1. TOC & Kanban in Embedded Domain
An Experience share
Rajith R & Girish Hegde
Huawei Technologies India Pvt. Ltd.
www.huawei.com
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD.

2. The SCOPE
TOC – Wave1 TOC – Wave2
Project Background Kanban experience sharing
• Need for change Learning
• Gaps and challenges observed
• Strategies to overcome challenges
• Benefits seen
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 2

3. Background - Business Line: 2010
Huawei India’s Central R & D Business Line predominantly works on Platform Development for
Telecom products (e.g. Protocol Stacks, NMS, OS Middleware, Data Middleware, Cloud based solutions, BI System and so on)
• 90% teams use agile • Lean Thinking to Improve Efficiency
• Time-to-Market still a challenge. Further • VSM to find gaps in process flow
Analysis
• Wanted efficiency to improve Lead to consider • Deeper analysis of lean practices
This is an experience sharing of one of the teams that used TOC and Kanban
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 3

4. Project Background
60+ protocols Maintain over
150+ Product teams 3M LOC
300+
Deployed
requirements/per
In 500000+ NEs
year
Network-critical • NE: Network Elements
• LOC: Lines of Code
We are a Market facing, platform development team and address the demands of
various product family teams located worldwide, primarily Shenzhen China
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 4

5. TOC Analysis to find & overcome limiting assumptions (2008)
Why Change What to change What to change to How to cause the change
System Goal, constraint & Gap Conflicts and current reality Future reality tree Implementation
Based on VOC Conflicts association with UDE Break Conflicts with Win-Win How to Change
Handling new requirement
is not optimized
Manage HR better –
GAP
More HR – better efficiency Deliver frequently using agile
Less HR to handle high and faster delivery?
load • Shared members,
• Manage work in sprints of 3
• Increase availability for active weeks; Use Scrum.
components
PRS process is • Share members across
time consuming More lightweight components in a domain
Process?
Do it IID way -
Follow agile
Where we are
• UDE: Undesirable Effects
• HR: Human Resource
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 5

6. What to change: Conflicts associated with UDEs
High
Quality
Existing
procedure
Good & PRS process is
Fast time consuming
Lightweight
Fast procedure
response
Better
efficiency
Existing HR
Efficient & Less HR to handle
Fast high load
Deliver More HR
faster
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 6

7. What to change to? Break conflicts with Win : Win
Assumption Injection How to
UDE: PRS process is time consuming
Current PRS procedures cannot ensure fast Current PRS procedures can ensure fast
Do it the IID way. Follow Agile development method.
response response
UDE: Less HR to handle high load
HR can be managed better to ensure faster
HR should be added to ensure faster delivery Deliver frequently using IID/Agile.
delivery
HR can be managed better to ensure good Share HR across related domains, across more than one
Adding HR will reduce efficiency
efficiency component.
Adoption of Iterative Incremental Development was a Radical Change to the team
which addressed many of our problems
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 7

8. TOC Analysis to find & overcome further challenges (2010)
Why Change What to change What to change to How to cause the change
System Goal, Constraint & Gap Conflicts and current reality Future reality tree Implementation
Team Challenges Conflicts association with UDE Break Conflicts with Win-Win How to Change
Inability to de-scope
deliverables
• Prioritize work every day and
Improve multitasking ability Multitasking is taxing; One finish till end as one piece of
GAP
Reduced time for to improve efficiency? Piece Flow is efficient
System Testing work, to deliver faster
• Use Kanban mode with agile
High outburst tasks Extend iteration length to
to control queues and delays
Control queues and delays
accommodate Testing? to get more time • Strengthen visual indicators to
see problems early
Where we are
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 8

9. What to change to? Break conflicts with Win : Win
Assumption Injection How to
UDE: Insufficient time for Testing
Working independently is not a concern.
Independently working members pile up the Have better mechanism to visualize the flow. Ensure study
Ensuring continuity in the flow is important to
work in the end, reduces testing time flow of value across different states, reduce queues.
improve efficiency.
Don’t have to reduce testing cycle, if work is
Re-plan sprints or reduce testing cycle Operate in One Piece Flow mode to have continuity in flow.
processed to DONE without discontinuity
UDE: High outburst activities, but unable to de-scope
A process based on task flow visualization
Need to improve Multitasking ability to handle 1. Limit Work In Progress at any point of time, so that
and management can be a better alternative
many outburst activities. changing the scope even later in the iteration is possible.
to multi-tasking
2. Optimize “in process lead time” by applying Kanban in
De-scoping is not an option because effort De-scoping is possible even later in the and improve efficiency;
has already been burnt. iteration. A medium size requirement be delivered in < 7 Cal Days.
Adoption of Kanban was one top deed we thought would work for us and found to
be the point of highest leverage
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 9

10. Specific approaches taken
• Apply Kanban process within the Scrum Measure and Optimize Lead Time
Framework
Set lead time goal
• Adaptations to Scrum
 User Stories to MMF (Minimum Marketable Measure lead time using Kanban process
Feature)
 Continuous flow preferred over timeboxed Trigger kaizen when actual lead time > goal
sprint
 Retrospectives to Kaizen Find root cause for exceeding lead time goal
Focused on the longest queue and the one
top improvement.
Identify top improvement
 Relevant metrics measured:
 Lead time (Small/Medium/Large)
Update and systemize new process
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 10

11. Focus areas and strategies
• Lean knowledge in team • Study group • Internal coaching
• Kanban framework • Limit WIP • Work cells & swim lanes
• Optimize lead time • Lead time goal • kaizen
• Improve the lean knowledge in the team by forming
study group and employing an internal coach
• Create the Kanban board by identifying work cells &
deciding the Work-In-Progress (WIP) limits
• Measure and optimize lead time using kaizen
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 11

12. Kanban Visualization
• Restructured Story wall: Defined 6 States
• Limiting WIP at each state
• Split teams into two 3 lanes to enable One Piece Flow;
Lane1 - 2 components, Lane2 – 2 components, Lane3 – Quality Improvement
TODO Analysis (2) Development (2) Testing (2) Release (2) Done
L1 F34 F33 F32 F31
L2 F43 F42 F41
QI QI2 QI1
• Rule: Tasks can be moved from one state to next only if WIP space is available. No tasks movement if WIP limit has
reached
• Simple template for Kanban cards to record start date, end date to measure the lead time
• Bi-Weekly Kaizen, focus on optimizing lead time
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD.

13. Challenges Faced & How we addressed
Challenges Initiatives taken
• Limiting WIP was tough
• Started recording Expected End date (lead time goal)
• Sharing team members resulted in some task & time taken at each state to know about big delays.
states reaching the WIP limit often
• Record backflow items & reasons for delays on the
• Lead time measurement & optimizing Kanban cards.
• Reducing task switch due to frequent outburst
tasks
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD.

14. Further improvements
 Added 1 new swim-lane and
reduced WIP limit for some
task states
• Revisit WIP limits • Improvise swim lanes • Green channel
• Measure lead time • Event triggered kaizen • Quality Improvements
 Green Channel – for
handling outburst tasks
 Event triggered kaizen –
Don’t delay improvements
TODO Analysis (1) Implementation(1) Review (2) Testing (2) Release (2) Done
F37 F32 F35 F31
L1 F34 F36
F33 Green channel - Express Way
L2
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 14

15. Benefits observed
 WIP limits & one piece flow helped in reducing task switch &
waiting
 Kaizen helped in Lead time optimization & identifying rework
queues. Improvements based on this helped in reducing many
quality risks (e.g. through Quality Improvement task force, preventive patches)
 Explicit visual management (e.g. Green Channel) & work-cells
helped in handling outburst tasks like patches & urgent
requirements better
 Could restrain from delivering the requirement which will not be
used by Product Teams immediately
 Could make intermediate releases without much delay, which was
earlier linked with time boxed iterations
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD.

16. Key lessons learnt from TOC, Kanban & Kaizen
Highest Leverage Visualization Flow Optimize
Methods used: Kanban Methods used: Work Methods used: Measure
Method used
board, swim lanes, cells, WIP limits lead time , kaizen
POOGI green channel
Lessons Lessons Lessons Lessons
learnt learnt learnt learnt
Highest leverage points are Visualization helps in Regulated flow helps you Optimizing lead time helps
often counter intuitive making your process to identify the rocks in reducing the time spent in
explicit (problems) queues
Keep finding areas of highest leverage to continuously improve
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 16

17. References
http://www.limitedwipsociety.org/
HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD.

18. Thank you
www.huawei.com