Are Your Agile Teams Struggling to Deliver Customer Value?
How to leverage a progressive demoing strategy to optimize product performance and deliver value to your customer.
By Rebecca Mears, BAS Senior Consultant
The key to high-quality delivery
As customer expectations become more fluid, Agile teams are increasingly challenged to pivot quickly and adapt to deliver quality products. It is critical that teams understand this concept and maintain a customer-centric focus. Demonstrating value is the moment in agile delivery that validates customer needs are met.
Product owners are responsible for creating value for end-users as well as the organization — they represent the user experience during the development cycle and therefore have the final say in product decisions. They are also the conduit between the customer and the development team. Product owners represent the users experience during the development cycle and therefore have the final say in product decisions based on customer needs.
So, why do most organizations wait until the end of the sprint to showcase working software to the product owner?
In addition, why does the development team versus the product owner generally demo working software?
The key to high-quality delivery is a product owner who understands the end user, knows how the product was designed and built, and can articulate the value of the product based on customer needs and wants.
When is the right time to demo?
Agile methodology prescribes that teams complete a formal demo at the end of the sprint — typically in the sprint review meeting. What prevents us from demoing earlier in the sprint when the story is done? One of the guiding principles of high-performing teams is: “If there is value in doing something, then do it more often.”
Waiting until the end of the sprint should not be the first time the product is showcased to the product owner. The development team should have multiple informal demos throughout the sprint. As soon as the user story is developed, the team should perform an informal demo for the product owner. The idea is to gather and respond to feedback as soon as possible. A continuous demo cycle requires a product owner who is available and committed to the team, the release strategy, and customer needs.
How to apply progressive demoing to your Definition of Done and measure success
When adopting a progressive demo approach, agile teams should evaluate their Definition of Done (DoD) and consider adding criteria to support user story demos throughout the sprint. The DoD is the framework for incremental development and fosters the team’s “inspect and adapt” mindset.
When teams include progressive demo as part of their DoD, team culture and dynamics mature toward a collective ownership and accountability of the sprint backlog. Teams are no longer waiting to demo; they are collaborating quickly and with purpose to inspect and adapt. Trust is elevated.
Examples of Definition of Done with progressive demoing:
- Development is complete, and the story is demoed to the product owner in a development environment.
- Development and QA are complete, and the story is demoed to the product owner in a QA environment.
- Test data is available for the product owner to run the end of sprint demo to stakeholders.
Measuring progressive demoing
Sprint health metrics should be tracked to evaluate progress. Burn-down and burn-up metrics are critical for gauging what has been completed and if the team is on track to complete against their sprint commitment. The burn-up chart below is an excellent example to gauge sprint health of the team:
- The first story was accepted on Day 2 of the sprint — indicating the product owner is actively engaged with the team.
- The ‘accepted’ bars gradually increase each day — teams are working on manageable user story sizes that allow them to deliver high-quality value incrementally, throughout the sprint.
- The work is spread evenly throughout each day — the workload is balanced, team morale is high, and the product owner is engaged.
Benefits of demoing early and often
Progressive demoing allows the product owner to review and provide feedback during the development lifecycle early and often. It allows for continuous feedback at the time of delivery, not at the end of the sprint. More frequent demos increase the team and product owner’s accountability for high-quality delivery.
Other advantages are:
- Reduced risks. Risks related to quality, time, cost, and value are identified early and often, decreasing the impact of an issue that might occur downstream.
- Improved team morale. Progressive demos increase communication and create clarity on priorities and expectations for each team member in the sprint.
- Quick time-to-market. Continuous review of the product increases speed by shortening the product owner review process and creating windows for teams to adapt and improve early and often.
- Better control on release cycles. The product owner has real-time information on sprint and release readiness.
Progressive demoing creates a culture where the team has a strong understanding of business value, the product owner is available and engaged, and release cycles are delivered with high quality. Rather than waiting until the end of the sprint, a continuous demo strategy fosters the “inspect and adapt” mindset while keeping teams focused on delivering sprint commitments and goals.
Want to learn more?
Reach out to Slalom Orange County Business Advisory Services at slalomocbas@slalom.com — or visit slalom.com.
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