At the organisation level, an agile transformation usualy consists in two interlaping phases: a transition to new ways of working and an evolution of the new ways onto business agility.
The starting point is usually at the team level where an agile methodology is adopted to engrain agile practices, commonly Scrum. As more teams adopt agile practices an agile at scale mathodology is adopted, commonly SAFe.
What would be the most efficient approach to lead an organization’s transition towards agility, upsteam or downstream implementation?
Up-stream agility implementation
The organization decides to become agile, so …
Start implementing agile practices at development team level. Development team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of delivering working solutions regularly. The need for a quality work backlog emerges.
Set up a product team to produce the work backlog. Product team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of delivering working backlog regularly. The need for quality and funded initiatives emerges.
Set up a portfolio team to produce an enterprise backlog. Portfolio team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of delivering value generating initiatives regularly. The need for a strategic vision and business roadmap emerges.
Get the organization leadership to define a vision and business strategy. Leadership team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of communicating and adapting a vision and strategy regularly. The need for an adaptive business model emerges.
The business understands and adopts agile values and principles.
Is this an efficient way of transitioning towards business agility? …
Down-stream agility implementation
The organization decides for business agility, so …
The leadership team and the business understand and adopt agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of communicating and adapting a vision and strategy regularly. The need to process business initiatives aligned with vision and strategy emerges.
Set up a portfolio team to evaluate initiatives and produce an enterprise backlog. Portfolio team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of funding value generating initiatives regularly. The need to design the funded initiatives emerges.
Set up a product team to design solutions for the initiatives. Product team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees to the way of delivering quality business prioritized work backlog. The need to implement the value increments emerges.
Set up delivery teams to produce value increments. Delivery team understands and adopts agile values and principles. Team agrees on the best way of delivering quality value increments regularly. The need for a flawless value release structure emerges.
The release team understands and adopts agile values and principles.
Conclusion
Which ever is the most efficient way of transitioning towards business agility could be a topic for discussion . However both approaches put needs at the center of the transformation, and satisfying these needs is what drives both the transition to new ways of working and the evolution through continuous improvement.
Agile Ways 