

23. Benefits
Realization
Delivery
Ensuring value
Strategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
• Visibility of costs
• Visibility of outcomes
• Improving outcomes
MAXIMIZING BENEFITS

24. Benefits
Realization
Delivery
Macro agility
Strategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
Value: imagined, planned, created and measured
Feedback: facilitated continually at every stage to drive quality
Focus: carefully maintained to maximize value

25. • Controlled experiments to assess options
• Lean startup methodology
Familiar examples of macro-agility…
VALUE
FOCUS
FEEDBACK
• Strategic road map
• Breakdown into projects and initiatives
• Business-technology collaboration and feedback loops
• Adaptive planning based on progress, costs and benefits

26. • Prototyping, experiments
• Lean startup approaches
• Cost benefit analysis
Macro
VALUE FOCUS FEEDBACK
• Releases
• Sprints/iterations
• Features/epics & stories
• Automated testing
• Cross functional teams
• Continuous integration & delivery
• Backlog prioritization
• Thin slices / feature-based
delivery
• Acceptance Criteria
• Well articulated goals
• Strategic road map
• Road maps and initiatives
• Adaptive planning
• Visibility of progress, challenges
• Business showcases
Micro
• The macro drives the micro. The micro enables the macro.
• Business agility is easier to facilitate when we accord more value to the macro aspects.
The macro and the micro co-exist

27. LEADERSHIP

28. create capability: people, technology, processes
facilitate collaboration using sustainable structures
In highly agile organisations, leadership plays a facilitating
role that enables capability and collaboration.
Why leadership

29. Importance of agile leadership
• Systems thinking: Organizations as aggregate organisms
• Mindfulness and consciousness
• Bridging between two different worlds
• Managing scale and change

30. Benefits
Realization
Delivery
Agile leadership roles: Product owner and Scrum master
Strategic
Roadmap
Business GoalsVision
Product Owner
Scrum Master
The Product Owner is best poised to enable business agility.
Whereas, the Scrum Master can ensures agility for technology delivery.

31. Scale brings in even more leadership challenges
• Voids in leadership structures are catastrophic
• Breaks value chains as well as feedback chains
• Results in loss of focus, which results to loss of value
• Scale often needs specialised or niche roles
• Focussed functions like PMO, Test Management, Release Management
• Leadership within communities or tribes

32. VALUE FOCUS FEEDBACK LEADERSHIP

33. vs
Micro vs Macro
Technology agility vs Business Agility

34. Questions & Discussion