Being agile enables the software development groups in Enterprises to deliver high value and high quality software with speed. However legacy applications along with the overall Enterprise landscape pose their own challenges that are outside of the scrum framework to solve. Multiple small scrum teams though working on separate applications need to be cohesive with a big picture. As a portfolio lead, who owns multiple applications and teams related to a portfolio within an Enterprise is a Chicken in scrum terminology. The expectation from the role is that of leader, scrum master as well as an Architect providing technical and functional oversight to the teams within the portfolio. This session is about a retrospective of our work life as a Portfolio Lead who takes care of multiple scrum teams, and applications. We would like to speak about the top 3 challenges faced such as Scaling Production Support / Knowledge Retention for applications delivered through Scrum, Impact of Organizational Transformation initiatives on the scrum teams, and Multiple Stakeholder Expectations / Conflict Management through real life examples of our work. We would retrospect what we did, and discuss and debate what worked well, and what did not. The session would focus on top 3 challenges faced: Production Support / Knowledge Retention for applications delivered through Scrum Impact of Organizational Transformation initiatives on the scrum teams Multiple Stakeholder Expectations / Conflict Management

1. What and What not
A Portfolio Lead Retrospects
Yashasree Barve & Dipen Shah
Tata Consultancy Services

2. Yashasree Barve, CSM, CSP
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Diversity & Women’s Network @ TCS

3. Dipen Shah
Scrum Gathering India 2014

4. Who’s in the room?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. Agile Coach or
Consultants
1. Scrum Master,
Team Member, or
Product Owner
3. Program,
Portfolio Lead, or
Manager?
4. None of these

5. What is a Project?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. Project is what our
business sponsors tell
us to do.
1. It’s a temporary
group activity
designed to produce a
unique product,
service or result.
3. Something that we
do every day as part of
software development
4. None of these

6. What is a Portfolio?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. Something that
Photographers click for
aspiring models
1. A collection of
investments held by an
investment company,
hedge fund, financial
institution or individual.
3. A collection of
programs, projects and/or
operations may not be
interdependent managed
as a group.
4. None of these

7. Context Setting
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Project
• Agile/Scrum for 7 years
• ~30 parallel scrum projects
• ~200 team members in all
• 6 program groups
• Flat reporting structure
• 3 Delivery owners
• Open source + Enterprisy
• Data intensive apps
• Wide technology footprint
Quick Facts
Portfolio
Program

8. Scrum Gathering India 2014
0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
3.0
3.5
4.0
4.5
5.0
5.5
6.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
Team2
Team1
Team3
Team23 Team22
Team21
Team20
Team19
Team18
Team30
Team29
Team28
Team27
Team26
Team25
Team24
Team35Team34
Team33
Team32
Team31
Duration (months)
Unit of measurement
Priority
Unit of measurement
Team17
Team16
Team15
Team14
Team13
Team12
Team11 Team10
Team9
Team8
Team7
Team6
Team5
Team4
Program 6
Program 5Program 3
Program 4Program 2
Program 1
Our Portfolio!

9. Scrum Gathering India 2014
Stressed out!

10. Time for a Retrospective!
Scrum Gathering India 2014

11. What is the Career path
defined by Scrum?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. Developer >>
Product Owner
1. Developer >>
Scrum Master
3. Developer >>
Project Manager
4. None of these

12. People Problems
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Cope up
with Emergent
Design
Adopt
Engineering
practices,
be a craftsman
Feeling
stagnant,
not growing
Individual
Performance
over Team
Performance
Cope up
with Emergent
Design
No defined
Career Path

13. Managing Career Path
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Understand
individual
aspirations
Set expectations
For
Project and Role
Deep
involvement
with teams
Separate Role
from
Designation

14. Share & Learn
• Put training plan
• Assign mentees
• Create forums to
learn and share
Architectural
Thinking
• Explain Big picture
• Design Discussions
• Architecture CoE
• Portfolio level
weekly scrum of
scrums for tech leads
Fuel
Innovation
• Portfolio
Visioning
• PoCs with new
technology
• Continuous
Improvement
• Business value
addition
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Defining Career Path

15. What is the appraisal process
prescribed by Scrum?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. Scrum prescribes
Bell Curve
1. Scrum prescribes
evaluating team and
not individuals
3. None of these 4. Scrum does not
define any appraisal
process

16. Scrum Gathering India 2014
Add Scrum-y performance goals
Team Behavior, Building
trust, transparency
Sharing, Learning
Mentoring, Pairing up
Improve the process
through retrospectives
New ideas, Technology /
Business value additions

17. How do Stakeholders decide
the project priorities?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. Why worry about
the stakeholder
priorities?
1. All stakeholders
know each other
very well and think
alike.
3. None of these 4. Each stakeholders
may have their own
priorities and product
vision.

18. Stakeholder Management
Challenges
Scrum Gathering India 2014 Yashasree Barve & Dipen Shah
Multiple Sponsors
Different roadmaps & Priorities
Varied interaction styles with team
Inconsistency of approach
Product quality not similar

19. Image source: http://lifewayblog.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/biblestudiesforlife/files/2013/12/road-map.jpg
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Roadmap Discussions

20. Scrum Gathering India 2014
Be open and Transparent

21. Image Source: http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2645/3759196793_77a886c9d1_o.jpg
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Elephants and cheetahs in the room

22. Image source: http://u.jimdo.com/www54/o/s9dc4a98b8dbd1ac4/img/ibc8486b329af5038/1332179649/std/image.jpg
Scrum Gathering India 2014
Organizational Rhythm

23. Project Mapping
0
1
2
3
4
5
Complexity
Sponsor Grade
Duration
Cost
Team maturity
(reverse)
Business Value
Impact of failure
Sample Project
Scrum Gathering India 2014

24. What Application Support
Groups feel about Agile?
Scrum Gathering India 2014
2. OMG!1. Wow!
3. Frustrated 4. I don’t care

25. The Support Hangover…
Less
Documentation
Churn in
the team
Not able to
cope up!
Frequent
Releases
Production
Issues
Scrum Gathering India 2014

26. Define what’s “Just Enough”
Scrum Gathering India 2014
DEEP Product Backlog
Definition of Done
Architecture Diagram
Security Review Document
Major Design Decisions
Automated Tests
User Manual

27. Support
onboarding
process
Bi-weekly calls
to sync up
Add support
stories to
backlog
Give support
Access to
Product
Backlog
Pair up Dev
and Support
teams
Bust
troublesome
tickets through
Do It Yourself
screens
Supporting the Support!

28. Scrum Gathering India 2014
1 Pay attention to Career Growth in terms of responsibilities
2 Ensure scrum-y goals enter appraisal process
3 Transparent and constant connection with stakeholders
4 Projects’ Rhythm and Mapping helps appropriate oversight
5 Define Just Enough Documentation and help support group
Panch-Mantras for a Happy agile
Portfolio Leadership

29. Happy to take Questions
Hope This Session Helps!
Thank you
?
Scrum Gathering India 2014