April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

1

I Went to the Lean Software and Systems Conference in Atlanta

and All I Got Was a Bunch of Thought-Provoking Ideas*

Ted M. YoungDevelopment Manager, BillingCentertyoung@guidewire.comGuidewire Software (http://www.guidewire.com)

*And a cool t-shirt

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

2

Twitter Activity at LSSC

• 374 Tweets

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

3

A Lean Background

• System Thinking• Inventory = Risk

• Just-in-Time• Delays Cause Waste (Batching)

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

4

Some Terms

• MMF/MVF• Minimal Marketable Feature• Minimal Viable Feature

• WIP• Work-in-progress

• Kanban 看板 • Sign board

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

5

Lean Focus

• Value > Flow > Waste

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

6

Four Big Ideas

1. Small Slices are Best2. Make Work Visible3. WIP Limits and Flow4. Lean = Whole System

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

7

Small Slices are Best

• Estimates are waste

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

8

Make Work Visible

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

9

Make Work Visible

• Can't improve what you can't see• Exposes knowledge

• Makes implicit -> explicit

• Metrics provide Guidance• What's right?• What's wrong?

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

10

Measurements

• Lead Time• Request to Delivery

• Cycle Time• Work Begins to Work Ready to Deliver

• Throughput• Little's Law for Queuing Theory

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

11

Theory of Constraints

• Cause of Delays• Long feedback cycle• Building unnecessary features • Overbuilding features

• Result of Delays• Finding bugs gets harder

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

12

Queue & WIP Limits

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

13

Queue & WIP Limits

• Limit Queue Size• Forces Bottlenecks Upstream

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

14

Goal: Single-Piece Flow

• Work ONE thing to completion• "Swarming"

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

15

What about Iterations?

• Artificial boundary?• How about Feature-based (MFV)?

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

16

Support/Service Provider

• Multiple Classes of Service (QoS)• Normal• Expedited

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

17

Lean = Whole System

• Allocate capacity strategically• Delivering Value to Customers• Solving Problems• Sustainability• Support

• Optimize for the Whole System• More features faster doesn't mean

improved sales

April 28, 2010 Copyright © 2010, Guidewire Software. All Rights Reserved.

18

Not The End

• But I'll Take Questions…

• My “tweet stream”:• http://www.scribblelive.com/Event/

LeanSSC_2010?Page=0