The Organization represents the top level in product development, and thus all people, roles and groups. It is also called the Portfolio Level. All of the Organization’s work is shown in the Portfolio Backlog with the greatest possible transparency.
Larger Organizations (over 100-150 people) are divided into different sub-organizations, which are called Cluster in the P4 framework The Clusters are responsible for different Systems, different target Markets or different Applications.
By scaling the Scrum roles at the organizational level, there are …
- the Portfolio Owner (PFO) as representative of the Cluster Product Owner Group (CPOG),
- the Portfolio Architect (PFA) with the Cluster System Engineer Gruppe (CSEG) and
- the Organization Scrum Master (OSM) as representative of the Cluster Scrum Master Gruppe (CSMG)
Der PFO, der OSM und der PFA bilden den Management-Kreis für die gesamte Organisation (siehe auch übernächstes Kapitel).
Roles & Groups
To organize the organization, in addition to the clusters, different groups are formed to regulate the three different areas of responsibility. The groups are formed from members of the clusters according to the overlapping principle. In order to clearly regulate this dual affiliation, the working hours for the work in the group are determined centrally by the Cadence. There is a clear agreement from the outset as to when and for how long the group will work together.
The following groups correspond to the three areas of responsibility:
- Market and Business: The Cluster Product Owner Group with the Portfolio-Owner
- Technologie and Architecture: The Cluster-System-Engineer-Gruppe with the Portfolio Architekten
- Processes, Infrastructure and Culture: The Cluster Scrum Master Group with the Organization Scrum Master
Organization Management Circle
The Portfolio Owner, the Portfolio Architect and the Organization Scrum Master form the Organization Management Circle. They support and complement each other in the decision-making of topics that reach their level or have been escalated to them by one of the three groups they represent. This construct effectively prevents “lonely individual decisions”, because decisions are previously examined and discussed from all three directions.
The Organization Management Circle forms an interdisciplinary group of managers who, like all other groups and teams, hold daily or weekly Sync meetings and Retrospectives.
Service Teams at Organization Level
The Infrastructure Services, such as accounting & controlling, human resources, IT and building services (site management) are Service Teams at the Organization Level.
Worksflows & Value Streams for the Organization
Teams and clusters that work within the organization often deliver partial results and intermediate products to each other. To make this transparent for everyone, “Value Stream Maps” describe the different areas of responsibility and delivery objects. For this purpose, the P4 framework uses the SIPOC description from classic organizational development. (Suplier >> Input >> Process >> Output >> Customer).
Example Value Stream for the Organization
With organizational modeling, the specific organization is modeled by P4 elements, i.e. the teams, groups and Clusters are represented by their information and work flows.
The processes can now be represented within the organizational model, whereby this is done by defining and documenting the corresponding inputs, responsibilities, actions and outputs. Every organizational unit is described according to the SIPOC method (Supplier - Inputs - Process - Outputs - Customers).
See also: Artefacts of the Organization and Organization Events
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Further suitable links:
| Events | Roles | Groups | Artifacts |
| Portfolio Planning | Portfolio Owner | Cluster Product Owner Group | Portfolio Backlog |