Colin Deady: How Lean was my Scrum? (Remote Meetup)

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Colin Deady; Head of Agile Development at Capita Software Digital Development Centre.

At a recent Unicom conference I presented, "How Lean is your Scrum?" A talk, and challenge, asking the assembled if they valued delivering customer-driven value or adhering to The Agile Method (whatever that may be). I.e.: have they lost the meaning of value-based agility by misunderstanding the intent of the Agile Manifesto and the Principles that back this? I also challenged some of the industry surrounding Agile / Scrum as reinforcing method/process over individuals, interactions and valuable outcomes. Do teams value discovery of options, conversation and collaboration to deliver successfully or do they congratulate each other when they have ticked the Agile boxes ("we do stand-ups, we have a Kanban board, we...")? Why do Agile Consultancies far too often evaluate "transformation" by the number of Agile boxes ticked? I even hinted at this in my synopsis with the tongue-in-cheek last sentence, "By definition, this topic ticks a lot of the Agile “boxes”."

In my talk I gave reasons why replacing your Agile Consultant with the Barista from your local coffee shop may lead to a better outcome. My talk prompted me to review my own journey in agility over the last ~15 years: I alluded to the challenges and changes in teams I had seen over the years and continue to see. Hence, here is the next question: how Lean was my Scrum? And, how Lean is it today? Do I constantly identify and eliminate waste from process? Do I genuinely value value? Do I (perhaps grudgingly) give up an old process/method for something new that simplifies the value chain? My new talk is presented as a self-reflective timeline split into bite-sized chunks using examples from across my 20+ years in software. Starting with my first IT project (designing a virtual fishtanks for schools multimedia software) I progress forward highlighting the good, and not so across industries as diverse as education, finance and real-time GIS, that has driven me to where I am now. I then look forward: what can I do to get even better at value-based delivery?