by Ted Eytan, on 27 Sep 2007 07:11 am
The Journey
Agile and the Web Team Revealed
Imagine that your health care organization had a team that tirelessly advocated for the best patient experience, and was never satisfied with the status quo in care delivery. In most organizations, I would say this is your Web Services team. Why? Because it’s their job to make your system function well for patients they never see, and they know that even the best technology can’t repair dysfunctional physical processes.
This is the team I started working with when I joined the organization and the one I continue to associate with, because of their initiative to transform our sysem. Given this background, it’s no wonder that they wouldn’t be satisfied with their own processes. At the same time, if they changed nothing about what they did, they would still be highly regarded - the number of national awards this team has garnered in creating the ideal patient-centered experience online filled a whole wall at our old headquarters.
About a year ago, this team transitioned to Agile software development, and as a marker of their transformed processes, they transformed their physical operations, when we moved to a brand new headquarters. Pictures are below.
What they started with was a visual system, previously pictured on this blog. In our new headquarters, they’ve created visible storyboards. What you can see is stories, on cards, and then tasks in the middle, and then done items on the right. There are standup meetings every day, and with previous examples described here, the art is in estimation, predictable cycles, and breaking things into chunks. On the right of the storyboard pictured, there is a thick stack of notes describing finished tasks. That’s an unmistakable visual of accomplishment.
Speaking of our new headquarters, this team took matters further into their own hands and studied physical arrangements to support this new way of working. What they came up with was movable “boomerang” tables, lockers, and whiteboards, and you can see that pictured here. What’s interesting about the setup is that it is adjacent to an older cubicle model on the same floor. The old and the new co-exist. What a great experiment. This team’s manager said that they are adapting to this model - one issue was the need for well placed electrical outlets and accurate spacing of the tables. These are the details that matter!
The last image is of a whiteboard that spontaneously sprung up with a visual system by some of our developers. Imagination begets imagination.
As I mentioned when I first described this team’s work, this system was not given to them by executives. Executives created the environment and supports, and they did it for themselves - that’s one of the reasons it is so special. I have seen the principles in action and even this patient-centric and customer-centric team is becoming even more so.
As usual, I found multiple correlations to clinical medical practice.
on 27 Sep 2007 at 9:33 pm 1.Maureena Moran said …
Thank you, Ted, for describing our journey to collaborative workspace for our online services team. We had a great opportunity with the move to the new facility. The team has had many suggestions for improving the space since we moved in, and we’ve maintained a close relationship with our interior designers; they’ve been wonderfully supportive, working with the team to make changes, tweaks, and adjustments. I recently heard a quote that I see playing out in our new space every day: “In the old world, your value to the organization is the knowledge you have; in the new world, your value to the organization is in what you share.” Our web team has moved to the new world and it’s truly exciting to be part of it.