Central Role for Lean
Central Role for Lean
By Oakleigh Consulting Ltd
Lean thinking can help your company analyse and improve its software development processes in a number of ways. This is actually true irrespective of the development methodology that you currently use because it focuses on elements that exist in both the waterfall and agile worlds.
Consider these examples:
- [Waste] How involved is the business in your software development process? If it is not heavily involved then waste will occur.
- [Waste] What is the skill profile of your team against the types of projects being executed? Careful management is required to avoid people being under-utilised, another form of waste.
- [Value] How does your software development process currently ensure that the maximum value is achieved? Have you identified the value stream for your development process and know where value is added within the process? Can you say with confidence that all steps are necessary and that the process is as lean as it can be?
- [Flow] Are you sure all the bottlenecks have been removed from the process? The monthly steering group meetings where changes must be approved? The developer with a particular skill set that is controlling the throughput of your whole team? Does the team have the right skills to get the work done?
So why aren’t more people using lean thinking in the software development process? It’s probably because they assume that past activities have made them as lean as they need to be (don’t we all?). However it is very likely that just like me, you do need to be a bit leaner in order to get more value out of your processes and your business.
Source: Oakleigh Consulting Ltd
If you have any questions about the subjects covered in this article or you would like to find out more about how Oakleigh Consulting Ltd could help your organisation, please contact us on 0161 835 4100 or email us.
