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Distributed Team Challenge: Graphic Arts teams
Distributed Agile
• You are on a team of graphic artists creating images for the gaming industry• Your cutting edge tools: Ball point pen
• Cutting edge in 1888
• Your games: Connect the dots• Fun for children of all ages
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Goal: Create as many images as you can
Distributed Agile
Acceptance Criteria:• Each image must be presented in sequence: Apple, Elephant.
• Images out of sequence don’t count
• All of the lines must be drawn and the image colored in
• A team member can only draw 4 lines on an image and then the must pass it on to another team member
• All co-located team members must draw at least one line on every image
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Your teams
Distributed Agile
• Blue Team: Co-located
• Red Team: Distributed with a 3 hour overlapping work schedule
• White Team: Distributed with no overlapping work time
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Each round
Distributed Agile
• 6 minutes
• 4 day sprint• Each day is 90 seconds• Only work during your “Day”
• Locations will start off cycle
• Look for the sun to know if you should be working
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Debrief
Distributed Agile
• Which team structure had the advantage?
• What changes could the other teams make to improve?
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What percentage of Agile organizations have their teams distributed?
Distributed Agile
A. 22%
B. 42%
C. 62%
D. 82%
9Distributed Agile
As of 2016, more than 82% of Agile organizations had at least some distributed agile teams.
Source: 10th Annual VersionOne State of Agile Survey
Distributed teams in Agile today
12Distributed Agile
Some of the Challenges
Collaboration
Team Building
CommunicationDifferent Time Zones Cultural Differences
Coordination
Facilitating Ceremonies
Engagement
Language Differences
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What are Some of the Benefits?
Distributed Agile
The VersionOne survey mentioned earlier reports that 62% found that adopting Agile helps them to better manage distributed teams!
Distributed Teams help Agile by:
• Making it possible to get the right people on the team – no matter where they’re located
• Increasing the span of work hours that the team is working across
• Better enabling organizational insights from different organizational locations
• Providing a wider organizational, regional or global outlook for the team
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Jason’s Suggestions for Distributed Teams
Distributed Agile
• Limit the time zone spread when setting up the team
• Optimize your technology toolkit
• Utilize the highest bandwidth communication methods
• Increase focus on deliberate team building
• Tailor your methodology
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Limit the time zone spread
Distributed Agile
• Overlapping work times equals increased communication potential
• Teams in 2 time zones can easily develop methods for overcoming the location and time distribution
• Teams in 3 or more time zones are handicapped
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Optimize your Technology Toolkit
Distributed Agile
• Use and maximize available collaborative online tools
• Enable video for your team members
• Consider a laptop webcam as a video conferencing tool – just gather round!
• Investigate and use online tools to support ceremonies
• Get your arsenal up, tested and running and train team members so you are ready at a moment’s notice! Once enabled, you can
use video for meetings or even just for chats!
Image from Susan’s Skype!
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Useful online tools and sites
Distributed Agile
• Estimation:• PointingPoker.org
• Planning and Meetings:• Google Docs• Google Drawings• Kanban Flow
• Story Workshops• Trello (informal)• JIRA
• Kanban Planning• Kanban Flow (informal)• Trello (informal)• JIRA
• Retros:• Trello• Google Drawings
Trello Retro
Google Drawings Retro
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Utilize the highest bandwidth communication methods
Distributed Agile
Use video-enabled communication as much as possible when you can’t be face-to-face.
Source: Gigaom Survey and LinkedIn.com
Kill Your Email!
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Increase focus on deliberate team building
Distributed Agile
• Develop a practical working agreement
• Do more – not less – team building
• Respect time differences
• Everyone is remote
• Pay extra attention to what’s happening on your team
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Develop a practical working agreement
Distributed Agile
Make sure your working agreements keep in mind:• Preferred online collaboration tools
• Preferred communication methods, keeping communication richness in mind
• Guidelines for working hours and communications outside working hours
• Agreement on the times and facilitation of ceremonies so all team members can participate
• Commitment to keeping the technology toolkit ready, in case co-located team members become temporarily distributed.
Keep your team’s unique needs in mind when crafting your working agreements
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Do more – not less – team building
Distributed Agile
• Get Face to Face whenever possible
• Investigate distributed team building exercises
• Take into account cultural and language differences
• Make sure distributed members are not excluded from any activity
• Find creative ways to include all team members in celebrations or other team building events for special occasions
Consider an On-Site / Off-Site Ice Cream Party!
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Respect time differences
Distributed Agile
• Honor time differences when scheduling meetings and ceremonies
• If some team members have to be inconvenienced sometimes, consider rotating the inconvenience
• If there is a golden window of shared time, keep it sacred
Would you want to make Sprint commitments in
this condition?
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Everyone is remote
Distributed Agile
• All meetings, facilitation techniques, and collaboration processes should emphasize ease of use for remote team members
• Consider having all of the team members work with the same remote tools
• i.e. Don’t do in person meetings
• As % of distributed team members increases the % of meetings done fully remote should increase
Get into the habit of Thinking Remote First
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Pay extra attention to what’s happening on your team
Distributed Agile
Even with video, it can be harder to pick up on a team’s ”vibe.” • Pay extra attention to possible symptoms like:
• Lateness or non-attendance to meetings and ceremonies
• Non-participation during meetings and discussions• Passivity, hesitance to disagree or unusual silence
• Check the pulse more frequently• Include questions in retros about how distribution
is working for all team members and how it is affecting performance and delivery
A Distributed Agile Team should be a happy team!
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Tailor your methodology
Distributed Agile
• Scrum was designed for co-located teams
• Adapt the Scrum meetings to meet the needs of your team• Honor the spirit and purpose but adapt the format
• Examples:• A team with limited time overlap may split planning across 2 days• Teams with multiple languages may adapt who demo’s the software
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Recap: Jason things distributed teams need to:
Distributed Agile
• Limit the time zone spread when setting up the team
• Optimize your technology toolkit
• Utilize the highest bandwidth communication methods
• Increase focus on deliberate team building
• Tailor your methodology