Retail Company
“Agile Essentials outdoor training proved to be productive, positive and fun.”
A large Spanish retail company approached us for help with their agile transformation. 40 different systems, and a large team of software developers, various tools in use (Excel, Trello, Post-It notes as backlog). While the company had a very clear strategic goal and vision for the year, there was no clear structure and there were unclear goals on the team level.
Our goal was to define a clear set of values for transforming the changes to the organisation. We reshaped the component teams to work as feature teams. This see if this would help to change the silo-ed teams, and reduce the stress on the developers. We introduced a facilitative leadership role for the new feature teams (Scrum: Scrum Master) to help protect the developers and help to remove impediments.
Our specialist Agile Coach Andres Mumenthaler organised agile training for all the colleagues and team members This helped people to get in an agile mindset, understand the basics of agile ways of working, Scrum and Kanban. Then a specialist training for the Scrum Masters, Product Owners (building the internal permanent capability), and helping the teams to choose a tool that would help them to work off a clear backlog.
Remote training was the only option due to the Corona Virus restrictions. Our associate suggested that the training would work well outside, in the woods.
Quickly a location was found, the participants gathered at a serene location in the woods, with face-masks. At first our trainer was unsure about the logistics: Could we do this? What about the weather? And could we get the right level of interaction, and would people appreciate joining on such a location? And what about not having the acoustics of a room. And then he figured: everything worked.
Using items found in the woods, like pinecones, branches and sticks –to interact with, and by using the walls of a nearby shed, which functioned well for the stickies, things began to work out rather well.
This far, the outdoor training was rewarded as our most effective and successful agile mindset training. In the future, we would like to continue the combination of agile mindset training in the outdoors. Our assumptions are that learning about things in a natural environment helps people to experience learning in a positive way.
