Value Chain Mapping

	Software Development ⇫ Up	Software In Process ⇨ Next Topic
Previous Page ⇦ AT Frameworks

[ Here's a link from the Lean Institute which helps explain what I'm on about:

http://www.lean.org/Lean/Community/Resources/Misunderstandings.doc

In softwareinprocess@yahoogroups.com, "timocock <t.ocock@i...>" <t.ocock@i...> wrote: > Sorry, I can't help but think you've confused a Value Chain with a > workflow. ] --- [ I just tried value chain mapping for the first time as a way to measure and influence SIP, copying http://www.lean.org/Lean/Community/Resources/thinkers_start.cfm (the articles are in reverse order). I was amazed at the results. We laid out the map, then I asked the team for ideas for reducing SIP. 1) the resulting ideas were obviously good, regardless of SIP and 2) none of the ideas had anything to do with XP. The blocks in the flow of value were organizational and deployment oriented. We have a fair bit of progress to make before test-driven development becomes the next most important thing to work on.

Kent ] --- [ They are not currently using XP. Their inner cycle varies widely. They are very proud of their ability to expedite critical changes (the dialog could have been straight out of The Goal.) We mapped the "normal" cycle.

I have worked several places where the upfront planning and the deployment of QAd code both took longer than programming (like large Swiss banks.) I was shocked by the numbers on the map and what they added up to (29 weeks of (occasionally marginally) value-add activities and 10 weeks of waiting), but not as shocked as they were.

The diagram looked something like this (working backwards in time):

Deployment, 1 day <- Customer approves model changes, 4 weeks <- We make model changes, 2 weeks <- Customer specifies model changes, 1 week <- Final code deployment QA, 2 weeks <- Waiting for QA, 4 weeks <- Code "freeze" QA (and development), 6 weeks <- Development, 8 weeks <- Project planning, 4 weeks <- Waiting for marketing approval, 2 weeks <- Marketing requirements document, 4 weeks <- Engineering initial estimates, 2 weeks <- Waiting for engineering initial estimates, 2 weeks <- Marketing vision document, 1 week.

It took us about 1/2 hour to come up with this (don't spend longer than that or you'll have too much detail.)

Kent

 -----Original Message-----

From: sentto-8007113-315-1039026821-kent=threeriversinstitute.org@returns.groups.yahoo.com [1] On Behalf Of Arien Malec Sent: Wednesday, December 04, 2002 10:34 AM To: softwareinprocess@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [SIP] Value Chain Mapping

--- kentlbeck <kent@threeriversinstitute.org> wrote:

> I just tried value chain mapping for the first time as a way to > measure and influence SIP, copying > http://www.lean.org/Lean/Community/Resources/thinkers_start.cfm (the > articles are in reverse order). I was amazed at the results. We laid > out the map, then I asked the team for ideas for reducing SIP. 1) > the resulting ideas were obviously good, regardless of SIP and 2) > none of the ideas had anything to do with XP. The blocks in the flow > of value were organizational and deployment oriented. We have a fair > bit of progress to make before test-driven development becomes the > next most important thing to work on.

Is this a company that is not currently using XP? What is their inner-cycle development time (requirements available to software produced)? I ask because the companies I have worked for have had that inner cycle at something like 9-12 months, and there was nothing outside of that that was a bigger constraint. I would expect that moving to XP would *immediately* expose other constraints, where further cycle-time improvements in the inner cycle would be counterproductive, but I'm surprised that the outer cycle inefficiencies were already the constraint.

Do you have a (perhaps sanitized) diagram you could share with us?

Arien ]