Maersk. Every time that I see a Maersk container on the road… I get reminded the Agile concept of fixed capacity.
The cost of the container is also fixed. A business person may ‘buy’ a fixed-capacity Maersk container at a fixed-price.
The business person may fill up the container with anything as long as it is legal…
The content of the container is listed on the manifest.
The business person picks one of the fixed set of shipment dates. The shipping company maintains a cadenced schedule to allow business people to plan as to when to ship their valuables.
Sounds familiar?
That was a great example of an Agile way of working. Fixed capacity. Fixed schedule. Fixed cost. FLEXIBLE SCOPE!!!
Many other companies do it…
Question is… why can’t you? Yes, you can!
Start by funding your Development Value Stream… do not fund Projects…instead, fund your dev value stream… this is the ‘Container’! Fixed cost regardless of the project or product (the scope).
Your release management has fixed schedules to release … to ship that thing of value (the scope)… and deliver it … and then… value is realized in the hands of the Customer!
I know… funding the value stream ….not the projects … is hard or impossible to some companies. In that case, go piece-meal… like shipping one box at a time through FedEx…. However, it will be more costly. This approach is ‘funding the project’ !
Either way…. funding value streams or funding projects… at the end of the day, Value will be realized and in the hands of the customer.
Value … is the universal language… it is the ‘end’ (the valuable outcome) that is important…. not the ‘means.’. Know your outcome… and be flexible on your means or approach.
There are more ideas like this in my two books — both are available for purchase on Amazon.
SAFe (6.0) Is Like…
This reached “#1 New Release” on Amazon
SAFe 6.0 Practice
My new book, released on October 15, 2023.
