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The Agile Software Development Series
Scaling Lean & Agile Development: Thinking and Organizational Tools for Large-Scale Scrum
Lean Development and Agile Methods for Large-Scale Key Thinking and Organizational Tools for Sustainable Competitive Success Increasingly, large product-development organizations are turning to lean thinking, agile principles and practices, and large-scale Scrum to sustainably and quickly deliver value and innovation. However, many groups have floundered in their practice-oriented adoptions. Why? Because without a deeper understanding of the thinking tools and profound organizational redesign needed, it is as though casting seeds on to an infertile field. Now, drawing on their long experience leading and guiding large-scale lean and agile adoptions for large, multisite, and offshore product development, and drawing on the best research for great team-based agile organizations, internationally recognized consultant and best-selling author Craig Larman and former leader of the agile transformation at Nokia Networks Bas Vodde share the key thinking and organizational tools needed to plant the seeds of product development success in a fertile lean and agile enterprise. Coverage includes In a competitive environment that demands ever-faster cycle times and greater innovation, applied lean thinking and agile principles are becoming an urgent priority. Scaling Lean & Agile Development will help leaders create the foundation for their lean enterprise–and deliver on the significant benefits of agility. In addition to the foundation tools in this text, see the companion book Practices for Scaling Lean & Agile Large, Multisite, and Offshore Product Development with Large-Scale Scrum for complementary action tools.
368 pages, Paperback
First published December 8, 2008
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797 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
April 11, 2015
I've decided to read this book, becase:
* someone from Agile Warsaw community has brought LeSS up to my attention as a simple & flexible way to scale Scrum as opposite to SAFe I'm allergic to
* I found the description on http://less.works promising, but far from actual issues that appear "on the battlefield"
* I've enjoyed watching Craig Larman's video about LeSS: http://www.ndcvideos.com/#/app/video/...
And this was not a bad decision at all.
1. Book composition is very interesting: authors start with the ideas of what to try / what to avoid (the division is well grained) & the actual idea of organizing the scale approach is in the very end. Because it doesn't actually change anything, it's not the actual value of the book as there's no silver bullet, no ideal approach -> it's these well grained pills of wisdom that (correctly applied) make a difference.
2. Book is very practical, even if it does not focus on actual practices (there's a supplement book for that).
3. Book is not "running around" Scrum & it's terminology (like some other books do). On the contrary, it's VERY strongly influenced by LEAN practices & it may be the best thing about this book (at least for me, as I consider myself Lean/Kanban zealot).
4. But if I had to point out one particular chapter that had made the biggest impression on me, it would be "Teams". As I'm not new to Agile or Scrum in particular, I didn't expect anything truly new, but authors' approach to "feature teams" (and especially its consequence on the ownership of the codebase) was something that has really made me thinking. I'm not sure (still) whether I really agree with their statements, but that's definitely something worth more consideration.
To summarize: a very decent book, especially if you're interested in the topic of scaling Agile approach in large enterprises.
* someone from Agile Warsaw community has brought LeSS up to my attention as a simple & flexible way to scale Scrum as opposite to SAFe I'm allergic to
* I found the description on http://less.works promising, but far from actual issues that appear "on the battlefield"
* I've enjoyed watching Craig Larman's video about LeSS: http://www.ndcvideos.com/#/app/video/...
And this was not a bad decision at all.
1. Book composition is very interesting: authors start with the ideas of what to try / what to avoid (the division is well grained) & the actual idea of organizing the scale approach is in the very end. Because it doesn't actually change anything, it's not the actual value of the book as there's no silver bullet, no ideal approach -> it's these well grained pills of wisdom that (correctly applied) make a difference.
2. Book is very practical, even if it does not focus on actual practices (there's a supplement book for that).
3. Book is not "running around" Scrum & it's terminology (like some other books do). On the contrary, it's VERY strongly influenced by LEAN practices & it may be the best thing about this book (at least for me, as I consider myself Lean/Kanban zealot).
4. But if I had to point out one particular chapter that had made the biggest impression on me, it would be "Teams". As I'm not new to Agile or Scrum in particular, I didn't expect anything truly new, but authors' approach to "feature teams" (and especially its consequence on the ownership of the codebase) was something that has really made me thinking. I'm not sure (still) whether I really agree with their statements, but that's definitely something worth more consideration.
To summarize: a very decent book, especially if you're interested in the topic of scaling Agile approach in large enterprises.
February 3, 2019
This book addressed some of the trickiest challenges I've been facing for years in Product Development, Software & Hardware Engineering, agile transformations, and simply modern management practices. If you work on any teams within any technical field and want to go faster, then I'd suggest reading this book; especially if you work in an organization of 50 to 500 to 1000s of staff.
As an agile coach and practitioner , I've had a pretty deep understanding of the core aspects of agile, but this book solidified many of those concepts. Along with the companion book (which is setup as a never-ending series of experiments), I'm able to answer and articulate responses to the toughest questions from agile skeptics, ranging from the why, what, and how of small-to-large-scale agile/scrum transformations and kaizen.
The biggest lesson I learned from this book is to take a deeper look into the organization to see how the agile teams are fighting institutional inertia. For example, OKRs and agile work beautifully together, but if you cascade OKRs down to silos then to individuals, then the OKRs and agile processes are fighting each other. HR, recruiting, and the whole organization needs to either "be agile" or at least "be agile-aware".
As an agile coach and practitioner , I've had a pretty deep understanding of the core aspects of agile, but this book solidified many of those concepts. Along with the companion book (which is setup as a never-ending series of experiments), I'm able to answer and articulate responses to the toughest questions from agile skeptics, ranging from the why, what, and how of small-to-large-scale agile/scrum transformations and kaizen.
The biggest lesson I learned from this book is to take a deeper look into the organization to see how the agile teams are fighting institutional inertia. For example, OKRs and agile work beautifully together, but if you cascade OKRs down to silos then to individuals, then the OKRs and agile processes are fighting each other. HR, recruiting, and the whole organization needs to either "be agile" or at least "be agile-aware".
January 18, 2023
The first "LeSS book".
Craig Larman and Bas Vodde draw on their experience and also borrow compelling ideas from systems thinking, queueing theory and lean product development to suggest practices that can help scaling agile software development.
This is not a book that focuses on processes or recipes for software development as is. Instead, what is offered is a series of practices known to have worked in other contexts, which the authors refer to as "experiments". Because product development is a complex endeavor, there's not such thing as best practices.
Because this book was written more than a decade ago some aspects (like the references to Scrum) are a bit dated. Nonetheless, I enjoyed reading it because it is accessible and the ideas are well presented. At the end of each chapter there's a recommended reading list for the readers to delve deeper into a subject.
Craig Larman and Bas Vodde draw on their experience and also borrow compelling ideas from systems thinking, queueing theory and lean product development to suggest practices that can help scaling agile software development.
This is not a book that focuses on processes or recipes for software development as is. Instead, what is offered is a series of practices known to have worked in other contexts, which the authors refer to as "experiments". Because product development is a complex endeavor, there's not such thing as best practices.
Because this book was written more than a decade ago some aspects (like the references to Scrum) are a bit dated. Nonetheless, I enjoyed reading it because it is accessible and the ideas are well presented. At the end of each chapter there's a recommended reading list for the readers to delve deeper into a subject.
August 12, 2020
A great book for thinking about organisational challenges when implementing agile principles. While it is what spawned LeSS, this book covers useful tools that apply far more generally than a single framework. Particular chapters that were highlights for me included the chapters in systems thinking and queuing theory and the extensive chapter on organisational agility in respect to Galbraith’s star model for organisational design. I like the contents section as a list of Try... and Avoid... subheadings - I think that will prove useful in applying the breadth of tools contained in this book.
May 5, 2020
As a coach and consultant, I use Scaling Lean and Agile Development as bible in this field. This isn't a book you sit down to read from front to back in one sitting. Rather, I've immersed myself in chapters based on the current problem/situation at hand. This is my handiest reference and always enjoy the sound advice of Craig and Bas. A must have in any Coach's/CIO's/Scrum Master's collection!
July 8, 2019
Some good ideas, but a lot of it feels like it would only work in Japan, not in the US.
Read
July 30, 2019Very good book on system thinking, organizational design and agility. Highly recommend to everyone involved in organizational change (even if your change has nothing to do with agile).
Want to read
April 9, 2020I want to readthis book to get knowthe Agile Development.
March 1, 2021
Amazing book! Really one to keep and review regularly.
February 11, 2014
This book is fantastic. The organizational context is well explained and many times suggested approaches are included that often come from the authors' direct experiences.
The systems thinking chapter is insightful. Many know components of this, but putting it together for this purpose and in this way was helpful and will be a valuable brainstorming/thinking tool. The continual emphasis on being agile rather than "doing it" is spot on... because (in my opinion) this will succeed or fail on how well it "seeps" into the culture over time.
Further the overview of tools was helpful. For some, this will be a set of tools, many of which they may not have realized were available. For others (thinking of some managerial people, but others too) it will legitimize their use, and legitimize why developers often love these kinds of tools.
I was struck by this book (and Essential Scrum for the same reason) how the cultural barriers and organizational contexts are so highlighted, because they are so pivotal.
I can also appreciate how the authors openly discuss organizations with whose approach they strongly disagree (made me laugh out loud in places) yet they didn't just bash in general, they were well thought out criticisms.
There are places in which I felt the authors were exaggerating to make a point. I wish that were left off. It at times caused me to re-read needlessly because it sounded so strong, but this is not too common so was OK.
The emphasis on research throughout, I greatly appreciated.
If you want to understand how to be agile in much larger groups, this is a great book for you.
The systems thinking chapter is insightful. Many know components of this, but putting it together for this purpose and in this way was helpful and will be a valuable brainstorming/thinking tool. The continual emphasis on being agile rather than "doing it" is spot on... because (in my opinion) this will succeed or fail on how well it "seeps" into the culture over time.
Further the overview of tools was helpful. For some, this will be a set of tools, many of which they may not have realized were available. For others (thinking of some managerial people, but others too) it will legitimize their use, and legitimize why developers often love these kinds of tools.
I was struck by this book (and Essential Scrum for the same reason) how the cultural barriers and organizational contexts are so highlighted, because they are so pivotal.
I can also appreciate how the authors openly discuss organizations with whose approach they strongly disagree (made me laugh out loud in places) yet they didn't just bash in general, they were well thought out criticisms.
There are places in which I felt the authors were exaggerating to make a point. I wish that were left off. It at times caused me to re-read needlessly because it sounded so strong, but this is not too common so was OK.
The emphasis on research throughout, I greatly appreciated.
If you want to understand how to be agile in much larger groups, this is a great book for you.
May 31, 2013
I haven't lately read that many books on Agile and software development, since I have felt that I learn more about software development reading about other subject than software development. Also some of the books have been quite boring, but I wanted give Craig Larmans and Bas Voddes book a change based on good reviews I had seen.
Too often books about Agile or Lean say mainly the same things that all other books are saying. Scaling Lean & Agile Development was a fresh exception. Although it did explain many of the basic things, but it did those with easy and compact form, so it wasn't disturbing.
Book goes thoroughly through many different aspects of Agile development in larger scale. It does concentrate on Scrum in it's name, but it does look the things from really from organizational perspective. It doesn't only look from certain layers, but it tries to cover many different aspect. It actually tells about the agile transformation and thinking tools also to get into scaled agile development.
It is easy and fun to read, but it does require background knowledge of agile development, scrum and lean to get most benefits from it. So it isn't the first book to read about agile, but somehow I feel it never is the first book.
I enjoyed it a lot and highly recommend it to anyone who are in organization which have more than one development team doing software development.
This review was originally published in my blog - here
Too often books about Agile or Lean say mainly the same things that all other books are saying. Scaling Lean & Agile Development was a fresh exception. Although it did explain many of the basic things, but it did those with easy and compact form, so it wasn't disturbing.
Book goes thoroughly through many different aspects of Agile development in larger scale. It does concentrate on Scrum in it's name, but it does look the things from really from organizational perspective. It doesn't only look from certain layers, but it tries to cover many different aspect. It actually tells about the agile transformation and thinking tools also to get into scaled agile development.
It is easy and fun to read, but it does require background knowledge of agile development, scrum and lean to get most benefits from it. So it isn't the first book to read about agile, but somehow I feel it never is the first book.
I enjoyed it a lot and highly recommend it to anyone who are in organization which have more than one development team doing software development.
This review was originally published in my blog - here
March 16, 2009
This is a fantastic book to help with the issues of taking scrum/agile/lean/xp from a small software development team into a much larger scale product development effort. The depth of knowledge and experience of the authors demonstrated by the fact that they don't give any silver bullets, but describe tools for dealing with complexity of scaling.
The first half of the book on Thinking tools is well considered and useful. Most of it isn't a surprise to me, but the section is well written and distills the fundamentals of systems thinking, lean thinking, queuing theory, false dichotomies and being agile very well. These thinking tools are used to help the reader understand the concepts in the second part of the book on Organisational tools.
Organisational tools is fantastic, covering Feature teams, Teams, Requirement areas, Organisation, and Large-scale Scrum. Using experience and the thinking tools Larman & Vodde describe why you would adopt these tools to help scale. I regularly did the "d'oh, it's so obvious when you put it like that" forehead slap reading this section of the book.
The recommended readings and fantastic reference list at the end will ensure I blow another huge wad on books this year.
The first half of the book on Thinking tools is well considered and useful. Most of it isn't a surprise to me, but the section is well written and distills the fundamentals of systems thinking, lean thinking, queuing theory, false dichotomies and being agile very well. These thinking tools are used to help the reader understand the concepts in the second part of the book on Organisational tools.
Organisational tools is fantastic, covering Feature teams, Teams, Requirement areas, Organisation, and Large-scale Scrum. Using experience and the thinking tools Larman & Vodde describe why you would adopt these tools to help scale. I regularly did the "d'oh, it's so obvious when you put it like that" forehead slap reading this section of the book.
The recommended readings and fantastic reference list at the end will ensure I blow another huge wad on books this year.
September 8, 2012
The best book I've read for agile practitioners. Not for noobs... this isn't an introduction. But if you've been running agile projects for a year or two and want to know where to go from here, Larman lays things out clearly and practically, and I found very, very few points I disagree with. I'm even tempted to read the "companion" volume, although it promises to be filled with much more hands-on advice, and sounds a bit less useful for me.
Larman starts out by providing giving a bit of background in Lean, Systems Thinking, Queuing Theory, and other thinking tools. From there, he directly tackles the problems of scaling Scrum (and Agile in general) past the standard "7 plus or minus 2". He tackles team organization, work organization, prioritization, and flow, and uses the tools from the first section to back up his advice.
If you're an Agilist, pick this one up!
Larman starts out by providing giving a bit of background in Lean, Systems Thinking, Queuing Theory, and other thinking tools. From there, he directly tackles the problems of scaling Scrum (and Agile in general) past the standard "7 plus or minus 2". He tackles team organization, work organization, prioritization, and flow, and uses the tools from the first section to back up his advice.
If you're an Agilist, pick this one up!
February 3, 2015
Really good book, I found many good tips inside. It is not only for large-scale scrum, all is absolutely valid also for a company with just two teams. I liked the fresh perspective on agile development - it is simply not enough to create some teams doing Scrum and pretend that the company is now agile. To be agile the *whole* company including management (above all), marketing and HR has to change.
Just one thing that distracted me... in this book cross-functional teams are described as a silver bullet and Scrum is presented as the only lean and agile development framework (and of course Kanban is bad, bad, bad). But I think the world is not black and white and often it is better to make queues visible (and manage them) than to assume that with cross-functional teams there are no queues possible (and ignore them).
Just one thing that distracted me... in this book cross-functional teams are described as a silver bullet and Scrum is presented as the only lean and agile development framework (and of course Kanban is bad, bad, bad). But I think the world is not black and white and often it is better to make queues visible (and manage them) than to assume that with cross-functional teams there are no queues possible (and ignore them).
July 15, 2016
I am not an expert in Scrum but I have a lot of experience in it. I was in witness when one of the biggest development factory in Poland tried to implement scrum. I don't like all elements of scrum but I like agile. So this was background of review.
Book has a lot of interesting information, and also a lot of topics which for me weren't interesting. For me book was difficult to read, maybe because I'm not used to this kind of books. I learn something from it but it wasn't something what change my life. I think I will read it again, but after couple years.
Book has a lot of interesting information, and also a lot of topics which for me weren't interesting. For me book was difficult to read, maybe because I'm not used to this kind of books. I learn something from it but it wasn't something what change my life. I think I will read it again, but after couple years.
August 22, 2012
Excellent book. Lots and lots of practical experience brilliantly conveyed including background on theory and practices.
This will help you tremendously in implementing agile in any larger enterprise.
A must read for anyone thinking about taking in scrum or another agile process, whether in software or product development in general.
The writing is very concise and practical and will immediately read the companion book with more detail on practices.
This will help you tremendously in implementing agile in any larger enterprise.
A must read for anyone thinking about taking in scrum or another agile process, whether in software or product development in general.
The writing is very concise and practical and will immediately read the companion book with more detail on practices.
April 25, 2016
Hard to believe this is 8 years old already.
Packed full of examples and experiments. I love the way they present different views & doubt themselves even, a self awareness and humility lacking in much online and printed literature.
I read the companion book first, I was mistaken, this is the one to read first.
Packed full of examples and experiments. I love the way they present different views & doubt themselves even, a self awareness and humility lacking in much online and printed literature.
I read the companion book first, I was mistaken, this is the one to read first.
January 16, 2012
I found this book a very useful and detailed approach to the subject. I especially liked how it related Agile to general topics in Operations Management and the information about the Toyota Production System
February 6, 2013
Always getting back to this book to influence others with "back to basic" approach. Feature development and how to scale it in big organizations is written on a very easy and understandable way. Warmly recommend.
September 16, 2012
Not a bad book with some interesting insights. Would have given it another star if they hadn't advocates for firing all PMs in a later chapter.
October 17, 2013
Many useful models and tools for preparing to scale
June 6, 2016
repetition of many contents of other books, didn't really give me new insights into scaling of agility
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews