Chapter 9

Enterprise Transformation: Profound and Persistent Change

A senior executive who led an organizational transformation to Scrum is a happy person. Just as happy are the organization's employees. They now have a great place to work and a great way to develop and market valuable software quickly—and they have achieved this through their own hard work.

The Enterprise Transformation Project

The path from initiation of an enterprise transformation project to realization of the vision consists of many activities, and it can take five or six years before the transition is complete—before profound and persistent change is embedded. Major changes will occur quickly, and benefits will occur within the first year. Significant competitive advantage will be reaped within two years. Even when the transformation is complete, continuous improvement—the heart of success—goes on forever.

You have used Scrum in one or more projects. You are convinced that you would like to use Scrum throughout the enterprise. To start, you should assess whether the type of change embodied in Scrum has enough value to be worth the cost of an organizational change project. You will gather the key people you will work with throughout the project so that they, as well as you, gain this certainty.

Once you decide to implement Scrum within your organization, a journey begins with a belief that the effort will be rewarded with a more effective software process and a more responsive and competitive company. It ...

Get Software in 30 Days: How Agile Managers Beat the Odds, Delight Their Customers, And Leave Competitors In the Dust now with the O’Reilly learning platform.

O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.