Agile Transformation & its never-ending Journey to Agility

Based on Oxford dictionary, Agility means ability to move quickly and easily. Increasing your company agility could be your best way to survive in today’s increasingly complex world

“Success today requires the agility and drive to constantly rethink, reinvigorate, react, and reinvent.” ~ Bill Gates

In this article, I will share the journey of our transformation process in tiket.com by improving our Agility.

First of all, before we even start the transformation, we need to find our WHY, here is some example :

• WHY we should transform / change?
• WHY don’t we just use our current process? It works fine for years.

After we find the answer of our WHYs, we can dig deeper by using the other “W” in “5W + 1H” questions :

• What happen if we transform? What happen if we don’t?
• What is our objective & success criteria?
• Who should lead & run the transformation?
• When should we start?
• Where should we start (which function / area)?
• How should we do it?

In our case, we found the answer of our WHY by realizing that we need to “change the game” so we can catch-up with the competition & deliver value early to customer.

1. The Beginning Stage — Early 2018

At this stage, our current team start to learn about Agile & Scrum Framework. Start establishing 1 or 2 Scrum teams as pilot project for the Transformation. Give workshop & training to this teams to prepare them before we start piloting.

Highlights :

• We start running Scrum Events but it was not properly done
• Mini-waterfall : Scope was fixed every Sprint, timelines are defined for each sequential process within Sprint
• No dedicated team (One developer can handle multiple projects)

2. The Fixing Stage — Mid 2018

At this stage, we evaluate & try to improve the process. We start hiring Scrum Masters from external who can guide, help the process & be a mentor for the transformation processes.

Highlights :

• Evaluate & inspect the Pilot projects. Propose action plans
• Give workshops & training to team members (Product & Tech)
• Building the right Agile mindset
• Fixing the scrum events & processes based on the Scrum Guide
• Establish 6 dedicated Scrum team with dedicated team member & roles (Product Owner, Developers & Scrum Master)
• Establish Release Train / Release Management process

3. The Scaling Up Stage — 2019

At this stage, our company are hyper-growing the team. Each team are getting bigger in number & scope, we start splitting the teams to be more focus on each feature / module.

To manage this hyper-growth, we need to scale up our Agility. How we do it?

Highlights :

• Scaling-up our Agility by establishing our own Agile Scaled Framework. We are adapting Large Scale Scrum (LeSS) with combination of Spotify Model
• Introduction of Vertical Models
• Piloting in 1 vertical. We selectively choose team that is most suitable for piloting (not too big & not too small - just right)
• Evaluate, improve & continue the implementation in other vertical
• Hyper-grow from 6 Scrum Teams to 20+ Scrum Teams within 6 verticals
• Collaborate with People Team for Onboarding Process for every newjoiners
• Improve Release Management Process

4. The Continuous Improvement Stage — 2020

At this stage, we regulary evalute our current process & continuously improving it based on the feedback that we get from everyone in team. Feedback gathering through Retrospectives, questionnaire & survey.

Highlights :

• Team Maturity are getting better
• Scrum Framework & the processes are embedded in everyone on the team and become their routines & habit (muscle-memory)
• Ownership from team member to their own team are increasing
• OKR Implementation
• Standarization & Guidelines for better collaboration across verticals
• Self-Deployment Process

5. The “What Next?” Stage — 2021 onwards

What will happen next? What should we do next? No one knows what kind of uncertainties that we will face in the future. We need to be prepared by doing:

• Keep evaluating & inspect the current process (what went well? what needs to be improved?)
• Adapt to changes
• Continuous Improvement
• Find a new way or method and do some experimentation
• Revisit & improve the Metrics to measure the agility
• Scaling up the Agility in company-wide
• Unlearn, Learn & Relearn!

Summary

To summarize it, here are the steps that might help to do the Agile Transformation in your company / institution :

• Start with WHY
• Set the EXPECTATION & Success Criteria. Define the methodology, framework, how-to, etc
• Get a buys-in & SPONSOR to support the transformation
• Establish & train the team who will become the Agile CHAMPION
• COMMUNICATION is key. Socialize it, give workshop & training to inject the Mindset
• Start PILOTING in 1 or 2 suitable team
• Evaluate, get feedback & continuously IMPROVE
• Create a SUCCESS STORY for the pilot teams
• ROLL-OUT to other team in the organization

Closure

Those are the stages that what we have been through during the Agile Transformation to improve our Agility. The journey itself was not easy and very challenging. Hopefully this article can inspire everyone who are on progress doing the transformation or plan to do it in the future.

Every company / institution has their own challenges, find your own best & suitable way to conquer your journey to Agility, there is no silver bullet.

It’s a never-ending journey, enjoy the process. Cheers!