“SCRUMBAN” – A LEAN-AGILE FUSIONThe red pill approach for building & sustaining attractive products in an enterprise

May 21, 2012 | Document Version 1.1

Michael O’RourkeProduct Manager. Agile & Lean Enthusiast.

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WHAT’S THE INTENT HERE?

Expose complaints about your products to determine where improvements must be made

Review your current product development processes

Justify the necessity of injecting new “Lean” philosophies into your work

Compare the finer points of Scrum & Kanban Define what Scrumban is Show opportunities where improvements can be

made to better quality, performance & meet user/buyer expectations

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WHAT ARE YOUR OPEN WOUNDS?

Is your software quality poor? Are your releases continuously late? Has the amount of hotfixes (or patches)

increased? Are you an enterprise disguised as a small

business? Are you a flat organization catering to an imperial

organization? Do you serve many masters in different groups –

groups rarely agreeing or communicating with one another?

The problem is not you personally The problem is not agile, either

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PROCESSES YOU USE TODAY ARE NOT SCALABLE & ADAPTABLE TO DEAL WITH YOUR BUSINESS DYNAMICS

…to put it respectfully.

WHAT’S DISRUPTING YOUR DEVELOPMENT PROCESS?

Don’t have what’s needed to start work, but forced to commit to it anyways

New stories constantly injected (force-added) after committing to a Sprint

Constant task-switching that reduces productivity

Unclear “Definition of Done” for many backlog items

Team roles & responsibilities overlap – causing extra work for everyone

Too many stakeholders with all the power & none with their skin in the game

Impossible to schedule recurring demos with all the stakeholders’ meeting conflicts

Indecisions about priorities encourage Dev Teams to find work on their own

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DEVELOPMENT PROCESSES YOU USE TODAY

Today, you use Scrum – a framework that derives from the Agile software development methodology­ Scrum is more than just a process – it’s a value

system­ It’s core component is the double-feedback loop –

without it you’re not Agile

Scrum works for you­ Early, constructive feedback to make early adjustments­ Frequent knowledge sharing & internal communication

improves our performance­ Teams inspect each iteration thoroughly & adapt

quickly­ Continuous involvement of QA­ Able to mitigate risks & resolve issues easily & quickly­ Nearly instant patch releases for critical issues­ Heavy, up-front requirements were rarely necessary

kind of

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WEAKNESSES OF SCRUM IN AN ENTERPRISE

Limited visibility of where the Team is in their development cycle

Nearly impossible to scale-up with enterprises going through organizational changes

Being in constant crunch modes encourages cutting corners – leaving you with piles of technical debt

Scrum Master & Product Owner roles sometimes conflict & overlap, making excessive work for both of them

Lacks flexibility for Teams during transitions – Scrum demands for normalized Teams before starting work

“Pig & Chicken” lore encourages Dev Team’s to push out & diminish Product Owners authority

Any slack in a Sprint can be filled with unauthorized work

You need processes that are flexible, predictable & practical

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SO, WHY NOT CHANGE HOW SCRUM WORKS?

That should be your exact intentions

You don’t need to scrap Scrum Rather, you need to layer new

Kanban philosophies on top of your Scrum framework

This approach is called SCRUMBAN

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Kanban-Lean

processes

Scrum Framework

Scrumban

WHAT’S KANBAN?

Pronounced kahn-bahn Derives from Lean – a software development

methodology Unlike Lean, Kanban is not a framework or

methodology – it’s a process model similar to Scrum Starts with 3 basic principles

1. Start with what we do now

2. Agree to pursue incremental, evolutionary change

3. Respect the current process, roles, responsibilities & titles

Draws on 5 core properties1. Visualize your Work

2. Limit WIP (Work-in-Progress)

3. Make Process Policies Explicit

4. Manage Flow

5. Improve Collaboratively

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We’re not pioneers. Pro-Lean subcultures started to emerge within

product development communities back in 2008. Since then, companies like Dell,

FedEx, eBay, Telerik & SAP have welcomed Lean thinking into their

software endeavors.

WHY SCRUMBAN IS A GOOD FIT FOR YOU?

Instills Lean principles Reduces time devoted of planning & estimating Promotes constant flow of work Spawns a “continuous improvement” culture Emphasizes on continual delivery while not

overburdening the development team Encourages a “Think big, act small, fail fast, learn

rapidly” philosophy

Rally claims customers get to market 50% faster and are 25% more productive when they employ Lean and Agile hybrid methods

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Scrum Kanban

Time-boxed Iterations Cadences (Time-boxing is optional)

Commit to chunks of work each Iteration Commitment is optional

Velocity is the default metric for planning Lead Time is the metric for planning

Cross-Functional TeamsSpecialists (Cross-Functional Teams are

optional)

Decompose work to fit in a sprint No sizing requirements

Burndown Charts Cumulative Flow Charts

WIP limited by Sprint WIP limited by State

Estimation prescribed Estimation optional

Can’t change Sprint in process Add whenever there is capacity

Sprint backlog owned by Team Kanban board shared by Multiple Teams

Scrum board reset between Sprints Kanban board is persistent

Prioritize backlog Prioritization is optional

Requires WFT (Well-Formed Teams) before starting a project

Focuses on Flow rather than Team forming & norming

No tactic for enforcing explicit policies Allows explicit policies

Visibility of development input & output only – work is black-boxed

Visibility of development input, work & output

Management is kept at bay Management is inclusive

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SCRUM & KANBAN

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Scrum Kanban Scrumban

Time-boxed Iterations Cadences (Time-boxing is optional) Cadences (Time-boxing is optional)

Commit to chunks of work each Iteration

Commitment is optional Commitment is optional

Velocity is the default metric for planning

Lead Time is the metric for planning

Lead Time is the metric for planning

Cross-Functional Teams Specialists (CFT’s are optional) Cross-Functional Teams

Decompose work to fit in a sprint No sizing requirements No sizing requirements

Burndown Charts Cumulative Flow Charts Cumulative Flow Charts

WIP limited by Sprint WIP limited by State WIP limited by State

Estimation prescribed Estimation optional Estimation prescribed

Can’t change Sprint in process Add whenever there is capacity Add whenever there is capacity

Sprint backlog owned by TeamKanban board shared by Multiple

TeamsKanban board shared by Multiple

Teams

Scrum board reset between Sprints Kanban board is persistent Kanban board is persistent

Prioritize backlog Prioritization is optional Prioritization is optional

Requires WFT (Well-Formed Teams) before starting a project

Focuses on Flow rather than Team forming & norming

Focuses on Flow rather than Team forming & norming

No tactic for enforcing explicit policies

Allows explicit policies Allows explicit policies

Visibility of development input & output only – work is black-boxed

Visibility of development input, work & output

Visibility of development input, work & output

Management is kept at bay Management is inclusive Management is inclusive

BLENDS THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS…

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This goes… …and gets replaced with this

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Time-boxed Iterations

Sprint Planning

Fine-grained Stories

Estimating Tasks

Velocity is replaced by cycle time

Cadences (Release)

Dynamic Planning

Coarse-grained Stories

Estimating Stories only

Cycle Time

WHAT CHANGES NEED TO BE MADE?

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SCRUMBAN: IN LAYMAN’S TERM…

Eliminates a constant iterative cycle

Also eliminates need for a Sprint backlog

Encourages a pull by demand system, rather than a “push by force” system

Promotes constant flow of work

MUST SEE!Click here to watch a short, informative video about applying Kanban to Scrum –

compliments of bti360

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WITH A “LEAN” APPROACH, YOU WILL FOCUS ON CONTINUOUS FLOW &

QUALITY, RATHER THAN TIME-BOXED ITERATIONS

“Continuous Flow” leads to better quality