The document discusses big room planning (BRP), which is a planning method used for mid-range planning of product delivery across multiple teams. BRP involves co-locating teams for 2 days to establish a shared vision, context, and plan that accounts for adjustments, risks, dependencies, and gains commitment from participants. When used at scale for an entire product delivery organization, BRP leads to better, more reliable plans created faster with happier participants who are more committed to execution.

1. 10 Years of
Big Room Planning
19 April 2018
Martin Burns
Senior Principal Transformation Consultant
Enterprise
Plumber
@MartinBurnsSCO

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Deadly Context Warning
DO NOT
do
Big Room
Planning
If this is your whole product org
Photo: Wikimedia

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Vision
Roadmap
Release
Iteration
Day
Long-Range Planning
Mid-Range Planning
Short-Range Planning

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Mid-Range Planning
is CORE to
Agility at Scale

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Purpose

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What is life like
without release
planning?

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Which of these is eating your
budget? What % of budget?
1. Dependencies that block
2. Risks that explode
3. Unrealistic plans
4. Unstaffed priorities
5. Frequent pivots
6. Lack of commitment
7. Late delivery

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If you can’t deliver
on your strategy,
it doesn’t matter how
good your strategy is.

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“95% of a company’s
employees are unaware of,
or do not understand,
its strategy.”
— Harvard Business School

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How Many
Decisions?
How Fast?
…..Reducing ‘DiP’

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Running a BRP

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Planning Flow

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DAY 1 DAY 2
VISION
CONTEXT

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Vision + Context
• Business context
• Product or solution focus
• Architecture, tooling, and practices

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DAY 1 DAY 2
VISION
CONTEXT
TEAM
BREAKOUTS

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Team Breakouts
• Teams breakout and plan
• Draft plan reviews
• Management review and problem solving

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Huddle Frequently
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Closing with Leadership Day 1
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DAY 1 DAY 2
VISION
CONTEXT
ADJUSTMENTS
RISKS
DEPENDENCIES
TEAM
BREAKOUTS

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Adjustments, Risks, Dependencies
• Adjustments to plan
• Team breakouts
• Final plan review

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DAY 1 DAY 2
VISION
CONTEXT
ADJUSTMENTS
RISKS
DEPENDENCIES
TEAM
BREAKOUTS
SHARED
COMMITMENT

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Shared Commitment
• Addressing risks: ROAM
• Commitment vote
• (Refine the plan)
• Retrospective

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Getting Ready…

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Logistics Tips
• A large enough space, with ‘breathing room’ - well stocked with supplies
• Order healthy food; it’s a long day & is seen as an investment in the time
together. Good food makes a real difference
– Corollary: blood sugar often dips; candy for the tables helps a lot
• Different coloured stickies for different things; try to be able to read at a
distance
• Chat or group messaging for all participants to run cross-community
comms
• Strong, accessible WiFi to handle all the connections
• A/V set up and thoroughly tested in advance
• Fund a bar tab for the end of day one while Mgt Review is taking place.

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“Next Release” Planning Calendar
3 Next Quarter High Level Pass- 9 weeks
4 Initiatives broken down into Features to present to sizing team- 8 weeks
5 Features Estimates Due, Next Q Roadmap Review with Leadership- 7 weeks
6 The Why Kickoff with all of Engineering- 6 weeks
7 Features to Teams. Feature Estimates Finalized- 5 weeks
9 Story Breakdowns Begin / UX Mockups for Stories- 3 weeks
10
Roadmap Plan 3rd Draft. User Story estimates with Iterations/Quarterly
R&D Demo
- 2 Weeks
12 Big Room Planning
Hackathon Demo/Quarterly R&D RetrospectiveWeek Of 11

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Results…

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What are organisations (our customers) saying?
We wish
we’d done
it sooner
We
delivered
earlier
than
expected
Silos are
broken
down
Quantity &
Quality of
collaborations
go up
More
objectives
met; with
fewer
heroics
People are
happier
Increased
decisions
made in
real time

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What are participants saying?
Source:
1 word surveys in an
organization that moved from
Big Phone Planning to Big
Room Planning,
before and after word clouds.
Larger text: more frequently
used

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Mid-Range Planning
is CORE to
Agility at Scale

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Cost: 2% (per meeting)
Opportunity Cost..?
Priceless

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Make the
INVESTMENT

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Summary of Learning Points
1. Linking strategy to execution is critical for Agility at
Scale
1. Context matters – BRP is for Team of Teams+ delivery
organisations
2. Holistic thinking, focused on value realisation gives better
results
2. BRP gives better, more reliable plans faster, with
happier people, who are more committed to execution.
3. We drink our own Prosecco; BRP is a long-standing
CA/Rally method that we use for our own products and
with customers

44. Senior Principal Transformation Consultant
Martin.Burns@ca.com
Martin Burns
@ca_agile
Slideshare.net/CAinc
Linkedin.com/company/ca-technologies
ca.com
Enterprise Plumber