Duration 60 minutes
Long time the development in the healthcare industry was characterized by a strong alignment to a waterfall approach due to the thinking that based on regulatory constraints (e.g. FDA) no other development models would be possible. This leads also to a certain setup of the corresponding offshore development supplier in a global environment. Following the waterfall model, only certain parts of the process where "off shored" to supplier, leading mainly to an "extended workbench" approach.
Now after more and more companies, outside of healthcare, have changed successfully to agile development models in order to overcome the burdens of waterfall approaches, also the healthcare industry has started to look more into detail into what is really required from regulatory point of view, in order to change their development process. The goal, of course, is becoming more effective and better equipped for a competitive global environment. Still a certain discussion is going on about if an agile development approach is suitable for Offshore Software Development or not.
One important aspect enforced by Agile is the aspect of responsibilities. To develop our suppliers from an "extended workbench" only implementing exactly what they have been told, to partners willing to take over responsibilities for a complete set of features, it is a long way to go. This needs changes from organizational point of view, from architectural point of view, and many others. But in special it needs a change of the mindset of headquarters, and also of the suppliers that become now partners. It is about the mindset how we see and treat each other, as well as the mindset about giving and taking responsibility. This is the most crucial point in what we defined for our Agile Transition.
We, being part of a healthcare company with about 7 offshore locations and over 1500 developers, want to line out how we have implemented successfully Agile for Offshore Software Development and will illustrate how we have incorporated our Offshore Partners into our development lifetime cycle.