LitheSpeed has partnered with Nationwide Insurance for more than a decade, evolving from initial Agile pilots to supporting an Application Development Center with over 500 teams. Through scaled Agile constructs, including value stream teams, Lean portfolio governance, and enterprise Big Room Planning, Nationwide achieved a 67% improvement in delivery velocity, reduced costs by approximately 15%, and established a sustained culture of alignment across business and technology. Today, Agile is embedded across the enterprise, driving coordinated planning and value delivery at scale.

Client

Nationwide Insurance

Market

Insurance & Financial Services

 

Industry

Enterprise Technology

 

Offerings

Enterprise Agile Transformation, Training & Coaching

Challenge

Founded in 1926, Nationwide Insurance has grown into one of the largest and most diversified insurance and financial services organizations in the United States. Serving individuals, businesses, and farms, Nationwide offers auto, homeowners, pet, life, commercial insurance, retirement plans, annuities, mutual funds, and specialty health services.

As Nationwide’s portfolio expanded, so did the complexity of coordinating delivery across business units, infrastructure teams, and shared services organizations. Leadership sought to improve speed, reduce costs, and strengthen alignment between strategy and execution, without disrupting critical financial and insurance operations.

Key challenges included:

  • Scaling Agile beyond isolated pilot teams

  • Aligning hundreds of teams across business and IT functions

  • Improving delivery predictability in complex systems

  • Modernizing portfolio planning and governance

  • Coordinating cross-team dependencies across multiple organizational units

Nationwide required a scalable transformation approach that would embed agility deeply into the enterprise operating model.

Solution

LitheSpeed partnered with Nationwide to design and implement a comprehensive, end-to-end Agile transformation that extended beyond IT and into core business units.

From Pilots to Enterprise Scale

The engagement began with targeted Agile pilots, which successfully demonstrated improved delivery outcomes. These efforts expanded into the formation of an Application Development Center supporting over 500 teams.

Scaled Agile Constructs

To enable enterprise coordination, LitheSpeed introduced and operationalized:

  • Value Stream Teams aligned around business outcomes

  • Lean Portfolio Planning and Governance to modernize investment decision-making

  • Big Room Planning to synchronize work across large, interdependent teams

These constructs strengthened transparency, improved prioritization, and aligned execution with strategic objectives.

Strategic Consulting, Training & Coaching

LitheSpeed provided embedded coaching, leadership advisory services, and training to ensure adoption at all levels, from executives to delivery teams, building sustainable Agile capabilities across the organization.

Results & Impact

The transformation delivered significant quantitative and qualitative improvements:

  • 67% improvement in delivery velocity

  • Approximately 15% reduction in costs

  • Successful quarterly “complex systems” Big Room Planning sessions

    • Aligning up to 20 teams and 400 team members

    • Coordinating work across multiple business units and organizational areas

Today, Agile is deeply embedded within Nationwide’s operating model, enabling unprecedented levels of enterprise planning and alignment across business units, infrastructure, and shared services. The organization now operates with stronger cross-functional collaboration, improved execution speed, and greater adaptability in a competitive financial services landscape.

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