Operations review

Since metrics drive behavior, an operations review:

• reminds everyone that we are running a business;
• presents a summary of the overall performance for the month;
  • budget details;
  • throughput;
  • headcount;
  • tells how well we are managing against budget, and, therefore, how much slack we have to do kaizen, buy items like flat-screen monitors and new computers or throw a party.
• builds on the financial data of the previous time period, so takes place after the books for the prior month are closed
• preferably takes place on a fixed day of the week, for example on the second Friday of the subsequent month;
• compares planned versus actual numbers;
• is the feedback loop between adjacent layers in the holarchy:
  • the Check in the PDCA-cycle;
  • the Measure in Sociocracy;
  • sprint or release review meeting in scrum.

A mini operations review:

• is an objective, data-driven retrospective on the squad's or organization’s performance rather than the more subjective, anecdotal, qualitative management.
• is above and beyond any one sprint or project;
• sets an expectation;
• provides the feedback loop that enables growth of organizational maturity and organization- level continuous improvement.
• reviews data like:
  • defect rates
  • average lead time distribution
  • throughput
  • value-added efficiency, and, occasionally,
  • a specific report that would drill into some aspect of our process on which the business needs more information
• wraps up with questions & answers, comments, and suggestions from the floor for a few minutes.

To keep our costs under control, guest sponsors food—Invite a vice president from another part of the company so that our value-stream partners take an interest, show interest in them and invite them to present.

Source:

• Kanban—Successful Evolutionary Change for Your Technology Business, David Anderson