As organizations commence their journey towards better business agility one of the key factors that determines the success of such an initiative is whether there is strong and meaningful ongoing coaching of teams and leadership. To accomplish that, it is critical that organizations realize early-on that continuous improvement and success can be enabled, encouraged, and assisted by a robust agile coaching team, one that can help them transcend the mundane and help achieve extraordinary results. At IHS Markit we have created a highly effective, empowered, and deeply impactful agile coaching team that works across silos to enable the organization to take firm and confident steps towards better business agility. We have seen undeniably great results that are clear and measurable with this approach, and wish to share the story of this extraordinary team and their phenomenal contributions towards successfully initiating and advancing business agility across the organization. More details: https://confengine.com/agile-india-2019/proposal/8445/the-key-to-initiating-and-sustaining-true-business-agility-a-robust-agile-coaching-organization Conference link: https://2019.agileindia.org

1. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
The Key To
Initiating And
Sustaining True
Business Agility:
A Robust Agile
Coaching
Organization

2. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
About Sesh
Head of Academy and Agile Practice
Engineer, coach, trainer, mentor
Serve a global team of servant-leaders
Envision & strategize growth and agility
Make things better
Animal rights, photography, books

3. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
About Laxmana
Principal Agile Coach
Software Engineering Background
Coach local team of SMs
Develop and lead agile initiatives
Train and coach teams/individuals
Parenting

4. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
 About IHS Markit
 Our agile transformation journey
 How we are accelerating & sustaining business
agility
 Success stories
Agenda

5. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
• HQ – London
• 16,000+ colleagues
worldwide
• Information, Analytics,
Expertise
About IHS Markit

6. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
$1.5MM
Things to remember: 1/2

7. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
7
What is business
agility?
• Ability of a business to respond rapidly to
changes (better to create change)
• Internal/External
• Without losing momentum or vision
Things to remember: 2/2

8. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
8
How many of you have a
coaching organization in
place staffed by qualified,
full-time coaches/SMs?
How many of you don’t
have one, but plan on
creating one?
A quick survey

9. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Started towards agile
formally in 2013
PD&D – (legacy IHS) 1,200
colleagues
Initial
challenges
 Mix of AUP, waterfall, wagile, PMO
 Multiple, siloed business lines
 Global presence (dispersed teams)
 Mindset/cultural issues
Our Journey begins

10. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Initial outcome – legacy IHS transformation: phase 1
(2013-2016)
10

11. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Started to see strong success!

12. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Factors contributing to success

13. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Challenges exist(ed)

14. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
IHS Markit transformation: phase 2 (2016…)

15. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Realization: we NEEDED agile coaches to further business agility

16. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
16
How we created our agile coaching org

17. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Our Vision
“Nurturing a culture of agility,
achieved through coaching,
mentoring, training, and
Communities of Practice, to
deliver superior business value.”

18. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
OKRs

19. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Where are we

20. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
How we continue to boost business

21. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Custom career path
Roles & Responsibilities
Holistic growth/career path

22. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
Phase 2 –Ongoing
succe$$ stories
 Legacy Markit (Digital) in Boulder, CO
 Updraft: A major initiative in Bengaluru
 HR goes agile!
 R&D turnaround examples
Success stories

23. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
India
Colleagues
dev
sqa
dev
Dev
lead
dev
SM
PO
TasksPM
Business
Requirements
Product
Capabilities
Agile Team
Transformation
Decisions made according
to our Updraft guiding
principles
India Colleagues
dev
sqa
de
v
Dev
lead
dev
S
M
P
O
Shared
Strategy
P
M
Business
Requirements
Product
CapabilitiesChange Opportunity
(Retirement, etc)
India
Colleagues
dev
sqa
dev
Dev
lead
de
v
SM
PO
P
M
Business
Requirements
Product
Capabilities
Change Opportunity
(Retirement, etc)
Updraft Team
Updraft Model

24. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
• In order to accelerate business agility, among other
factors,
an agile coaching organization is a must, and it
should be
• well supported
• strongly competent
• charged with a clear purpose
• autonomous
24
In summary/takeaways

25. © 2016 IHS Markit. All Rights Reserved.
/in/sesh-veeraraghavan-643971/
Seshadri.Veeraraghavan@ihsmarkit.com
25
/in/Laxmana
Laxmana.Settipalli@ihsmarkit.com
Questions/thanks/let’s connect!