Agile Development Blog

Okay, I must be obsessed with Agile and PMOs lately. Well, Lean, too, as long as we are talking about obsessions.

Recently, I posted two blogs on the PMO topic: “Are PMOs Obsolete in Agile?” and “8 Ways to Re-tool a PMO in an Agile Environment“.

Now, in the upcoming Better Software Conference June 8 through 12, I will be presenting “Agile, Lean and the PMO”.

To summarize and entice, let me give you a quick preview.

PMOs usually think they are out of a job when Agile comes to town. But the truth is that a PMO can play a pivotal role in successful Agile adoption in large organizations.  In this presentation, I bring my experiences guiding organizations in how to engage their PMOs for successful Agile Adoption.

Enter three primary Lean Principles:

• Eliminate Waste
• See the Whole
• Amplify Learning

I intend to give examples of how PMO members act as the “systems thinkers” for their organizations, pulling Agile success outside of the engineering group alone and into the entire enterprise.

As I’ve stated before, there is a fundamental shift of the role of the PMO with Agile.

Simply stated, the PMO pulls standards versus pushing them;  the PMO provides product backlog prioritization guidance with regard to architecture and governance; and the PMO serves its Agile community by facilitating release planning across teams and creating and maintaining product councils.

In short, I contend that a truly Agile PMO brings “shocking openness” to the organization. This ensures deep, wide Agile adoption.

Let’s get together in Vegas to talk about PMOs and Agile and how Lean can guide us to take “what happens in Vegas” back to our organizations!