Scaling Agile @ Spotify
One of the things I love the most about the software industry is the culture of openness. In this article, some folks at Spotify thoughtfully describe how they take on the challenge of moving fast with a large and growing organization. Since much of the literature on agile development focuses on small (~10-20 person) teams, this is a great real-world example of how a successful company has scaled these practices out.
The authors detail their organizational structure and importantly, acknowledge the tradeoffs and tensions between roles.
Some bits I found especially interesting..
- Autonomous, multi-discipline feature teams called “squads” with the inclination to move fast are balanced with single-discipline “chapters” with the inclination to do things correctly
- Regular surveys that track several key metrics (and direction) over time assisting management making decisions about which areas to focus on
- Ops as a supporting role supporting devs deploying rather than being responsible for deployment themselves
