Scrum for Hardware

Paolo Sammicheli
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Contents

Acknowledgements i

Dedication ii

Foreword iii

Introduction v

The Stories 1
Joe 2
Acknowledgements
This book would not have been possible without the many people
who support and encourage me every day. My biggest challenge is
not to forget anyone now.
First, I would like to thank the people who helped me write
this book: Francesca Martinuzzi for the Italian edition and Anna
Spertini for the English edition.
A decisive factor has been the contribution of my most passionate
readers. They reported inaccuracies and provided suggestions (in
alphabetical order): Allen Jones, Davide Roitero, Lapo Cioni, Luca
Bertoldo, Marcello Semboli, Silvia Bindelli, Tiziana Cascino.
Thanks to my friends and fellow coaches, whom I deeply respect;
each of them in his or her way, consciously or not, has created in
me the urgency to start writing this book (in alphabetical order):
Alberto Brandolini, Andrea Provaglio, Andrea Tomasini, Claudio
Perrone, Fabio Armani, Gaetano Mazzanti, Jacopo Romei, Lapo
Baglini, Raffaello Torraco, Samuele Guidi, Stefania Ciani.
Huge thanks go to Avanscoperta¹. Again Alberto Brandolini and
the great Alessandra Granaudo. When this book was just a bunch
of notes and post-its, they believed in me and started organizing
the first workshop² of Scrum for Hardware.
I also would like to thank my family, which always supports and
encourages me even without understanding my job.
And, of course, my infinite gratitude goes to Joe Justice. He is the
myth that inspired me to write this book; at the same time, he is
the humblest, most modest, and kindest person I know. A modern
hero who – I am sure – will be in schoolbooks one day.
¹http://www.avanscoperta.it/
²http://www.avanscoperta.it/it/training/scrum-for-hardware-course/
Dedication
I would like to dedicate this book to the people who
contributed to make me who I am and who are no
longer with us.
Germano, Patrizia, Renato, Maurizio.
You are always with me.
Foreword
What would happen if we all could deploy a superior product
or service every one week or even faster? That changes long
lead procurement, separate test organizations with queues, project
status meetings, and risk sources from “can we do it?” to “will
they use it?” The idea of a “Development Phase” and a “Production
Engineering Phase” lose meaning or utility for project planning and
funding in a system that moves this quickly.
This book takes the stance that markets are rewarding faster devel-
opment and time to market.
Shorter development times mean less risk and less cash outlay.
This book comes during the turning point of all product develop-
ment. Software development embraced agility at scale, and now
no customer will even entertain a ten-year software development
life cycle. Like financial services groups and governments, Hard-
ware companies are driving Agile Manufacturing, and specifically
Scrum for Hardware are in every time zone globally. We see
this acceleration around the world from luxury niche to mass
production to military-grade. The quest for half-price, half-time
projects has forced the question, investigation, and adoption of
daily standup meetings, empowered Product Owners, and highly
trained Scrum Masters sprinting across teams of teams doing new
product development on the factory floor.
Paolo Sammicheli’s work results from collaboration with my work,
my clients, his clients, and the rich professional peer group of expert
practitioners and the earliest adopters such as Peter Stevens, Hubert
Smits, Peter Borsella, and many more. We are learning that all of the
technical patterns that revolutionized software for twice the work
in half the time, such as the XP practices, the Scrum PLoP, UATDD,
Foreword iv

and software design patterns for performance and reusability, have

direct translations across domains with similar speed increases. In
the words of Jeff Sutherland, co-creator of Scrum, “Scrum did not
start in software, and it will not stay there.”
So what does Scrum for Hardware look like? Imagine a manu-
facturing shop floor with concrete floors and suspended heating
ducts. Then imagine groups of 4 to 5 people, each group clustered
around a piece of flexible manufacturing equipment, test fixtures,
and computers. Tens of teams, hundreds of teams, in some cases
tens of thousands of teams. Each team has a big board to organize
the flow of work inside their small group and a labeled “input”
and “output” for parts or sub-assemblies, with quality indicators,
called the Definition of Ready and Definition of Done. Components
and sub-assemblies are shuttled non-linearly between teams by
autonomous carts or excited interns. Integration happens inside
each team, with no part being allowed to be called “done” unless
integration tests successfully pass. Each team is responsible for
producing their piece of the parallel puzzle and improving it, testing
it, and validating it in production every sprint. And the shorter the
sprint, the faster the product is reinvented.
This book is the first significant publication on the topic, the
most complete and authoritative. If the Agile transformation of
the Software industry has any parallels outside software, and if the
current client adoption rate is any indication, this book will be the
reference for executives, shop floor managers, and team members
globally. And it is clear this book and books like it will grow with
case-studies from readers just like yourself. Every aspect of Scrum
for Hardware is observed from teams delivering and retrospecting
to improve, to Kaizen. That would mean the source of ammunition
for this book is the readers’ clear production and process notes. So
let’s keep up the awesome.
Joe Justice
Creator of Scrum for Hardware and eXtreme Manufacturing.
Introduction
This book is being published through the Agile Publishing³ method.
This means that it has been published several times, well before be-
ing completed, to allow me to receive rapid and frequent feedback
from my most passionate readers. It also means that the content
and form of the final draft will be affected by my readers’ feedback.
From yours as well.
THANKS IN ADVANCE!
Your tips will allow me to adjust the text and create the best possible
book on Scrum for Hardware.
Did you like what you read? Do you have any questions I did not
answer? Do you feel that something is missing? Is there any vague
phrase?
Please write me at [email protected]

Copyright
The material of this book, unless otherwise specified, is published
under the Creative Commons BY-SA⁴ license. This means that
you’re free to copy, share and show in public this material with
any media and form and create derivate work for any purpose, even
commercially under the following terms:

• Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a

link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You
may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that
suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
³https://leanpub.com/manifesto
⁴https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
Introduction vi

• ShareAlike — If you remix, transform, or build upon the

material, you must distribute your contributions under the
same license as the original.
• No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms
or technological measures that legally restrict others from
doing anything the license permits.

Sharing my work with a permissive license so others can freely use

it is the best way I know to create a better world and to thank the
giants who came before us.

Future editions
I am going to publish various paper editions, adding every time new
stories and practices I discover with clients. The electronic version
will always be updated on Leanpub⁵. You will not need to pay for
future electronic editions and you will receive all updates forever.
It is a promise!

Changelog
If this is the first copy you downloaded from the Leanpub.org
website, you can jump at the next paragraph. If otherwise you just
got a new version, this section is dedicated to you. Following, you’ll
find the changelog, starting from the more recent so that you can
jump directly to the new or updated sections.

• 2 April 2021 - Ver. 2.2.5 - major

– General review, text improvements and update of the
paper version.
• 25 March 2021 - Ver. 2.2.4 - minor
⁵https://leanpub.com/Scrum-For-Hardware/
Introduction vii

– Chapter 7 - Rewriting of the Scrum chapter, to align with

the Scrum Guide 2020.
• 25 March 2021 - Ver. 2.2.3 - minor
– Chapter 8 - Grammar improvements and typo fixing.
• 23 March 2021 - Ver. 2.2.2 - minor
– Chapters 4,5,6, and 9 - Grammar improvements and typo
fixing.
• 14 March 2021 - Ver. 2.2.1 - minor
– Chapters 1,2, and 3 - Grammar improvements and typo
fixing.
• 28 December 2020 - Ver. 2.2.0 - major
– New case study: Pietro Fiorentini Spa
• 1 November 2020 - Ver. 2.1.0 - major
– New case study: Sisma Spa
• 18 October 2020 - Ver. 2.0.0 - Second Edition
– New chapter Case Studies with a first story: Vimar Spa.
• 7 December 2018 - Ver. 1.3.1 - minor
– Fixed typos. Thanks to Joe, Mark and Dee
• 18 August 2018 - Ver. 1.3.0 - major
– New chapter in the Appendix: Popcorn Flow
• 14 August 2018 - Ver. 1.2.1 - minor
– Fixed many broken links, thanks to Allen Jones!
• 11 August 2018 - Ver. 1.2.0 - major
– New Story: On the Shoulders of Giants
– Scrum@Scale Guide
• 27 May 2018 - Ver. 1.1.0 - release candidate 3
– Foreword by Joe Justice.
• 2 February 2018 - Ver. 1.0.1 - release candidate 2
– Fixed typos and stylistic improvements.
• 24 January 2018 - Ver. 1.0.0 - release candidate 1
– Completed the “Scrum” chapter with the “Pattern of
Performance”.
Introduction viii

– Completed the Other Ingredients chapter.

– The book is now released under the Creative Commons
BY-SA license terms.
• 16 January 2018 - Ver. 0.9.0 major
– New paragraph in the “Scrum” Chapter
* Develop competencies
* How to choose the Scrum Master
• 17 November 2017 - Ver. 0.8.0 major
– New chapter: Scrum
• 9 November 2017 - Ver. 0.7.0 major
– New chapter: Cynefin
• 8 November 2017 - Ver. 0.6.0 major
– New chapter: eXtreme Manufacturing
– Updated the Scrum Guide at version November 2017
• 4 November 2017 - Ver. 0.5.0 major
– New chapter: Three Meters above the Sky
• 21 October 2017 - Ver. 0.4.1 - minor
– New chapter: Introduction
• 19 October 2017 - Ver. 0.4.0 - major
– New story: A New Industrial Revolution
• 30 September 2017 - Ver. 0.3.0 - major
– New story: Summer 2016
– Fixed some typos in previous chapters.
• 26 September 2017 - Ver. 0.2.0 - major
– New story: Paolo
• 24 September 2017 - Ver. 0.1.0 - major
– New story: Joe
Introduction ix

Book Structure
This book is divided into three parts: the Stories, the Method, and
Case Studies. The stories go with the reader along with the same un-
derstanding I have experienced with Scrum for Hardware. I have
chosen this approach to allow everyone to become familiar with the
topic more lightly and smoothly, using a narrative style. The second
part of the book, however, summarizes the methodology, and it can
also be used as a reference for quick access. The third part contains
Case Studies I personally implemented. This section will evolve and
extend over time and is the most iterative and incremental part of
the publication.

SHU - HA - RI
The progression of the ideas expressed in the stories follows the
SHU-HA-RI scheme, used to describe the stages of learning to
mastery in Japanese martial arts.
The SHU stage can be described as “Follow the rule”. In this
beginning stage, the student follows the teachings of one master
precisely and he concentrates on just practicing thoroughly in order
to acquire the basic knowledge of the main moves. The teacher,
according to his experience and style, decides what the student
must learn at this stage.
In the HA stage, described as “Use the rule”, the student begins
practicing the art, learning the underlying principles and variations
of already-learned moves. He enriches his language and departs
from the orthodoxy of the previous phase.
The RI stage is described as “Be the rule” or “Transcend”. At this
stage, the student begins to build his own style: he knows the rules
and can deliberately decide to break some to create his own style.
Introduction x

Of the five stories in the first part, the first two chapters introduce
the characters, the third chapter sets the basic concepts (SHU),
the fourth illustrates some motivations and alternatives (HA) and
the fifth shows advanced concepts and personal interpretations of
methodology (RI).
Now, it is time to dive into the stories. Enjoy your read!
The Stories
Joe
In 2008, Joe Justice was a software consultant living in Denver,
Colorado. He worked for Avanade, a large software company, a
joint venture of Microsoft and Accenture, developing interesting
software projects for large businesses.

At the beginning of the year, he received a phone call: an Accenture

employee was forming the team for a new project for the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation, founded by the American magnate and
patron of Microsoft and considered the richest man in the world.
Joe’s curriculum seemed highly suitable for that project: besides
learning about the .NET development environment and Microsoft
Sharepoint, the two leading technologies of the project, Joe also
had experience with Scrum⁶, the Agile development⁷ method that
the Gates Foundation had decided to adopt for all new projects.
⁶In the second part of the book, you will find the description of Scrum and all the technical
terms used hereafter.
⁷https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agile_software_development
Joe 3

Scrum’s experienced staff was scarce in Accenture, so they offered

Joe to fly to Seattle every Sunday and go back home every Thursday
night for the following months. The idea of working with the Bill &
Melinda Gates Foundation was inspiring, and Joe did not hesitate
to accept; he would be the Scrum Master of the Avanade team at
the Foundation and would teach Scrum to the entire organization.
Joe knew Scrum well; he had used it since his first job in Denver
as a developer; he considered it the only serious way to develop
software in a business context.
Joe had started to become interested in computer science since
he was a kid. Being the youngest of six children, Joe was very
intrigued by the games of his four sisters and his older brother John.
In particular, that strange object – a computer called Commodore
Vic 20 allowing to watch new worlds and live exciting adventures
on his TV thanks to some tapes – really fascinated him. When he
was about to go to university, Joe chose the faculty of computer
science, emulating his older brother, who had already graduated
and was enjoying the economic boom⁸ in the late 90s, earning
good money. Joe had received a scholarship offer from a very
prestigious university, and he was enthusiastic about starting this
journey. However, something went wrong: shortly before starting
the courses, he received a letter from the university stating that the
scholarship was allocated to the Hispanic minority and there had
been a mistake. He was not qualified to access it. Joe, an adolescent
and inexperienced person at that time, did not think to seek advice
from a lawyer; he consulted with his school secretary. Thanks to the
student placement officer’s knowledge, he obtained a scholarship
from the University of Wyoming. It was an alternative far below
his expectations, but Joe was just OK with it and decided to accept.
Ai, a young Japanese student, was attending classes on the same
campus, where she also held a language and culture course about
her country, as required by the international scholarship that had
brought her to the US.
⁸https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot-com_bubble
Joe 4

Joe made no secret with the friends of his passion for the Japanese
culture: he had received it from his mother, who had spent her
childhood in Japan to follow her father, a prominent US Army
General, on a mission to the island. Joe’s roommate, who knew
about this, met Ai in class and told him immediately: “You must
know my Japanese teacher; she is definitely your type. I’m sure
you’ll like her”. “I don’t like older women,” Joe replied. “She is our
age! Trust me, you must know her”.
For Joe, it was love at first sight, and as soon as he left university,
he asked her to marry him. They were young, newly graduates, and
with little money. They decided to get married and to celebrate
their wedding in Hawaii so that friends and families could join
them more easily from Japan and the United States to celebrate
all together. They would then spend their honeymoon exploring
Hawaii, renting several cars along the road.
One morning, great sports car enthusiast Joe was driving a small
convertible on the road to Hana. He just felt in heaven, with his
young wife sitting by his side and a gentle breeze coming from the
forest and refreshing his face. Suddenly, despite feeling so well with
a smile spread from ear to ear, he saw that paradise slowly blurs in
front of him. “If every single individual of the 7 billion populating
the planet would like to enjoy this same pleasure – he thought – the
forest could no longer exist. It would be replaced by a bare clearing
devastated by acid rain, and the air would smell of exhaust gas.”
Ever since he was a child, Joe had naturally developed a strong
ecological sensitivity. He still remembers that when he was 4 or 5,
he prevented his older sister from killing a grasshopper with ether,
which she needed for science school research. In an attempt to save
the insect, Little Joe cried and threw such a tantrum that he lost his
senses by hyperventilation, alarming the whole family.
And now, the only thought of a devastating forest made him feel
almost physically distressed. Such stomach-burning feeling wiped
that smile off his face for the rest of the trip, and that disturbing
Joe 5

image began to haunt him even at night. He felt guilty as if he was

doing something wrong or unfair. It was precisely during this trip
that Joe all of a sudden fully understood the ecological meaning of
the word “unsustainable.” This thought was disconcerting to him,
and he felt he had to react and do something. But what exactly?

The Challenge
The XPrize Foundation is a nonprofit organization based in St.
Louis, Missouri, which organizes public competitions to encourage
technological innovation. It is a moral institution aiming to identify
solutions to complex problems with its initiatives and facilitate the
financing of projects that can benefit humanity in different fields
(medical, aerospace, environmental, etc.). In 2008, with sponsorship
from Progressive Insurance, the Foundation announced an Auto-
motive XPrize competition with a ten-million-dollar prize. Partic-
ipants were challenged to build a four-seater eco-friendly vehicle
that could be legally registered in the United States, producing less
than 200 grams/mile CO2 equivalent emissions, able to achieve 100
MPGe (100 miles per gallon equivalent of petrol, that is 100 km per
2.8 liters) and that could be manufactured for the mass market. Over
one hundred competitors took part in the competition, including
individuals, companies, and universities from all over the world.

Wikispeed’s Birth
It was immediately clear to Joe: he had to participate in the XPrize.
Contending with the construction of an ecological car would have
been the best way to overcome the discomfort he had felt during
his honeymoon. Unfortunately, while being a car enthusiast, Joe
was new to any mechanical expertise. Before that moment, he had
not even ever changed the oil in his car, and he was well aware of
the need to learn many things. However, he did not let himself be
Joe 6

scared by these initial obstacles and decided to focus on his goal: he

placed a large board in his garage, and he hung there a sticky note
saying, “Win the XPrize.”

How to proceed? Where to start? Joe knew only one method to de-
velop something serious: Scrum. He began to apply the “user story
splitting” method to his car. Targets were broken down into sub-
objectives, thus becoming smaller and more reachable in acceptable
times. Joe wrote the first two objectives on two different sticky
notes: “build a car that can be registered” and “build a 100MPG car”.
Joe recurrently split them into subtasks so that his board got full
of sticky notes within one afternoon only. He knew that he could
not do it alone, so he began to share this idea on his blog, telling
the world about his experiments, mistakes, and new learnings. He
asked specialized communities for help and advice, and people
from around the world began to answer, offering suggestions and
opinions. Joe replied to anyone who could provide a little support.
He updated his followers and asked for further information. Many
mechanics, electric technicians, and simple hobbyists began to be
interested in the project. Someone even wanted to meet in person
“that guy on the internet” who tried to build the most ecological car
ever designed, and strangers started arriving to spend the weekend
with Joe after flying at their expenses over the US. Wikispeed⁹
was born: a community of enthusiasts who, like Wikipedia, was
⁹http://wikispeed.org
Joe 7

developing collaboratively and openly a 100 MPG car to participate

in the XPrize competition.

Toward XPrize
In 2010, Joe and his wife had moved to Seattle, Washington for
some time. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation project had
been going on for two years, and some weekends, instead of going
back to Denver, Joe had asked Ai to join him in Seattle. Like any
good Japanese, Ai has a vast food culture. The excellent cuisine of
the typical restaurants in Seattle, along with the variety of choice
of international restaurants, had convinced her that it was worth
moving there. Also, Seattle was the headquarters of significant
companies, including Amazon, Microsoft, and Starbucks; it seemed
an exciting city from different perspectives.
The Wikispeed project was going on quickly: it counted a group of
44 people coming from 4 countries and actively helping Joe. It had
a Facebook group¹⁰ with a thousand fans already and a Youtube
channel¹¹ with many followers. After the evaluation phase of the
documentation for admission to the competition, Joe and his team
started the operation phase, and they had built in three months only
their first prototype called SGT01, Super Grand Touring 01.
The SuperGT¹² class is a car racing championship in Japan with
road cars. They are probably the fastest vehicles that resemble
standard cars; better performance is obtained only from cars similar
to Formula 1. Joe had always been fascinated by those competitions,
and, in his imagination, the car he was planning would have to
look as much as possible like a racecar, beautiful and charming.
Simultaneously, it had to consume so little to be the most ecological
car ever built.
¹⁰https://www.facebook.com/WIKISPEED/
¹¹https://www.youtube.com/user/WIKISPEED
¹²https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_GT
Joe 8

The first simulated tests showed¹³ that the car could reach 104MPG
on urban cycle and 114MPG on extra-urban cycle: already perfect
to win the contest! Also, weighing only 1300 Lbs. (about 589 Kg),
it could go from 0 to 60 miles per hour (nearly 100 Kph) in less
than 5 seconds and reach a top speed of 149mph (about 240 Kph).
The prototype went like greased lightning! On April 6, during a
trial run, Joe ended up colliding with a wall. Luckily, the crash
tests carried out on the simulator confirmed very realistic: Joe did
not hurt too badly and, with a one-day work and not too much
expense for the materials, Wikispeed was as good as new. On
April 12, the team obtained the official confirmation¹⁴ so longed-
for by everyone: Wikispeed had been admitted to the final selection,
called Shakedown, which was to be held from May 2 to 8, 2010 at
the international circuit of Michigan, 100 km west of Detroit and
location of the famous NASCAR racing. It was great news.
The development team at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
was also very excited by the idea, and everyone went out of their
way to allow Joe to take the necessary vacation to get the business
done.
However, it became necessary to find a specialist mechanic quickly,
as Wikispeed had the Honda Civic engine. If necessary during
the final selection, the team had to be able to intervene without
hesitation. Moreover, the race was only less than three weeks away!
Joe and his friends published an ad on Craigslist humorously titled
“Mechanic/MacGyver (Michigan International Speedway)”:

Team WIKISPEED is competing in the final rounds of

the Progressive Automotive X Prize, and we need a
fantastic Honda mechanic to support our team at the
Michigan International Speedway the week of May 2-
8. We are building a prototype car that will go 100
¹³http://wonderfulworldofwikispeed.blogspot.fr/2010/04/faq.html
¹⁴http://wonderfulworldofwikispeed.blogspot.it/2010/04/we-did-it-detroit-here-
wikispeed-comes.html
Joe 9

mpg and will retail for under $20k. The challenges we

will hit will probably be pretty novel– no repairs are
routine on a prototype car. Ideally, the candidate would
be willing to work at a reduced rate or gratis since we
are a small volunteer team—an attitude similar to the
TV show MacGyver’s help.

With that single ad, they got an answer from Bryan, a certified tech-
nician with experience on Honda engines. In addition to working
for free and taking part in the Wikispeed project, Bryan refused
some job offers, which were not so profuse in that crisis period in
the Detroit area.
Moreover, a certain Todd, owner of a company producing Plexiglas
material, offered his help to build and install for free the transparent
canopy that would protect the pilot, in return for the only flight to
Seattle.
Finally, Mike, a robotics enthusiast attending a Yahoo-themed
forum, showed up unannounced at Joe’s garage where volunteers
were working at Wikispeed. No one had ever seen him before, but
he spent the whole afternoon working hard and solved some wiring
problems that Joe, despite his efforts, had not been able to come to
grips with for weeks.
Joe 10

The Big Day

May 5: eventually, the big day! The entire Wikispeed team is along
the Michigan International Speedway – palpable excitement is in
the air. The team members have not slept for three nights to finish
the car according to the competition’s rules.

Everybody invested time and expertise into the project, and ev-
erybody also feels it as his own. It’s Wikispeed’s turn. The jury
examines the prototype, and some problems arise. The team does
not let this get it down and keeps working: in a few minutes,
Wikispeed is disassembled into its main modules (chassis, engine,
front dashboard, etc.), and all the participants work in pairs and
parallel on the components.
Joe 11

The jury and rival teams are impressed by the speed and readiness
with which the Wikispeed team solves the highlighted problems
one by one and congratulates them several times. After finishing
the work, the team rolls the car in the designated area for the final
inspection. All together towards glory!

Just before the inspection, Joe asks his brother John to help him
move the seat belt straps. It was an optional recommendation in the
list of change requests, but it seemed like a simple thing to do in a
Joe 12

few minutes. Lack of sleep and lucidity played their part. Drilling
the frame with the drill, Joe accidentally shears an electric cable
inside it. Turning to Mary Wilkes, the team’s expert electrician, he
begged her: “Can you fix it?” Unfortunately, it was not possible
in the few minutes left before the final inspection, and when the
judges arrived, the car could not start. The team appealed to the
judges asking a little more time to solve the electrical problem
by showing that it had just occurred, but the extension was not
granted.
However, that was a moment of great disappointment for everyone,
compensated by the satisfaction of being positioned tenth on the
final ranking, surpassing prestigious and well-funded competitors
as TESLA, TATA Motor, and the Team from Boston MIT.

Wikispeed SGT01

More importantly, Wikispeed obtained a wide media coverage: the

story of Joe and his volunteers appeared on numerous blogs and
online magazines, the number of fans continued to grow steadily
after the end of the competition and, despite having no victory in
the XPrize, the Wikispeed project began to be considered a triumph.
Joe 13

The Ingredients for Success

Sometime later, an article on Fortune¹⁵ listed some elements that
had led to the success of Wikispeed, suggesting that firms should
consider the following four principles that helped them:

1. Reach out passionate people

“No matter how many smart people you have at your firm – said the
article on Fortune – there are a lot more on the outside. Competitive
success hinges upon the ability to connect with others and take
advantage of the knowledge that they can bring to the table. So, the
benefits of connecting with and bringing together passionate people
can be significant.” Since the very beginning, Wikispeed uses social
networks and specialized forums, getting help and suggestions from
passionate people around the world.

2. Keep timelines short

Traditional corporate projects require the creation of two- to five-

year strategic plans and detailed blueprints. On the other end of
the spectrum, Team Wikispeed works in 7-day cycles – they’re
constantly reflecting on different results and what they can do
better in the next cycle and the learning and adaptation cycle is so
fast that it also allows non-skilled people to quickly achieve very
ambitious results.

3. Make the project modular

If you have a monolithic product, it will be very difficult to evolve

and improve quickly, because the impact of any change will be
such as to compel you to review important parts of the entire
¹⁵http://fortune.com/2012/06/18/how-companies-ought-to-train-their-staffers/
Joe 14

work. On the opposite, Wikispeed consists of independent modules,

connected to each other through clear and predefined interfaces.
This way, Team Wikispeed manages to improve a single module
with no recourse to the entire work, with the possibility to see the
results of the changes within the same iteration week¹⁶.

Wikispeed’s Modular Architecture

4. Create opportunities for hands-on

learning

At Wikispeed, continuous learning is encouraged and planned.

Volunteers work in pairings of inexperienced and experienced
individuals who take on small projects and skills are quickly and
mutually transmitted between team members. Volunteers work as
much as possible on different modules, so they acquire skills¹⁷ on
the entire car.
¹⁶Further details in the Agile Architecture section.
¹⁷See the T-Shaped Skills section.
Joe 15

Detroit Auto Show

In January 2011, Team Wikispeed received one of those offers one
cannot refuse: they were invited to participate free of charge at the
most famous car show in the world, the Detroit Auto Show. All of
the most important car brands on the planet would be present. The
team members were extremely excited but also literally terrified by
the opportunity they were offered. Wikispeed’s body used for the
competition and nicknamed the “orange shoebox” was not up to
the task. For an international auto show, it was necessary to design
something more attractive. The team contacted some distributors of
composite materials. Still, estimates and conditions were desolating
– they would need 36,000 USD and three months to get the desired
results, but there was no time or money. What to do?
Once again, the connection was decisive. A design-specialized,
Wikispeed-enthusiast technician spent various sleepless nights to
create the design and sent his CAD project for a new bodywork
from Germany, which was later called the “Le Mans Version.” In
this case, nobody had ever met the author of a contribution that
proved to be decisive.
Joe 16

CAD of Le Mans version

In Joe’s garage, volunteers began modeling the bodywork with

pressurized foam, first on a reduced scale, and then, with the aid
of a CNC machine, they generated a real-size 3D model.

Bodywork Model

Joe took a vacation to attend a course on composite materials, and

after a few days, he had already acquired the basic knowledge to
attempt an experiment. The team used carbon fiber sheets softened
with a special solvent to perfectly adhere to the model. They then
Joe 17

painted the bodywork of a lovely “race black” and, with a strenuous

smoothing work and some stickers, the most beautiful Wikispeed
that had ever been seen came into existence. It was an incredible
achievement, especially considering that the car body cost only 800
USD and three days of work.

Painting Stage

Transport of New Body

The fact that Wikispeed, in addition to offering outstanding perfor-

mance, was also beautiful was, in turn, a decisive factor because,
with great team surprise, the car was placed on the main floor of
the show, right in the middle of Ford and Chevrolet.
Joe 18

Detroit Auto Show

Joe was still frightened by that environment – he expected to

be snubbed by the other booths’ white collars. Instead, one by
one, the managers of each automobile company shook hands,
complimented him, and many wished him to start a real automobile
company of his own. Joe was astonished: why did his competitors
encourage him? Subsequently, Joe stated in an interview that,
in his view, the managers of the big companies were frustrated
by the slowness with which things changed in larger companies
and hoped that a new, small, aggressive, and ecologic competitor
would put the proper pressure needed to generate a fundamental
change in their organizations. This explained, according to Joe, the
warm welcome he was given that day. Again, media coverage was
massive. Wikispeed was mentioned by prominent newspapers such
as Wired, National Geographic, New York Times Online, Forbes,
and many specialized blogs including Autoblog¹⁸.
¹⁸http://www.autoblog.com/2011/01/12/detroit-2011-wikispeed-sgt01-low-cost-super-
mpg-car/
Joe 19

TEDx Rainier
The peak exposure stage for Joe and the Wikispeed team arrived in
December 2011, when Joe was invited to speak to Rainier’s TEDx¹⁹.
TED is the most prestigious conference format in the world. The
main event, which takes place in California annually, can only be
attended by invitation; the videos of the TED talks, on the other
hand, remain available free of charge online and have a great
follow-up. TEDx is events independently organized according to
TED format and rules, and in short, have reached such a level of
interest that many of the highlights in the TED site²⁰ are just shot
at TEDx. Joe’s video on Wikispeed, which at the time of writing
this book has reached 90,000 views, was the turning point for the
project.

Joe Justice at TEDx Rainier

From a costume phenomenon, Wikispeed was starting to become

an example to follow. Even important companies, who knew the
Agile software development methodologies and were looking for a
way to innovate their product creation process, saw in Wikispeed
¹⁹https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8jdx-lf2Dw
²⁰https://www.ted.com/
Joe 20

the proof that improvement was possible and began contacting Joe
and Team Wikispeed.

John Deere
John Deere is one of the world’s largest agricultural machinery
manufacturers. John Deere, a blacksmith, founded the company
in 1837 at Grand Detour, Illinois. He was also a great innovator
who, like the others, produced pitchforks, rakes, horseshoes but one
day created a steel plow that for pioneering peasants became the
conquest tool of Midwest grassland. On that innovation alone, the
company grew for almost two centuries billing about $24 billion in
2007. John Deere executives learned about the story of Wikispeed in
2012 from this TEDx video and some articles in magazines. Curious,
though they knew more, they sent three managers to Joe’s garage
in Seattle, over 3,000 miles away. Shortly after their return, Joe
received an invitation to the headquarters of the company in Milan,
Illinois, to illustrate the story of Wikispeed during the initiative
“Frugal Engineering and Innovation.” They talked about modular
tractors and a startup that was creating open-source agricultural
modules called Open Source Ecology. At that time, John Deere was
building the 8030 model, a large modular tractor platform, and Joe
projected a statement during his talk that had been given five years
earlier by the chief engineer of the company:

The development process of the 8030 model is entirely

predictable: we know how much we will spend, how
many resources we need, and when we deliver the
product to the market.

Just after that, however, Joe exposed exciting information con-

tained in a document that the company had sent to him before the
meeting:
Joe 21

The 8030 project had been delayed by six months, the

staff involved worked 12 to 14 hours a day, and some
key features had to be omitted.

The tractor that was launched on the market had great commercial
success and was very profitable. But despite this, Joe showed the ex-
ecutives that the development of new products was becoming more
and more complex, as the world around them was changing very
quickly, and it would be wise to review the way budget estimates
and schedules were processed. Jonh Deere had been producing
tractors for 175 years; the company was very self-confident, and,
in showing the quotation and data that denied it, Joe feared being
sent away, or at least criticized. It was not so: on the contrary, the
managers invited Joe to repeat that intervention on a cruise ship
during the company’s annual meeting, and on that occasion, Joe
said clearly that in his view, the annual budget planning should
not be done annually anymore. In an interview, Joe later stated:

I cannot tell you the details because I signed a confiden-

tiality agreement, but the other day I received a phone
call from a John Deere manager asking me what a Wiki-
Deere might look like.

Boeing
Not long after, Boeing also contacted Team Wikispeed. It was easier
this time, as their headquarters are about a 20-minute drive from
Joe’s garage, but it was not less exciting. Joe and other volunteers
were invited to see the 787, 777, and 767 production lines in the
world’s largest enclosure. Boeing’s production facility is so large
that clouds form inside, and sometimes even rain falls from them!
People in the distance look tiny, yet they are only at one-quarter of
the building. Entering, Joe felt being on the set of “Indiana Jones and
the Raiders of the Lost Ark.” After a guided tour of the production
Joe 22

line, Joe met some Boeing executives. They were interested in

learning more about Wikispeed and finding out if there was “a Wiki
project” in their field. At the meeting, Joe mentioned Maker Plane²¹,
an Agile company that declares to use the “Wikispeed method.” Joe
knew the founders and had exchanged emails with them. “They
are building two models, a 4- and a 6-seat. It will be exciting to see
what they can do”, Joe said in a subsequent interview. In the same
interview, Joe explained the reason why more and more companies
began to be interested in Wikispeed. The widespread fear of the
eventuality that more and more sectors would see the birth of
another “Google,” or “a group of guys, who in their garage, invent
a way to make a better product, spending less, faster, and that with
this idea create a competitor that cannot be bought.”

Agile Alliance 2012

In 2012, the Wikispeed Team was well known on the international
Agile scene, and Joe was invited as a keynote speaker to one of the
most prestigious Agile conferences in the world: Agile 2012 of Agile
Alliance²² in Dallas, Texas.
²¹https://makerplane.org
²²https://www.agilealliance.org/resources/videos/keynote-joe-justice/
Joe 23

At the end of his speech, a participant asked a question to Joe:

Joe, do you see Wikispeed manufacturing becoming a

large-scale manufacturer?

His answer explains why, at the same time, he changed his profes-
sion and, from a software developer, he became Agile Coach:

About 76 million new cars were built and sold last year.
Current analysts predict that about that same number
will be made again this year. We think at least 60 million
of those should get 100 miles per gallon. That said, I
don’t want to figure out how to do the economies of
scale on 60 million cars manufactured in a year. Even
worse than that, I don’t want to see the news that some
manufacturing plant was shut down, and 4,000 people
in a neighborhood were laid off at once because they’ve
just been put out of business by Wikispeed. I want
Wikispeed to succeed. I want it to grow in hundreds
of thousands of cars a year because that’s the number
that will make an appreciable difference in the amount
of fuel consumed and the number of emissions emitted.
Joe 24

We could sell ten of these at 100,000 USD each, and

my pocketbook would be pretty happy, or we could sell
100,000 of these at almost cost and make a difference for
the environment. That’s much more what I’m interested
in.

Joe was only interested in creating a positive impact on the planet.

And he began to understand that teaching others to do likewise,
according to the Wikispeed model, was the best way to boost its
impact in less time.

Scrum Inc
Scrum Inc is the consulting firm founded by Jeff Sutherland, in-
ventor, and co-author of Scrum. Joe had known Jeff as he had
attended a training session, and Jeff had visited the Wikispeed
garage curious about the project. On September 9, 2013, Joe’s
entry into the team was announced²³ on the ScrumInc website.
Joe started to hold his workshop: in Boston’s garage, he taught
people how to apply Scrum to constructing a Wikispeed vehicle.
Not long after, ScrumInc published a webinar²⁴ where Joe and
Jeff showed the secrets of the success of Wikispeed and what
Scrum for Hardware was. In May 2015, Joe became Certified Scrum
Trainer²⁵ for Scrum Alliance²⁶, the nonprofit association founded
by Scrum’s pioneers around the mid-2000s. From Joe’s entry on,
ScrumInc began to include Scrum Master Courses examples from
various areas, releasing the methodology from software alone. In
the second Webinar²⁷ regarding Scrum outside Software, which
ScrumInc published at the end of October 2015, Joe has the title
of President Scrum@Hardware. He had gained a stake in ScrumInc
²³https://www.scruminc.com/joe-justice-joins-scrum-inc-team/
²⁴https://www.scruminc.com/scrum-in-hardware/
²⁵https://www.scruminc.com/the-awesome-joe-justice-is-now-a-cst/
²⁶https://www.scrumalliance.org
²⁷https://www.scruminc.com/scrum-for-maximum-awesome/
Joe 25

and was now the leader of this new movement. The international
community of Scrum for Hardware was already growing, but Joe
wanted to see it grow even more. And he was wondering what to
do.