CINCHING TEAM STRUCTURES
Kevin Jones | Tech Lead
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Describe a team structure that you have found works well and why you think it was successful
– The brief
Search team
1
Works well?
What do we measure?
2
Structuring Teams
What matters when considering your future structure?
3
Mr Conway
Where do you split the teams, and why?
5
Cognitive load,
Why does it matters for success?
4
Team size
What size should it be, what does it impact?
6
Team anatomy
Does the right anatomy make much difference?
7
Collaboration
How do you optimise communication between teams?
KEY Questions
What does 'work well' mean?
Efficient flow
Flow of value or change through the system.
Metric - Time it takes ideas to reach the customer
Fast feedback
Signals that allow you to course correct.
Metric - time to acknowledge incidents.
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Cinch is a team of teams
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A network of people & systems
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Aim for team stability
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Aim for efficacy
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Avoid Bottlenecks/handovers
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Expect it to evolve, experiment
Structuring teamS
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Any organisation that designs a system (defined broadly) will produce a design whose structure is a copy of the organisation’s communication structure.
– Mr Conway, 1968
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A product's architecture tends to mirror the structure of the organisation within which it is developed
– Mr MacCormack et al. 2008
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7 ± 2
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Mr Bezos says 2 pizzas 🍕
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Smaller teams
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Closer relationships
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More trust
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Quicker decisions
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Less lines of communication
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Leans into cognitive load
Sizing teams
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Avoid overloading teams with complexity. Limit the size of the software system to the cognitive load the team can handle.
– Team Topologies*
– Team Topologies*
* Paraphrased it slightly
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Headspace is finite
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Performance sweet-spot
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Don't overload your small team
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Search + Recommendations
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So?
- More learning / mastery
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Experimentation thrives
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Raises team sense of satisfaction
Cognitive load
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The right people in the right seats, keeps value flowing
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Good anatomy creates:
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ownership - ship it, own it
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autonomy - minimise dependencies & make decisions
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Key roles keep the squad aligned with the wider business
team anatomy
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Efficiency between teams
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Types
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Search is value aligned
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Enabling teams like the principles or delivery
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Platform teams like infra
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Complex sub-systems BCA Data (Ziggy)
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How we work with these teams
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Collaboration
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x-as-a-service, low cognitive load
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Facilitated by the enablers
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Collaboration
〞
Describe a team structure that you have found works well and why you think it was successful
– The brief
1
Works well
Flow + Feedback
2
Structuring Teams
Efficient network, stability, avoid bottleneck
3
Mr Conway
Architecture imitates organisation... teams first
5
Cognitive load,
Just the right amount..
Performance and happiness lever
4
Team size
7 +/-2
Trust, quick decisions
6
Team anatomy
Autonomous, empowered, aligned teams
7
Collaboration
Efficient, deliberate collaboration across different team types
KEY Questions
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Always room for improvement though. Every day is a school day
– Me