A Day in the Agile Life of a Financial Services Company

1. A Day in the Agile Life of a Financial Services Company Presented by John Nicol, Doug Huffman, Beth Bleimehl, Mike Banta, Paul Quarles

2. How Agile has Evolved

3. How did we get here? • The catalyst for change • The beginnings of change • Agile assessment and kickoff • Where we are today and where we want to go

4. Agile Roles and Coaching Product Owner Scrum Master Delivery (Agile) Manager Team Members (Dev, QA/BA, SME) Coaching Role

5. Agile Roles Product Owner • Full-time, organizational savvy • Evolved to part-time, maintaining business connection Scrum Master • Well trained full-time focus, • For mature teams, can contribute in other areas Delivery (Agile) Manager • Staff Mgr for performance mgmt, career development • Team advocate, less hands on, program focus Team Members (Dev, QA/BA, SME) • Cross functional, co-located • Focus on versatility, role blurring, team focus

6. Interlocking Agile Leadership Roles

7. Coaching Philosophy • At inception, equal parts executive and team level training • Coaching engagement mandatory for new teams • Mature teams receive periodic “health checks” • Creates coaching opportunities for Agile practitioners

8. Quality Operating ModelEmbedded System Testing and Centralized Quality Control • Initial Needs • System Test Oversight • Automation Growth • Evolved to Focus on Value • Transition “Oversight” to Collaboration with Audit & Compliance • Evolve Centralized Automation from “Doing” to “R&D/Mentoring” • Facilitate Collaboration Between Teams • Expand Definition of Quality Beyond “Defect Free” • Correct/Prevent Systemic Issues (e.g., Production Quality) • Encourage/Coach Technology Best Practices • Continuous Development of Agility/Versatility • Evolve to “Continuous Value Assessment” • Expand Delivery Services & Quality via “Enterprise Capabilities Model”

9. STRATEGIC DIRECTION FROM SENIOR LEADERSHIP Strategy Creation & Evolution │ Continuous Value Assessment │ Communication of Vision, Direction & Priorities ENTERPRISE CHECKS & BALANCES INTERNAL/EXTERNAL AUDIT │ PMO │ CHG MGT │ DATA SECURITY │ COMPLIANCE | ARCHITECTURE |DATA GOVERNANCE | DATA POLICY TECHNOLOGY DELIVERY SERVICES CAPABILITY MOBILIZATION TECHNOLOGY DELIVERY SERVICES LEADERSHIP | BUSINESS LEADERSHIP | ENTERPRISE LEADERSHIP Epic/Project Status| Executive Status| Business Leadership Status DELIVERY TEAM EXECUTION Release Quality | System Testing │ Business Project & Product Ownership | Sprint & Project Reviews Test Automation Development │ Continuous Delivery Improvement forums Agile Team Agile Team Agile Team Agile Team Agile Team Agile Team Agile Team Traditional Team ENTERPRISE ENTERPRISE Traditional Team Quality Team ENTERPRISE CAPABILITY MOBILIZATION ENTERPRISE COLLABORATION • Improvement Communities • Quality, Tools & Process Quality Control is Centralized; Testing is Embedded in Delivery Teams • Business Svc Monitoring • ECM • Usability Arch QUALITY OVERSIGHT Tools & Technology People & Processes ● Production Quality in tandem with Business Quality Teams ● Audit, Compliance, PMO ● Financial Forecast / Monitoring ● Department Transparency ● Continuous Improvement at Department Level ● Automation & Frameworks ● Load & Performance ● Continuous Integration ● Technology Best Practices ● Research & Development ● Adaptive Staffing ● Delivery Services Continuous Improvement ● Team Health ● Agility & Versatility Development ● Cross-Functional Liaison ● Training / Mentoring / Career Development Facilitation

10. Agile and Legacy Systems Positive impact on software • Discourages monolithic componentry Test automation • Includes some home-grown tools Employees working with legacy systems • Sometimes Agile is a tougher sell • Test scrum with them • Scrum speaks for itself!

11. Agile and Offshore Teams • Challenges: • Colocation • Lack of face to face collaboration • Culture • Command / control vs. self organization • Significant time difference • Can also be advantage (round the clock work)

12. Agile and Offshore Teams • Strategies to make successful Quality of communication • Face to Face • Let your front line team members be included in travel • Offshore team members in our office & on team • Video or Telephone

13. Agile and Offshore Teams • Strategies to make successful Virtual standup • Virtual story board (eg Version One, scrumy.com) • Clearly communicate planning results • Telephone or video standup – maybe not daily

15. Moratorium – (Given) Reasons • Management didn’t know how we selected a project to go Agile • “Lack of transparency” • Heard we had multiple full-time Agile coaches on payroll • Cost of build outs for new Agile teams

16. Underlying Reasons • First two point to lack of control/influence • Last two point to unawareness of the value Agile was bringing

17. Communicating Value • Did well at first • Success led to slacking on the message • Increased # of Agile teams to program-sized levels • Nervousness settled in w/ management • Felt the loss of control/influence • Could not effectively keep up with all the teams, what they were working on

18. Scrutiny for Agile • Have to live with the double standard (years of comfort w/ the old ways) • Business feels like they’re giving more (PO, SME, BA, user testers, etc.) • Hard to let go of central command and control (esp. in a hierarchical-style mgmt.)

19. Evolving Leadership • How can we help them along? • Status report • Value report • Improved visibility • Keep the Agile program in front of Senior Management

20. Questions??