This is Part 4 in our series on Value Stream Mapping. You can catch up on  Part 1, Part 2, or Part 3 if you missed them. As more vendors enter the value stream management space, the “Build or Buy” decision is essential to consider. On the low-tech, high-touch end of the DIY spectrum, you can manually map out your value stream and then track it with sticky notes on a whiteboard, but that won’t scale well, and it is difficult to measure whether changes are improving your value stream. Building your own value stream management platform can take 12-18 months, and you’ll need to plan for, and staff, future maintenance. Finally, with more development teams working from home asynchronously across different time zones, it may not be the time to build your own platform from scratch. In contrast, many subscription-based value stream management platforms can be stood up quickly. That frees up time for your developers to spend on features, enhancements, and paying down technical debt in your customer applications.

Popular Value Stream Management Software Vendors

Tasktop Viz

According to SD Times, Tasktop is the only vendor that “takes a strategic approach to enterprise toolchain integration — connecting the complex network of best-of-breed tools used for planning, building and delivering software at an enterprise level.” Tasktop provides portfolio analysis, rolling up different product line value streams so that you can see which products can get to market quickly and which need more help. According to Forrester, TaskTop Viz “featured strong and differentiating what-if predictive analytics to enable planners and leaders to experiment with different models before putting plans into motion.” Analyst Rankings:

• Representative Vendor, Gartner 2020 Market Guide for DevOps Value Stream Management Platforms (VSMPs)
• Leader, The Forrester Wave™: Value Stream Management Solutions, Q3 2020 Report

Learn more about Tasktop Viz.

GitLab Value Stream Analytics

GitLab’s product, Value Stream Analytics, promises a single data store, zero integrations to manage, and a single dashboard. It tracks cycle time, lead time for change, and deployment frequency, among other metrics. Analyst Rankings:

• Representative Vendor in the Gartner Market Guide for DevOps Value Stream Delivery Platforms (VSDPs)
• Contender, The Forrester Wave™: Value Stream Management Solutions, Q3 2020 Report

Atlassian Jira Align

Jira Align focuses primarily on Jira Cloud, making it a good choice for customers already using Atlassian products. Learn more about Atlassian Jira Align. Analyst Rankings:

• Contender, The Forrester Wave™: Value Stream Management Solutions, Q3 2020 Report

Plutora

According to Forrester, Plutora Platform has a common data model, strong governance, great release visibility but needs stronger analytics capabilities. Analyst Rankings:

• Representative Vendor, Gartner 2020 Market Guide for DevOps Value Stream Management Platforms (VSMPs)
• Leader, The Forrester Wave™: Value Stream Management Solutions, Q3 2020 Report

Need Help Deciding?

ReleaseTEAM provides consulting and implementation for Value Stream Management processes and tools, including Tasktop, GitLab, Atlassian, and CloudBees.