As companies race to adopt new cloud computing technologies and systems to effectively compete as digital enterprises, they quickly discover that with new systems, applications, and processes comes monumental new complexity. At a fundamental level, legacy systems of record, which are critical to running core operating functions, like Finance, ERP, CRM, and HR were not designed to seamlessly connect with key systems of engagement or systems of intelligence used to create sustainable customer … [Read more...]
The IT Leader’s Place in the Business
This post was is an excerpt from the book A Seat at the Table: IT Leadership in the Age of Agility by Mark Schwartz. In the Agile world, senior IT leadership, and the CIO in particular, must look at their jobs in a new way if they want to secure a seat at the table. A few of the critical characteristics of the new IT leadership role include: Driver of Outcomes Manager of Uncertainty Steward of Assets Contributor Influencer and Salesperson Orchestrator of Chaos Enabler Impediment … [Read more...]
Antipattern 1.1: Doing an Agile Transformation
This post on the Agile Transformation Antipattern is adapted from Chapter 1 of Sooner Safer Happier by Jonathan Smart, with Zsolt Berend, Myles Ogilvie, and Simon Rohrer. I’ve met with many organizations and leadership teams that want to undertake an “Agile Transformation.” The process usually begins in the same way. We sit with senior leaders and ask them why they want to change. The response is often silence. A couple of people will stare at the ceiling. Someone will stretch their … [Read more...]
Domains of Work and Cynefin: A Primer for the Business Leader
Given the importance of taking an optimal approach for the type of work, it is important to understand what agile, lean, DevOps, and waterfall are and their history. People, historically, have spent very little time thinking about or improving how they do what they do. This is the fourth in a series of posts adapted from the book Sooner Safer Happier addressing these different frameworks. Approaching Work Based on the Domain of Work As we’ve seen, product development, unique change, is … [Read more...]
Waterfall: A Primer for the Business Leader
Given the importance of taking an optimal approach for the type of work, it is important to understand what agile, lean, DevOps, and waterfall are and their history. People, historically, have spent very little time thinking about or improving how they do what they do. This is the third in a series of posts adapted from the book Sooner Safer Happier addressing these different frameworks. What is Waterfall Most large, old, traditional organizations either used to take, or still take, a waterfall … [Read more...]
DevOps: A Primer for the Business Leader
Given the importance of taking an optimal approach for the type of work, it is important to understand what agile, lean, DevOps, and waterfall are and their history. People, historically, have spent very little time thinking about or improving how they do what they do. This is the second in a series of posts adapted from the book Sooner Safer Happier addressing these different frameworks. What Is DevOps? DevOps is a portmanteau that combines Development and Operations. DevOps focuses on breaking … [Read more...]
Agile and Lean: A Primer for the Business Leader
Looking for DevOps: A Primer for the Business Leader in our Ways of Working series? Click the link above. In our last post we discussed the ways of working from manufacturing that brought us to where are are today. Given the importance of taking an optimal approach for the type of work, it is important to understand what agile, lean, DevOps, and waterfall are and their history. People, historically, have spent very little time thinking about or improving how they do what they do. This is the … [Read more...]
A Sense of Urgency: Surviving in the Age of Digital
The world changed on June 26, 2018. It happened quietly. Few people even noticed. But that was the day that, after more than a century, General Electric, the last original member of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, was removed from the index. GE was one of just a dozen firms that Charles Dow included in his list in 1896. The company appeared alongside giants such as American Tobacco, American Sugar Refining Company, and Tennessee Coal and Iron, companies that dominated what Carlota Perez, an … [Read more...]
Making Bureaucracy Lean, Learning and Enabling
This post is a transcript of Mark Schwartz's DevOps Enterprise Summit- London 2020 presentation. Hi everyone. My name is Mark Schwartz. I'm an enterprise strategist with Amazon Web Services. I think I've spoken at every one of these DevOps Enterprise Summits since 2014, so I hope you're not getting tired of me yet. I think some of you might also have read one or more of my books. There's The Art of Business Value, A Seat at the Table, and War and Peace and IT. And the exciting … [Read more...]
Three Innovative Funding Models to Enhance DevOps
Adapted from War and Peace and IT: Business Leadership, Technology, and Success in the Digital Age by Mark Schwartz. The traditional project plan tries to manage risks by itemizing them in a register and proposing a mitigation plan for each one. Risks are mitigated to the extent necessary to bring the plan back into line—in other words, to adjust the initiative so the initial business case and plan are maintained. But the uncertainties in the IT domain go deeper—it might be that … [Read more...]
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