Leveraging Lightweight Value Stream Mapping Workshops

Value Stream Mapping for Digital Teams

Digital leaders and teams can leverage customized Value-Driven VSM workshops to deliver high-quality software faster and increase customer value.

Our VSM approach builds on the strengths of Lean practices and our expertise in applying them to the digital world.

Our services are based on over 30 years of experience in software engineering, real-world application of these techniques with digital product teams, and ongoing involvement in the VSM Consortium (now Flowtopia) for over 4 years.

To ensure the success of these workshops, our experience leads us to recommend a few structured steps. However, we are flexible and willing to work with you to co-develop services engagements suited to your context and constraints.

Please contact us for a free consultation to discuss the opportunity to use these practices within your organization.

A Game Changer for your Software Delivery

Digital leaders and teams are facing ever-increasing challenges to deliver valuable high-quality software faster and pressure to demonstrate their business impact.

Value Stream Mapping can help you if you are confronted with these types of situations:

  • Everyone is busy, but delays are piling up and value remains stuck.
  • Tools help improve efficiency, but customer complaints about slow delivery or quality persist.
  • Coordination meetings fill up calendars, but teams often don't work together.
  • Strategic objectives are communicated, but are disconnected from day-to-day work.
  • Responsibilities are assigned, but everyone blames each other when problems arise.
  • Leaders and teams are engaged but frustrated by organizational roadblocks.
  • Critical decisions must be made, but cannot be based on data to go beyond assumptions.

In short, digital leaders and teams must drive ever faster in increasingly foggy conditions. VSM workshops help you take a brief step back to clear the fog and quickly implement impactful improvements.

The approach generally offers immediate benefits, others within a few weeks, and sustainable impacts over time:

Fig1 - VSM Services

Proven Quick Steps to Success

Our customized Value-Driven VSM workshops are lightweight, quick and repeatable.

The proposed value-driven steps enable a rapid diagnosis of the situation, followed by the collective elaboration and implementation of an action plan:

  1. Define the expected value
    Ensure that everyone is aligned on clear criteria for success, value, and customer outcomes.
  2. Conduct collaborative Value Stream Mapping workshops
    Collectively understand where work is currently flowing (or not), identify and analyze key bottlenecks, and co-design a future state to achieve.
  3. Implement improvement actions
    Make improvements to eliminate obstacles one by one, checking their impact.
  4. Continuously measure and improve
    Review and improve the value stream and its performance, in particular through regular lightweight mapping exercises.
Fig2 - VSM Services

As mentioned in the description of our VSM approach, our workshops are customized to the specificities of software delivery. The idea is to draw on both the fundamental principles of Lean and software engineering expertise to quickly analyze the situation, identify the main constraints, and take action that will move the needle and unblock the flow of value.

Beyond the Maps

The engagement steps we suggest go beyond producing maps and recommendations for possible improvement actions:

  • These workshops generate a collective dynamic for improvement, which must then be guided and supported to ensure that the expected impacts are achieved.
  • We also promote learning by doing and provide support in the form of mentoring or training so that digital teams can take ownership of these techniques and gradually become able to use them autonomously.

References

"I met Patrice when he became a member of the Value Stream Management Consortium (VSMC).

I asked Patrice to join the delivery team at the VSMC because he had shown himself to be an expert in value stream management and connected disciplines, an excellent writer (in English), and a proactive and enthusiastic contributor to the community.

As Head of the Content Value Stream at the VSMC, Patrice has been able to coordinate and produce a wide variety of published blog posts on key topics and generate his own ideas on how to further VSM awareness globally, such as his popular weekly round-ups.

He's a pleasure to work with, conscientious and professional, proactive and detail-oriented."

Helen Beal
CEO & Chair
Value Stream Management Consortium (now Flowtopia)

If your digital teams are not yet taking advantage of VSM, give it a chance!

Keep an open mind, give it a try, and you won't be disappointed! Digital leaders, the time is now for you to take the opportunity to experiment with a first case. Learn quickly from this first experience that it is relatively easy, quick, and profitable.

Please contact us for a free consultation to discuss the opportunity to use these practices within your organization.

FAQ

🔓 Is Value Stream Mapping difficult? This is not rocket science, and it's not just about organizing a meeting either. You need to learn specific skills and techniques and adapt them to your context. It is important to find the right balance, so as not to oversimplify or overcomplicate things. The primary focus must remain on finding practical ways to help the digital team overcome its challenges.

⏳ Is it time-consuming? While traditional value stream mapping workshops can last several days, digital workshops can be conducted in short collaborative sessions lasting only a few hours in total. The time investment is not limited to the time spent together in the workshops, but the inefficiencies identified usually lead to significantly higher returns on investment.

💸 Is it expensive? Like any expense, we would of course prefer to avoid it, especially in the current financial climate. The decision first requires comparing it to the cost of maintaining the status quo. Should we remain in the same situation, or should we try to find a spark to create or reignite a dynamic of progress?
To avoid spending your entire budget, you don't need to hire the most expensive consulting firms on the market. Our reasonable rates come with a dual mission: to conduct these workshops with you and to help you gradually develop your skills so that you can quickly become autonomous.

🪄 Is it magic? Don't expect a miracle solution that will solve all your problems instantly. Value stream mapping is not a miracle solution, but rather a practice to be combined with others to help you make problems visible, align with priority objectives, and create or revitalize cross-functional team dynamic.

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