Get more bang from the IT buck!
Enterprise companies have to free budget space for driving their change towards use of modern software development practices. By implementing a portfolio strategy which combines sourcing and the focus on modern software practices like DevSecOps, Agile Software Development and new Technologies. Companies benefit with a faster moving organisation focused on their clients where it makes sense.
I just moved from Munich, Germany to New York for the company I work for. For me, that’s a dream come true and with it, brings a great onus to learn and adapt to another culture, new rules, processes, language and all of the little things in between. This morning, I was running in Central Park. By seeing all the runners passing me by, I realised the difference of what I knew before. In Munich, running in the English Garden is somehow a more relaxed and slower experience. In New York, I have the feeling everybody is training for the next marathon with each person taking it absolutely seriously. No one is “just running”. The speed is higher, they are running in groups with a coach upfront and a lot are doing interval training or speed runs. Most are running on an asphalt street, not on the softer natural ways which I prefer. It seems like New Yorkers prefer to feel the hard track underneath which with it, brings greater speed. They unleash their speed without compromise, speed is everything!
Nowadays, this is also best practice in IT organisations. If you like to dominate your market, you have to speed up your IT delivery organisation. The “Netflix model” or the “Spotify Model” are terms everybody in IT are using. You work in short, intense intervals. To change to such new models, IT organisations, trainers and coaches are hired to accelerate the change. If you like to lead, you have to become more agile without any compromises whatsoever. (Compare https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insight-financial-services-change-survey-2017)
These modern IT delivery organisations have fundamental three building blocks:
Flexibility in infrastructure & capabilities.
Experts and tools are balancing between speed and quality.
Adaptive and empowered workforce is embracing ongoing change.
How to build a modern delivery organization with your companies’ legacy?
Companies are facing the problem that they have to build up an agile enterprise at the same time they must manage today with flat or declining budgets. They have to invest strategically in IT, to support pace, growth and the future needs of the business. To act without compromises, focus has to be on the combination of the agile strategy with the shoring and sourcing concept. This is done by dividing your application and project portfolio into three areas like you see it on the following graphic: Standard, Transition Zone and Laboratory.
An agile enterprise requires a seed funding process to drive innovations.
In these three areas, typically applications are moving downwards and budget is shifted upwards. What was in the Laboratory in last year, doesn’t have to be in the Laboratory in the upcoming period. The budget which is saved in the Standard area is spent in the Transition Zone and mainly in the Laboratory. Additionally, to traditional portfolio management, we now need a seed funding process. That allows innovative, promising ideas to apply for budget in short cycles to build up prototypes and challenging opportunities.
This idea is driving the transformation roadmap. Typically we are starting the transformation with greater agility, DevOps, automation, or via a lean enterprise in the laboratory by a simultaneously driven re-calibration of our shoring and sourcing approach. This includes in-sourcing, vendor consolidation as well as offshoring.
Personally, I have just downloaded the latest version of my running app. The app is now offering guided runs: a coach is telling you during your run how to best train to improve. I just opted for interval training, 20 intervals every 30 seconds are planned for my next run in the Central Park. What about you? Are you already running fast and how have you funded your agile transformation?