What is Agile at scale?
Fresh out of our editorial meeting this week, we thought we would also pass on another great article that we found at MIT Management Sloan School that addresses a question we hear a lot. What is agile at scale?
Agile at Scale is when agile is being used through the technology and business side of the organization on tall types of projects. Organizations are looking at "Scaling Up" agile from just running projects to running business units and large initiatives. Using agile as a way to run a business unit breaks down all those functional silos by creating a team that is composed of technology and business team organizationally - they appear on the organization chart as a single entity even though they are made up of multiple functions. This is effect creates teams that are focused on a specific business process or product.
Agile at scale is also about getting better quality out of all your agile projects to improve the product being delivered. Okay we got speed - now let's get to higher quality. Building stronger methods and practices for getting a more robust product or deliverable out of a sprint is key to cutting costs in rework but also in building a stronger relationship with your customer.
MIT Management Sloan School put together a great infographic on Getting agile to scale.
The agile at scale diagram looks at the 6 dimensions of scaling agile up in an organization. From learning the language (common understanding of terms) from the C-Suite to the ground floor to understanding there will be friction because management is giving up some control.