In this talk, I share approaches to execute a successful digital transformation using Agile Engineering, a framework that combines Lean, Agile, and DevOps principles.
I also share 10 anti-patterns that tend to prevent a successful transformation, and counter-measures for these anti-patterns.
Execute a Successful Digital Transformation using Lean, Agile, and DevOps Principles
1. We connect. We deliver. 1
Execute a Successful Digital Transformation
using Lean, Agile, and DevOps Principles
Gautham Pallapa
West Corporation
https://www.linkedin.com/in/gpallapa
gpallapa at west dot com
@gpallapa
6. 6
We connect. We deliver.
West Corporation at a Glance
Market-leader with 30 years
of experience,
driving cloud-based
communication solutions for
a connected customer
experience
5BTexts, voice alerts,
emails and
notifications
65BVoice minutes
annually
162MConference calls
annually
305M911 calls per year
12. We connect. We deliver. 12
Cultural Transformation
Foster a culture that will drive a digital transformation
13. 13
Building a Culture
Culture – Group of people with a common set of values or beliefs
(Society)
Success of the human race
- Not because we are strongest or even the smartest
- Ability to build cultures or communities
14. 14
Success of the human race
- Not because we are strongest or even the smartest
- Ability to build cultures or communities
Building a Culture
Corporation – Group of people with a common set of values or beliefs
(Society)
23. 23
Difficult to sustain
Time factor
Value is still at the end of the value stream (waterfall)
Resource and Capacity limitations
Limitations of Lean
24. We connect. We deliver. 24
Software Development != Manufacturing
26. 26
• Understand Value– Understand why the client wants the solution
• Focus on Users – Who will be using the solution
• Define Done – Agree on Acceptance criteria before implementing
• Realize Value – What minimum functionality can be delivered to the client quickly
Focus on Delivering Value Early
33. 33
Identify people who believe in what you believe (Change Agents)
When surrounded by people who believe in what you believe
Something wonderful happens!
Fundamental Need
Trust
35. We connect. We deliver. 35
Peopleware
Optimizing roles to develop beautiful software
36. 36
We connect. We deliver.
1
Murphy’s Law
Anything that can go wrong
will go wrong
2
Moore’s Law
Computing power doubles
every 18 – 24 months
3
Conway’s Law
Organizations design
systems which copy the
organization
4
Brook’s Law
Adding more people to a
late project makes it later
5
Goodhart’s Law
When a measure
becomes a target, it
ceases to become a good
measure
6
Metcalf’s Law
The more devices
connected to a network,
the more useful it becomes
Six Laws That Govern Technology
37. Using Conway’s Law
Story 1
Story 2
Story 3
Microservices
Experimentation around team
structures to reflect the software
they are to build
Agile Transformation
Transforming a waterfall
organization to adopt team agility
Introducing DevOps
Building on the momentum of an
Agile team
38. 38
We connect. We deliver.
1
2
3
4
5
Waterfall
Organizational Silos
Command and Control Structure
BA
UI/UX
Dev
QA
Ops
Testing and Validation
39. 39
We connect. We deliver.
Software Development in a Waterfall organization
Source: https://tinyurl.com/yd95fjht
40. 40
We connect. We deliver.
STORY 1
Agile Transformation
Introducing Team Agility
Radical experiments to break
traditional waterfall methodology
and demonstrate the power of
agility
47. 47
We connect. We deliver.
Identify the Right Intrapreneurs
Identify the right change agents to drive cultural transformation - http://bit.ly/2cNuhg2
Agile Engineering
48. 48
We connect. We deliver.
Experiment
Hypothesis:
Having a team aggressively work on a problem that is unrelated to the team’s focus makes them
form, storm and norm, and that momentum can be used to drive throughput up by at least 15%
Sprint Zero
49. 49
We connect. We deliver.
Sprint Zero
CONTINUOUS
EXPERIMENTATION
2 Week Iterations
Working Prototype in 8 days
• 1 patent filed within 2.5 weeks
• 3 additional updates within next iteration
3 Engineers
• Form – Storm – Norm within 1 iteration
• 7 experiments in 10 days
50. 50
We connect. We deliver.
STORY 2
Introducing DevOps
Building upon Team Agility
Harnessing the momentum
gained by the team to overcome
inertia
51. 51
We connect. We deliver.
Progressive Elaboration
Opportunistic approach
to introducing DevOps
Strategic Disruption
52. 52
We connect. We deliver.
2 production sites in 18 daysRelease Pipeline in 6 daysDev Env in 12 days
This team broke every single record in each phase
Previous team had failed for 8 months and then handed
it over to us
Operational Automation FTW!Agile Engineering
1 Product Owner
1 Resource Manager
3 Engineers
CI/CD
54. 54
We connect. We deliver.
STORY 3
MicroServices
Using design patterns
Structuring the team around
design patterns that they have to
adopt (Conway’s Law)
55. 55
We connect. We deliver.
One code base
Explicit
Dependencies
Config in
Environment
Backing
service
Build, Release,
Run
Execute app as
stateless
processes
Services via
port binding
Concurrency Disposability
Dev/Prod
Parity
Logs as Event
Streams
Admin tasks as
one-off
processes
Beyond the 12 factor app - Pivotal
12 Factor Applications
56. 56
Mise en place – Everything in its place
Culinary Institute Of America - Learn To Cook – http://bit.ly/2wQ80Zx
57. 57
We connect. We deliver.
Cloud Native Stack
Infrastructure
Infrastructure Automation
Runtime Platform
Application Framework
Tools
59. 59
First Annual Pi Day Hackathon
• March 12 – 14
• 48 hours of intense coding
• 26 teams
• Open to anyone at West
• Show off skills, bold ideas
• Demonstrate
o Collaboration, Execution, Innovation
78. 78
We connect. We deliver.
Not Enough Change Agents
Anti-Pattern # 7
Identify the Right Change Agents to Drive a Cultural Transformation – http://bit.ly/2cNuhg2
84. 84
12 Factor Apps
One code
base
Explicit
Dependencies
Config in
Environment
Backing
service
Build, Release,
Run
Execute app
as stateless
processes
Services via
port binding
Concurrency Disposability
Dev/Prod
Parity
Logs as Event
Streams
Admin tasks
as one-off
processes
Beyond the 12 factor app - Pivotal
85. 85
Mise en place – Everything in its place
Culinary Institute Of America - Learn To Cook – http://bit.ly/2wQ80Zx
93. 93
Agile Engineering
A successful digital transformation requires harmony among Lean, Agile, and DevOps practices - http://bit.ly/2pqy4JQ
94. We connect. We deliver. 94
Strategy Vision Planning Communication Demo Marketing Sales
Requirements Planning
Design, Dev,
Test
Demo Deployment Maintenance
Business Track
Technical Track
