A presentation by Burak Ilter, Head of Lean Engineering, Konica Minolta at the Lean Digital Summit 2019. Workplace Hub (WPH) project is a very complex project both technically and organization-wise. Burak explained how they are transforming this complex software development project into a truly agile one, the talk focused on metrics, processes (based on SAFe), job roles and responsibilities and about how they are changing the mindsets and behaviors using these as input and what are the results so far. More Lean Digital stories on www.lean-digital-summit.com

1. Konica Minolta, Inc.
A transformation journey for a distributed
development organization
7th October, 2019
Lean Digital Summit, Paris
by Burak Ilter
Head of Engineering, WPH, Konica Minolta
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2. Konica Minolta, Inc.
• https://workplacehub.konicaminolta.eu/eu/
What is WPH?
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3. Konica Minolta, Inc.
VISION AND GOALS (why are we transforming?)
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VISION
• To become the best software development department in the
enterprise
• To become recognized by the industry as a software development
company
CURRENT MAJOR GOALS
• To deliver faster and smaller releases
• Continuously improve the quality of the releases

4. Konica Minolta, Inc.
CHALLENGES (no shortage of them ever, right  )
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• Timezone differences
• Brazil and Japan do not even have a
common time in the working hours!
• Different cultures
• Traditional waterfall mindset
• KM is a very old company with
waterfall as the standard
• Lack of motivation to change
• Comfort zone
• Lack of established processes
• Difficulties in hiring
• Lack of common understanding (or even
the knowledge of) for the agile concepts

5. Konica Minolta, Inc.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
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• Weekly PDCA meetings to align, plan and check
• Better motivated employees
• Yearly surveys as well as direct feedback tells us so
• SAFe transformation
• Official metrics
• From bug numbers to carry-over ratio
• Release cycle from once in 3 year to every 3 months
• Much fewer bugs
• Better installation/setup processes
• “Kitting” is a very important aspect
• Internal customers are much happier
• Much more effective Lessons Learned

6. Konica Minolta, Inc.
TO BE ACCOMPLISHED (BOTTOMLESS PIT)
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• Release on demand, after each feature is complete
• Full utilization of metrics
• Metrics to be utilized by the teams themselves
• Provide better/faster customer value
• Work directly with customers
• Or use customer data analytics
• Full utilization of scrum ceremonies
• Check if planning still holds true
• Raise risks earlier
• CI/CD with full test automation
• Integration tests are the biggest work
• Vulnerability check as part of CI/CD

7. Konica Minolta, Inc.
TO BE ACCOMPLISHED (Cont.’d)
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• Coaching/mentoring practices
• Employee (self-)development initiatives
• Better hiring practices
• Establish some standardization based on expected values

8. Konica Minolta, Inc.
• Hiring good people
• Establishing SAFe as the methodology to
use
• Clear job role definitions
• Clear processes
• The PI event!
• Working on items from the Lessons
Learned sessions
• Many improvement points
• Removing unnecessary hierarchy levels
• Faster decision making
• Empowerment
How did we manage to accomplish them?
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9. Konica Minolta, Inc.
• Enabling team members to take decisions and to plan
• Constantly sharing the vision/strategy
• Bringing people together in an actionable manner (PDCA, SoS)
• Creating value stream teams
• Reduced dependencies
• Team able to deliver value for the customer end-to-end
• Spreading the best practices, by separate team discussions
• Simplify the architecture when necessary (after all development is a technical topic,
isn’t it?)
• Still many ongoing activities
How did we manage to accomplish them? (Cont.’d)
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10. Konica Minolta, Inc.
HOW TO STAY FOCUSED
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11. Konica Minolta, Inc.
The Summit?
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12. Konica Minolta, Inc.
MOST IMPORTANT THING TO KEEP IN MIND
• It is about the people not about the processes.
• Hire, maintain the best people.
• Hire people up for challenges!
• Train them to make them even better and stay happy!
• Motivated people can undertake more challenges.
• Empower them to take their own decisions
• Support them whenever they need help though!!!
• Increase information sharing, using whatever means are best for the
team
• Repetition might be necessary due to multiple locations. This is
part of the job.
• Create F2F opportunities if possible
What is this all about?
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13. Konica Minolta, Inc. 13