Ask Me Anything (AMA): Agile at scale (ft. Kelly Drozd + Ashley Faus) on 26 Oct EST

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

Question submission for this AMA is now closed.

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Software team members, Ashley Faus + Kelly Drozd, are here to discuss scaling agile across a company. 

Submit your question here between now and Tuesday, 26 October EST.

Context

Agile is an approach to work that helps teams develop products, and deliver them to customers quickly and smoothly. Rather than have one giant project launch, agile teams deliver continuously. That way, they are able to collect customer feedback and use that to help them revise or change direction along the way.

Practitioners turned these ideas into frameworks to deliver agile to companies, and help them scale. When we say “scale” we mean both “horizontally” and “vertically.” Horizontal scaling means a company is bringing agile to all of their teams, and vertical means the company uses agile practices in how those teams work together.

Event details

On 26 October EST, ask subject matter experts, Ashley Faus + Kelly Drozd, any questions you have on the practice. They will review these questions and answer them live on LinkedIn Live.

Follow Atlassian on LinkedIn to watch it live at these times:

• 12noon EST (in the US or Canada)
• 9am PST (in the US or Canada)
• 5pm BST (in the UK)
• 6pm CEST (in Germany, France, Czechia Republic, etc)
• 9:30pm IST (in India)

We'll try to record and then post the final video here!

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*As a bonus, listen to the "Work Check" podcast episode that debates whether companies should scale agile, to learn more about the history of agile, where companies are at based on research on companies who've tried to scale agile, and the practice's pros and cons when scaled.

[Anita Kalmane · Accepted solution]

Q: what's your experience with implementing LeSS?

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

Thanks for submitting your Q!

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

Hi @Anita Kalmane - we didn't get to everyone's question in the live AMA, so here's a link for more info on LeSS!

https://www.atlassian.com/agile/agile-at-scale/less

[Anton Prokhozhy · Accepted solution]

As a Lean Change Manager and general Agile advocate, I find that that teams are generally really receptive to trying any good practice, even outside IT. The biggest battle is always on the executive side. What are the best practices when it comes to promoting the necessary changes? What are the pitfalls? Are there any effective shortcuts? Thanks

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

Added to the list of pre-submitted questions!

[Bill Sheboy · Accepted solution]

Hi @Christine P. Dela Rosa 

My question is: 

• Why would one use any "scaled" method before a product/project team has confirmed with evidence that they need something not provided by applying Scrum, Kanban, or Lean ideas?

Kind regards,
Bill

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

I don’t know why that would happen but I’m ready to feed that question to our SMEs for them to answer next week. Thanks for that submission, @Bill Sheboy!

[Bill Sheboy]

Thanks, Christine!  I know how I would answer, and want to learn the ideas from others' perspectives.

__Bill

[Christine P. Dela Rosa · Accepted solution]

Y'all. Video recording here - https://youtu.be/VmEKKpUy5t0. And embedded below.

[Bill Sheboy]

Thanks for posting the video, @Christine P. Dela Rosa and thanks for your thoughts and answers to the questions. Ashley and Kelly!

[nina_schmidt · Accepted solution]

I can‘t make it today, but I will watch the recording 😀

[Dave Liao · Accepted solution]

@Christine P. Dela Rosa - ooh, what flavors of Agile will we be hearing about?

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

Specifically focusing on companies trying to scale agile company-wide. Which, as I’m sure you know, is not as east as asking everyone to work with the agile manifesto in mind. 

Examples of questions and topics I expect:

• the difference between agile for a team or department and then agile adopted by an entire company.
• tactics on how to start the process.
• how to figure out the right pacing and rollout.
• when you know things are going well.

But our software team SMEs know a whole lot about agile in general if you want to stay within the topic of agile but out of the “scaling” focus. How’s that sound, @Dave Liao ?

[Dave Liao]

Ah, makes sense! When I see "Agile at scale" I instantly think flavors of scaled Agile. Other respondents are thinking the same thing - thanks for the clarification!

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

@Dave Liao the different times of scaled agile frameworks are fair game, too! Though, Ashley and Kelly won't be digging into them unless a question pops up.

[Antoine Berry]

Hi @Christine P. Dela Rosa ,

Working in a big company with dozens of teams that have their own methodology, how would you assist them from the perspective of a Jira administrator ? 

Would you incentivize the use of a limited amount of workflows, or would you answer each team's needs ?

To which extent should you customize screens and transitions to fit each project ?

Given that I am the only administrator in the company and I want to keep the instance as clean as possible.

Thanks,

Antoine

[Christine P. Dela Rosa]

Got it, thanks!