Steve will be presenting the following session
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  • Steve Tendon
    Steve Tendon
    MD
    TameFlow Consulting Lmited
    schedule 11 months ago
    Sold Out!
    45 Mins
    Talk
    Executive

    This talk will describe how we can enable the businesses to manage software engineering efforts at scale in a financially sound way, all the while dealing with multiple projects/products or value streams, multiple events or deadlines, multiple stakeholders and multiple teams.

    It will show how to resolve the conundrum of dependency management at scale by collapsing the combinatorial explosion of dependency networks into a simple linear queue.

    It will describe how to instrument the organization in order to raise leading signals of oncoming trouble in order to trigger intense, frequent and engaging collaboration between all players (business and engineering), leading to an environment that unleashes the organization's collective intelligence via co-creation and social learning.

    The talk will highlight techniques employed to foster intense collaboration between engineering and business, at scale.

    It has been employed, among others, in a case in the automotive industry involving an organization with 8.000 people, half of which in 120 engineering teams distributed globally across the world, dealing with on average 400 projects in process at any time, and 70,000 change requests per month. The focused approached allowed the organization to improve it's operational throughput by 40% in a matter of months after inception.

    The approach is data driven, and takes into account: Flow metrics, Buffer Burn Rate, Virtual Queue Sizes, Operational Throughput, Financial Throughput, Financial Throughput Rate.

    The techniques used are a re-elaboration of the Theory of Constraints, taking elements of Drum-Buffer-Rope scheduling and Critical-Chain Project Management, and combining them with queuing theory and Little's Law.

    The metrics and signals produced are also used to trigger collective psychological flow states leading to sustainable and optimal human experience at work.

1. What got you started/interested in modern software development methods?

The experience with Borland International between 1987 and 1992. The practices of Borland inspired Scrum's daily standup and even the Scrum Master and Product Owner roles.

2. What do you think is the biggest challenge faced by the software product engineering community today?

Scaling. Agile methods worked well at the single team level. They are not fit for purpose when larger settings have to be addressed. That's an area that is better addressed by other perspectives, like those given by the Theory of Constraints and that I have incorporated into my TameFlow Approach.

3. What do you think are the most exciting developments in software product engineering today?

The potential of better tools supporting all phases of the software engineering life cycle. Current obsession with Jira is totally misplaced; and represent a huge opportunity for improvement.

Likewise the adoption of innovative ways to manage collaborative knowledge work, especially at scale.

4. Why did you choose the topic(s) you will be speaking about at the conference?

Simply because it is an area I feel I have relevant experience and expertise.

5. What are some of the key takeaways from your session(s) at Agile India?

I will describe a new way to manage software engineering at scale, where the underlying paradigm is Constraints Management. If you are dealing with multiple project, products or value streams; multiple stakeholders, multiple events or deadlines; and multiple teams, in my session you will learn about a completely new way to handle the challenges thereof.

6. Which sessions are you particularly looking forward to attending at Agile India this year?

Mainly those sessions that are at the intersection between management and practices, in particular finance and devops.

7. Any personal remarks/message you want to share with the software community?

I can only exhort people to think with their own heads! :-) There is too much reliance on established methods proclaimed to be agile. We need a more thorough application of the Scientific Method, use logic, and be data driven. 

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