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Increasing Team Velocity By Increasing Team Autonomy

Xello tracked team velocity across their engineering teams and noticed some teams were not performing as expected. To fix this, they reduced communication channels by putting a dedicated UX person on each team and empowered them to make all decisions, and set up KPI's to measure teams against quarterly objectives. This improved team velocity and ensured teams were making the right decisions. The lesson learned was to ensure people are aligned with the company's mission and strategy, and to ensure they have autonomy to move quickly without relying on others.

Controlling Your Technical Debt

The VP of Engineering at Xello identified that their teams were taking on too much technical debt and set out to identify the cause. They used Jira to track debt, improved their testing, and focussed more on requirements. The lesson learned was to track technical debt independently and to track how much debt is taken on during each development cycle to prevent it from accumulating.

Improving Collaboration Through Plans Of Attack

To improve collaboration between teams in different locations, a process was implemented where Plan of Attacks (POAs) were published on a public channel. This gave people from different locations the chance to see what their colleagues were working on and provided a checklist for people to go through. Although the process has helped with team visibility and cross-formation, there are still issues with engagement with the tool. To address this, people are now explicitly asked to tag three people on their POAs to ensure at least three people review the documents and provide comment.

How To Reorganize Teams To Boost Morale

When Womply's teams were reorganized every quarter, it affected their velocity, cohesion, and morale. To create more permanent teams, the engineering manager gathered input from individual engineers and divided them into small task forces based on past camaraderie. It's important to communicate and listen to people's feedback, and to let them know when reorganization is happening and why. This will set the team up for success and prevent frustration.

Internal Communication - Why Explain Why?

Womply decided to roll out an all-star culture, but the founder's quick explanation led to people filling in the blanks with their own assumptions. To address this, the team drafted a message to explain the changes, tying it to other companies, and asked for their ideas to improve it. The lesson learned was to spend 80% of the time talking about why the changes were made and to validate them with external or data-based sources. Additionally, it is best to test the message with first-line managers first to anticipate any questions or issues.

Sharing The Tech Lead Role

At Doctolib, developers are involved in the process of developing new features from beginning to end. A "Tech Holder" is assigned to each project, and developers from all levels can take on this role. This has helped the developers to grow and develop, and has improved the quality of the product and code. A retrospective meeting was held to improve the process, and the feedback was positive.

A Career Path Based On Enjoyment

A year ago, the author was unsure whether to pursue a full-time career in people management or to split their time between technical work and people management. After analyzing their day-to-day activities and reading "Apprenticeship Patterns" by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, the author found that they enjoyed both the technical and people management sides of engineering management. They now work part-time in both roles and advise others in the same situation to examine their tasks to identify what they enjoy doing most.

Maintaining Team Processes After Restructuring

Doctolib needed to split their mixed team of 13 people into two teams, each focussed on one of their two main objectives. They identified who would go where and then evaluated each person to determine the best fits. They took three months to make the changes and used team retrospectives and short feedback loops to keep their culture and processes. They also used more precise indicators to measure how many features they were delivering. In the end, the teams were happy with the changes and the slow, methodical approach was successful.

How to Inspire People to Use Home-grown Products & Drive Adoption

In order to increase internal adoption of a product, a company organized a discussion with leaders from the consulting/services side of the organization to determine why they weren't using the product. To further increase adoption, the company developed a video training program and an in-person training program for the sales team, consultants team, and the engineering team. As a result of these efforts, the company won an award for the most innovative products of 2017. The lesson learned is that collaboration with others can lead to greater success than working alone.

Reducing Tension In A Hostile Environment & turn things around

The company was working with a customer who had purchased their product, but the mid-level managers and engineers were skeptical. The team was met with a hostile environment and were not given a desk to work at. Despite this, the team persisted and built a relationship with the customer, showing them the value of the product and solving their problems. By the end of the month, the customer had changed their mind and chose to continue using the product. The lesson learned was that relationship building and patience can go a long way, and as a manager, it is important to absorb pressure to create a smooth path for the team.

The Importance Of Personality In Hiring Good Engineers

The author was an Engineering Manager at Saama Technologies in 2013 and was under pressure to hire 11 engineers quickly. He interviewed 600 candidates and shortlisted a few, taking into account their personalities and communication skills, as well as their technical abilities. He then worked with his management to create a special budget for salaries and bonuses, and continued to talk to the candidates until they joined the company. The team was a success and the author learned that it is important to never take shortcuts when it comes to hiring, and to consider the environment, culture, and personalities of the company and team when selecting a candidate.

Achieving Team Scalability

The CTO of a startup was tasked with scaling from 2 developers to 10 in a year, which seemed impossible. He found a way to rebuild the product to make it easier for newcomers to enter, by cutting the product into two isolated parts and limiting its functionalities. This allowed developers to be onboarded in two weeks to a month, rather than three to six months. This experience taught the CTO that the way you build your product and structure your company can have a huge impact on scalability.

When Agile Isn’t Agile

The company had switched to Agile processes, but without understanding it, it resulted in a huge mess. The product manager switched back to cascade processes, and worked hard to get back on track. After the team had shown it could fulfill working releases, the product manager gradually introduced more agility and flexibility, and eventually reached a much more Agile method of working.

Reversing A Team’s Culture Of Fear

When joining a software company, the manager asked the new employee to work on an old product first. The employee quickly identified a culture of blame and fear within the company, so decided to take action. He requested to work on the old product and told his team that he would be the only one to blame for any mistakes. This approach was successful and the team was able to collaborate and learn without fear.

Stepping Back To Develop Your Engineers

The Director of Engineering at the Rubicon Project wanted to be involved in a machine learning project, but realized it would be a great opportunity for the most senior engineer on the team to show their skills. Despite challenges, the project was successful and the stakeholders were enthusiastic. The Director learned an important lesson in trusting their team and giving them the opportunity to grow.

Bringing A Team Together

The manager of a small engineering team at the Rubicon Project implemented weekly team meetings to encourage collaboration and open discussion. This allowed the engineers to become informed together and discuss concerns as a group. The team meetings also included interesting topics and articles to discuss, which helped the engineers come out of their shells and engage with the rest of the team. As a result, the team has grown to nine engineers and the team has become more comfortable with presenting ideas to each other.

When Engineers Struggle To Adapt To Rapid Changes

Chartboost, a tech company, has experienced rapid growth and change over the past 7 years. This has caused some engineers to struggle to adapt to the changing demands of the company. As a result, the company has become more conscious of hiring people who can adapt to change and are comfortable with the company's vision. The manager has also taken steps to ensure they have a good sense of what is coming up in the future.

When More Engineers Means Decreased Productivity

Chartboost went from a team of two to a team of six, but it took six months to get to a point where their team of six was as productive as the two-person team. It's important to add structure and ensure that everyone has a full picture of what is going on. As the team grows, it's important to adjust and reenvision the structure to ensure efficiency.

Trusting Engineering Teams With Product Management

The CTO of an engineering team split the team into two smaller squads in order to fix communication issues. To scale his role, he delegated tasks to the squads and allowed them to self-organize. This led to the team using user story mapping and hiring more well-rounded candidates based on trust.

When Communication Problems Are Symptoms Of A Bigger Issue

The CTO of Badger Maps experienced communication and productivity issues due to the large size of their team. To address this, they split the team into two smaller Scrum teams and implemented the concept of "Scrum of Scrums" and guilds. This resulted in improved communication and productivity. The lesson learned is to address issues quickly when they arise, as it can be difficult to get the engine moving again if the issue is ignored.

Increasing Team Velocity By Increasing Team Autonomy

Xello tracked team velocity across their engineering teams and noticed some teams were not performing as expected. To fix this, they reduced communication channels by putting a dedicated UX person on each team and empowered them to make all decisions, and set up KPI's to measure teams against quarterly objectives. This improved team velocity and ensured teams were making the right decisions. The lesson learned was to ensure people are aligned with the company's mission and strategy, and to ensure they have autonomy to move quickly without relying on others.

Controlling Your Technical Debt

The VP of Engineering at Xello identified that their teams were taking on too much technical debt and set out to identify the cause. They used Jira to track debt, improved their testing, and focussed more on requirements. The lesson learned was to track technical debt independently and to track how much debt is taken on during each development cycle to prevent it from accumulating.

Improving Collaboration Through Plans Of Attack

To improve collaboration between teams in different locations, a process was implemented where Plan of Attacks (POAs) were published on a public channel. This gave people from different locations the chance to see what their colleagues were working on and provided a checklist for people to go through. Although the process has helped with team visibility and cross-formation, there are still issues with engagement with the tool. To address this, people are now explicitly asked to tag three people on their POAs to ensure at least three people review the documents and provide comment.

How To Reorganize Teams To Boost Morale

When Womply's teams were reorganized every quarter, it affected their velocity, cohesion, and morale. To create more permanent teams, the engineering manager gathered input from individual engineers and divided them into small task forces based on past camaraderie. It's important to communicate and listen to people's feedback, and to let them know when reorganization is happening and why. This will set the team up for success and prevent frustration.

Internal Communication - Why Explain Why?

Womply decided to roll out an all-star culture, but the founder's quick explanation led to people filling in the blanks with their own assumptions. To address this, the team drafted a message to explain the changes, tying it to other companies, and asked for their ideas to improve it. The lesson learned was to spend 80% of the time talking about why the changes were made and to validate them with external or data-based sources. Additionally, it is best to test the message with first-line managers first to anticipate any questions or issues.

Sharing The Tech Lead Role

At Doctolib, developers are involved in the process of developing new features from beginning to end. A "Tech Holder" is assigned to each project, and developers from all levels can take on this role. This has helped the developers to grow and develop, and has improved the quality of the product and code. A retrospective meeting was held to improve the process, and the feedback was positive.

A Career Path Based On Enjoyment

A year ago, the author was unsure whether to pursue a full-time career in people management or to split their time between technical work and people management. After analyzing their day-to-day activities and reading "Apprenticeship Patterns" by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, the author found that they enjoyed both the technical and people management sides of engineering management. They now work part-time in both roles and advise others in the same situation to examine their tasks to identify what they enjoy doing most.

Maintaining Team Processes After Restructuring

Doctolib needed to split their mixed team of 13 people into two teams, each focussed on one of their two main objectives. They identified who would go where and then evaluated each person to determine the best fits. They took three months to make the changes and used team retrospectives and short feedback loops to keep their culture and processes. They also used more precise indicators to measure how many features they were delivering. In the end, the teams were happy with the changes and the slow, methodical approach was successful.

How to Inspire People to Use Home-grown Products & Drive Adoption

In order to increase internal adoption of a product, a company organized a discussion with leaders from the consulting/services side of the organization to determine why they weren't using the product. To further increase adoption, the company developed a video training program and an in-person training program for the sales team, consultants team, and the engineering team. As a result of these efforts, the company won an award for the most innovative products of 2017. The lesson learned is that collaboration with others can lead to greater success than working alone.

Reducing Tension In A Hostile Environment & turn things around

The company was working with a customer who had purchased their product, but the mid-level managers and engineers were skeptical. The team was met with a hostile environment and were not given a desk to work at. Despite this, the team persisted and built a relationship with the customer, showing them the value of the product and solving their problems. By the end of the month, the customer had changed their mind and chose to continue using the product. The lesson learned was that relationship building and patience can go a long way, and as a manager, it is important to absorb pressure to create a smooth path for the team.

The Importance Of Personality In Hiring Good Engineers

The author was an Engineering Manager at Saama Technologies in 2013 and was under pressure to hire 11 engineers quickly. He interviewed 600 candidates and shortlisted a few, taking into account their personalities and communication skills, as well as their technical abilities. He then worked with his management to create a special budget for salaries and bonuses, and continued to talk to the candidates until they joined the company. The team was a success and the author learned that it is important to never take shortcuts when it comes to hiring, and to consider the environment, culture, and personalities of the company and team when selecting a candidate.

Achieving Team Scalability

The CTO of a startup was tasked with scaling from 2 developers to 10 in a year, which seemed impossible. He found a way to rebuild the product to make it easier for newcomers to enter, by cutting the product into two isolated parts and limiting its functionalities. This allowed developers to be onboarded in two weeks to a month, rather than three to six months. This experience taught the CTO that the way you build your product and structure your company can have a huge impact on scalability.

When Agile Isn’t Agile

The company had switched to Agile processes, but without understanding it, it resulted in a huge mess. The product manager switched back to cascade processes, and worked hard to get back on track. After the team had shown it could fulfill working releases, the product manager gradually introduced more agility and flexibility, and eventually reached a much more Agile method of working.

Reversing A Team’s Culture Of Fear

When joining a software company, the manager asked the new employee to work on an old product first. The employee quickly identified a culture of blame and fear within the company, so decided to take action. He requested to work on the old product and told his team that he would be the only one to blame for any mistakes. This approach was successful and the team was able to collaborate and learn without fear.

Stepping Back To Develop Your Engineers

The Director of Engineering at the Rubicon Project wanted to be involved in a machine learning project, but realized it would be a great opportunity for the most senior engineer on the team to show their skills. Despite challenges, the project was successful and the stakeholders were enthusiastic. The Director learned an important lesson in trusting their team and giving them the opportunity to grow.

Bringing A Team Together

The manager of a small engineering team at the Rubicon Project implemented weekly team meetings to encourage collaboration and open discussion. This allowed the engineers to become informed together and discuss concerns as a group. The team meetings also included interesting topics and articles to discuss, which helped the engineers come out of their shells and engage with the rest of the team. As a result, the team has grown to nine engineers and the team has become more comfortable with presenting ideas to each other.

When Engineers Struggle To Adapt To Rapid Changes

Chartboost, a tech company, has experienced rapid growth and change over the past 7 years. This has caused some engineers to struggle to adapt to the changing demands of the company. As a result, the company has become more conscious of hiring people who can adapt to change and are comfortable with the company's vision. The manager has also taken steps to ensure they have a good sense of what is coming up in the future.

When More Engineers Means Decreased Productivity

Chartboost went from a team of two to a team of six, but it took six months to get to a point where their team of six was as productive as the two-person team. It's important to add structure and ensure that everyone has a full picture of what is going on. As the team grows, it's important to adjust and reenvision the structure to ensure efficiency.

Trusting Engineering Teams With Product Management

The CTO of an engineering team split the team into two smaller squads in order to fix communication issues. To scale his role, he delegated tasks to the squads and allowed them to self-organize. This led to the team using user story mapping and hiring more well-rounded candidates based on trust.

When Communication Problems Are Symptoms Of A Bigger Issue

The CTO of Badger Maps experienced communication and productivity issues due to the large size of their team. To address this, they split the team into two smaller Scrum teams and implemented the concept of "Scrum of Scrums" and guilds. This resulted in improved communication and productivity. The lesson learned is to address issues quickly when they arise, as it can be difficult to get the engine moving again if the issue is ignored.

Increasing Team Velocity By Increasing Team Autonomy

Xello tracked team velocity across their engineering teams and noticed some teams were not performing as expected. To fix this, they reduced communication channels by putting a dedicated UX person on each team and empowered them to make all decisions, and set up KPI's to measure teams against quarterly objectives. This improved team velocity and ensured teams were making the right decisions. The lesson learned was to ensure people are aligned with the company's mission and strategy, and to ensure they have autonomy to move quickly without relying on others.

Controlling Your Technical Debt

The VP of Engineering at Xello identified that their teams were taking on too much technical debt and set out to identify the cause. They used Jira to track debt, improved their testing, and focussed more on requirements. The lesson learned was to track technical debt independently and to track how much debt is taken on during each development cycle to prevent it from accumulating.

Improving Collaboration Through Plans Of Attack

To improve collaboration between teams in different locations, a process was implemented where Plan of Attacks (POAs) were published on a public channel. This gave people from different locations the chance to see what their colleagues were working on and provided a checklist for people to go through. Although the process has helped with team visibility and cross-formation, there are still issues with engagement with the tool. To address this, people are now explicitly asked to tag three people on their POAs to ensure at least three people review the documents and provide comment.

How To Reorganize Teams To Boost Morale

When Womply's teams were reorganized every quarter, it affected their velocity, cohesion, and morale. To create more permanent teams, the engineering manager gathered input from individual engineers and divided them into small task forces based on past camaraderie. It's important to communicate and listen to people's feedback, and to let them know when reorganization is happening and why. This will set the team up for success and prevent frustration.

Internal Communication - Why Explain Why?

Womply decided to roll out an all-star culture, but the founder's quick explanation led to people filling in the blanks with their own assumptions. To address this, the team drafted a message to explain the changes, tying it to other companies, and asked for their ideas to improve it. The lesson learned was to spend 80% of the time talking about why the changes were made and to validate them with external or data-based sources. Additionally, it is best to test the message with first-line managers first to anticipate any questions or issues.

Sharing The Tech Lead Role

At Doctolib, developers are involved in the process of developing new features from beginning to end. A "Tech Holder" is assigned to each project, and developers from all levels can take on this role. This has helped the developers to grow and develop, and has improved the quality of the product and code. A retrospective meeting was held to improve the process, and the feedback was positive.

A Career Path Based On Enjoyment

A year ago, the author was unsure whether to pursue a full-time career in people management or to split their time between technical work and people management. After analyzing their day-to-day activities and reading "Apprenticeship Patterns" by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, the author found that they enjoyed both the technical and people management sides of engineering management. They now work part-time in both roles and advise others in the same situation to examine their tasks to identify what they enjoy doing most.

Maintaining Team Processes After Restructuring

Doctolib needed to split their mixed team of 13 people into two teams, each focussed on one of their two main objectives. They identified who would go where and then evaluated each person to determine the best fits. They took three months to make the changes and used team retrospectives and short feedback loops to keep their culture and processes. They also used more precise indicators to measure how many features they were delivering. In the end, the teams were happy with the changes and the slow, methodical approach was successful.

How to Inspire People to Use Home-grown Products & Drive Adoption

In order to increase internal adoption of a product, a company organized a discussion with leaders from the consulting/services side of the organization to determine why they weren't using the product. To further increase adoption, the company developed a video training program and an in-person training program for the sales team, consultants team, and the engineering team. As a result of these efforts, the company won an award for the most innovative products of 2017. The lesson learned is that collaboration with others can lead to greater success than working alone.

Reducing Tension In A Hostile Environment & turn things around

The company was working with a customer who had purchased their product, but the mid-level managers and engineers were skeptical. The team was met with a hostile environment and were not given a desk to work at. Despite this, the team persisted and built a relationship with the customer, showing them the value of the product and solving their problems. By the end of the month, the customer had changed their mind and chose to continue using the product. The lesson learned was that relationship building and patience can go a long way, and as a manager, it is important to absorb pressure to create a smooth path for the team.

The Importance Of Personality In Hiring Good Engineers

The author was an Engineering Manager at Saama Technologies in 2013 and was under pressure to hire 11 engineers quickly. He interviewed 600 candidates and shortlisted a few, taking into account their personalities and communication skills, as well as their technical abilities. He then worked with his management to create a special budget for salaries and bonuses, and continued to talk to the candidates until they joined the company. The team was a success and the author learned that it is important to never take shortcuts when it comes to hiring, and to consider the environment, culture, and personalities of the company and team when selecting a candidate.

Achieving Team Scalability

The CTO of a startup was tasked with scaling from 2 developers to 10 in a year, which seemed impossible. He found a way to rebuild the product to make it easier for newcomers to enter, by cutting the product into two isolated parts and limiting its functionalities. This allowed developers to be onboarded in two weeks to a month, rather than three to six months. This experience taught the CTO that the way you build your product and structure your company can have a huge impact on scalability.

When Agile Isn’t Agile

The company had switched to Agile processes, but without understanding it, it resulted in a huge mess. The product manager switched back to cascade processes, and worked hard to get back on track. After the team had shown it could fulfill working releases, the product manager gradually introduced more agility and flexibility, and eventually reached a much more Agile method of working.

Reversing A Team’s Culture Of Fear

When joining a software company, the manager asked the new employee to work on an old product first. The employee quickly identified a culture of blame and fear within the company, so decided to take action. He requested to work on the old product and told his team that he would be the only one to blame for any mistakes. This approach was successful and the team was able to collaborate and learn without fear.

Stepping Back To Develop Your Engineers

The Director of Engineering at the Rubicon Project wanted to be involved in a machine learning project, but realized it would be a great opportunity for the most senior engineer on the team to show their skills. Despite challenges, the project was successful and the stakeholders were enthusiastic. The Director learned an important lesson in trusting their team and giving them the opportunity to grow.

Bringing A Team Together

The manager of a small engineering team at the Rubicon Project implemented weekly team meetings to encourage collaboration and open discussion. This allowed the engineers to become informed together and discuss concerns as a group. The team meetings also included interesting topics and articles to discuss, which helped the engineers come out of their shells and engage with the rest of the team. As a result, the team has grown to nine engineers and the team has become more comfortable with presenting ideas to each other.

When Engineers Struggle To Adapt To Rapid Changes

Chartboost, a tech company, has experienced rapid growth and change over the past 7 years. This has caused some engineers to struggle to adapt to the changing demands of the company. As a result, the company has become more conscious of hiring people who can adapt to change and are comfortable with the company's vision. The manager has also taken steps to ensure they have a good sense of what is coming up in the future.

When More Engineers Means Decreased Productivity

Chartboost went from a team of two to a team of six, but it took six months to get to a point where their team of six was as productive as the two-person team. It's important to add structure and ensure that everyone has a full picture of what is going on. As the team grows, it's important to adjust and reenvision the structure to ensure efficiency.

Trusting Engineering Teams With Product Management

The CTO of an engineering team split the team into two smaller squads in order to fix communication issues. To scale his role, he delegated tasks to the squads and allowed them to self-organize. This led to the team using user story mapping and hiring more well-rounded candidates based on trust.

When Communication Problems Are Symptoms Of A Bigger Issue

The CTO of Badger Maps experienced communication and productivity issues due to the large size of their team. To address this, they split the team into two smaller Scrum teams and implemented the concept of "Scrum of Scrums" and guilds. This resulted in improved communication and productivity. The lesson learned is to address issues quickly when they arise, as it can be difficult to get the engine moving again if the issue is ignored.

Increasing Team Velocity By Increasing Team Autonomy

Xello tracked team velocity across their engineering teams and noticed some teams were not performing as expected. To fix this, they reduced communication channels by putting a dedicated UX person on each team and empowered them to make all decisions, and set up KPI's to measure teams against quarterly objectives. This improved team velocity and ensured teams were making the right decisions. The lesson learned was to ensure people are aligned with the company's mission and strategy, and to ensure they have autonomy to move quickly without relying on others.

Controlling Your Technical Debt

The VP of Engineering at Xello identified that their teams were taking on too much technical debt and set out to identify the cause. They used Jira to track debt, improved their testing, and focussed more on requirements. The lesson learned was to track technical debt independently and to track how much debt is taken on during each development cycle to prevent it from accumulating.

Improving Collaboration Through Plans Of Attack

To improve collaboration between teams in different locations, a process was implemented where Plan of Attacks (POAs) were published on a public channel. This gave people from different locations the chance to see what their colleagues were working on and provided a checklist for people to go through. Although the process has helped with team visibility and cross-formation, there are still issues with engagement with the tool. To address this, people are now explicitly asked to tag three people on their POAs to ensure at least three people review the documents and provide comment.

How To Reorganize Teams To Boost Morale

When Womply's teams were reorganized every quarter, it affected their velocity, cohesion, and morale. To create more permanent teams, the engineering manager gathered input from individual engineers and divided them into small task forces based on past camaraderie. It's important to communicate and listen to people's feedback, and to let them know when reorganization is happening and why. This will set the team up for success and prevent frustration.

Internal Communication - Why Explain Why?

Womply decided to roll out an all-star culture, but the founder's quick explanation led to people filling in the blanks with their own assumptions. To address this, the team drafted a message to explain the changes, tying it to other companies, and asked for their ideas to improve it. The lesson learned was to spend 80% of the time talking about why the changes were made and to validate them with external or data-based sources. Additionally, it is best to test the message with first-line managers first to anticipate any questions or issues.

Sharing The Tech Lead Role

At Doctolib, developers are involved in the process of developing new features from beginning to end. A "Tech Holder" is assigned to each project, and developers from all levels can take on this role. This has helped the developers to grow and develop, and has improved the quality of the product and code. A retrospective meeting was held to improve the process, and the feedback was positive.

A Career Path Based On Enjoyment

A year ago, the author was unsure whether to pursue a full-time career in people management or to split their time between technical work and people management. After analyzing their day-to-day activities and reading "Apprenticeship Patterns" by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, the author found that they enjoyed both the technical and people management sides of engineering management. They now work part-time in both roles and advise others in the same situation to examine their tasks to identify what they enjoy doing most.

Maintaining Team Processes After Restructuring

Doctolib needed to split their mixed team of 13 people into two teams, each focussed on one of their two main objectives. They identified who would go where and then evaluated each person to determine the best fits. They took three months to make the changes and used team retrospectives and short feedback loops to keep their culture and processes. They also used more precise indicators to measure how many features they were delivering. In the end, the teams were happy with the changes and the slow, methodical approach was successful.

How to Inspire People to Use Home-grown Products & Drive Adoption

In order to increase internal adoption of a product, a company organized a discussion with leaders from the consulting/services side of the organization to determine why they weren't using the product. To further increase adoption, the company developed a video training program and an in-person training program for the sales team, consultants team, and the engineering team. As a result of these efforts, the company won an award for the most innovative products of 2017. The lesson learned is that collaboration with others can lead to greater success than working alone.

Reducing Tension In A Hostile Environment & turn things around

The company was working with a customer who had purchased their product, but the mid-level managers and engineers were skeptical. The team was met with a hostile environment and were not given a desk to work at. Despite this, the team persisted and built a relationship with the customer, showing them the value of the product and solving their problems. By the end of the month, the customer had changed their mind and chose to continue using the product. The lesson learned was that relationship building and patience can go a long way, and as a manager, it is important to absorb pressure to create a smooth path for the team.

The Importance Of Personality In Hiring Good Engineers

The author was an Engineering Manager at Saama Technologies in 2013 and was under pressure to hire 11 engineers quickly. He interviewed 600 candidates and shortlisted a few, taking into account their personalities and communication skills, as well as their technical abilities. He then worked with his management to create a special budget for salaries and bonuses, and continued to talk to the candidates until they joined the company. The team was a success and the author learned that it is important to never take shortcuts when it comes to hiring, and to consider the environment, culture, and personalities of the company and team when selecting a candidate.

Achieving Team Scalability

The CTO of a startup was tasked with scaling from 2 developers to 10 in a year, which seemed impossible. He found a way to rebuild the product to make it easier for newcomers to enter, by cutting the product into two isolated parts and limiting its functionalities. This allowed developers to be onboarded in two weeks to a month, rather than three to six months. This experience taught the CTO that the way you build your product and structure your company can have a huge impact on scalability.

When Agile Isn’t Agile

The company had switched to Agile processes, but without understanding it, it resulted in a huge mess. The product manager switched back to cascade processes, and worked hard to get back on track. After the team had shown it could fulfill working releases, the product manager gradually introduced more agility and flexibility, and eventually reached a much more Agile method of working.

Reversing A Team’s Culture Of Fear

When joining a software company, the manager asked the new employee to work on an old product first. The employee quickly identified a culture of blame and fear within the company, so decided to take action. He requested to work on the old product and told his team that he would be the only one to blame for any mistakes. This approach was successful and the team was able to collaborate and learn without fear.

Stepping Back To Develop Your Engineers

The Director of Engineering at the Rubicon Project wanted to be involved in a machine learning project, but realized it would be a great opportunity for the most senior engineer on the team to show their skills. Despite challenges, the project was successful and the stakeholders were enthusiastic. The Director learned an important lesson in trusting their team and giving them the opportunity to grow.

Bringing A Team Together

The manager of a small engineering team at the Rubicon Project implemented weekly team meetings to encourage collaboration and open discussion. This allowed the engineers to become informed together and discuss concerns as a group. The team meetings also included interesting topics and articles to discuss, which helped the engineers come out of their shells and engage with the rest of the team. As a result, the team has grown to nine engineers and the team has become more comfortable with presenting ideas to each other.

When Engineers Struggle To Adapt To Rapid Changes

Chartboost, a tech company, has experienced rapid growth and change over the past 7 years. This has caused some engineers to struggle to adapt to the changing demands of the company. As a result, the company has become more conscious of hiring people who can adapt to change and are comfortable with the company's vision. The manager has also taken steps to ensure they have a good sense of what is coming up in the future.

When More Engineers Means Decreased Productivity

Chartboost went from a team of two to a team of six, but it took six months to get to a point where their team of six was as productive as the two-person team. It's important to add structure and ensure that everyone has a full picture of what is going on. As the team grows, it's important to adjust and reenvision the structure to ensure efficiency.

Trusting Engineering Teams With Product Management

The CTO of an engineering team split the team into two smaller squads in order to fix communication issues. To scale his role, he delegated tasks to the squads and allowed them to self-organize. This led to the team using user story mapping and hiring more well-rounded candidates based on trust.

When Communication Problems Are Symptoms Of A Bigger Issue

The CTO of Badger Maps experienced communication and productivity issues due to the large size of their team. To address this, they split the team into two smaller Scrum teams and implemented the concept of "Scrum of Scrums" and guilds. This resulted in improved communication and productivity. The lesson learned is to address issues quickly when they arise, as it can be difficult to get the engine moving again if the issue is ignored.

Increasing Team Velocity By Increasing Team Autonomy

Xello tracked team velocity across their engineering teams and noticed some teams were not performing as expected. To fix this, they reduced communication channels by putting a dedicated UX person on each team and empowered them to make all decisions, and set up KPI's to measure teams against quarterly objectives. This improved team velocity and ensured teams were making the right decisions. The lesson learned was to ensure people are aligned with the company's mission and strategy, and to ensure they have autonomy to move quickly without relying on others.

Controlling Your Technical Debt

The VP of Engineering at Xello identified that their teams were taking on too much technical debt and set out to identify the cause. They used Jira to track debt, improved their testing, and focussed more on requirements. The lesson learned was to track technical debt independently and to track how much debt is taken on during each development cycle to prevent it from accumulating.

Improving Collaboration Through Plans Of Attack

To improve collaboration between teams in different locations, a process was implemented where Plan of Attacks (POAs) were published on a public channel. This gave people from different locations the chance to see what their colleagues were working on and provided a checklist for people to go through. Although the process has helped with team visibility and cross-formation, there are still issues with engagement with the tool. To address this, people are now explicitly asked to tag three people on their POAs to ensure at least three people review the documents and provide comment.

How To Reorganize Teams To Boost Morale

When Womply's teams were reorganized every quarter, it affected their velocity, cohesion, and morale. To create more permanent teams, the engineering manager gathered input from individual engineers and divided them into small task forces based on past camaraderie. It's important to communicate and listen to people's feedback, and to let them know when reorganization is happening and why. This will set the team up for success and prevent frustration.

Internal Communication - Why Explain Why?

Womply decided to roll out an all-star culture, but the founder's quick explanation led to people filling in the blanks with their own assumptions. To address this, the team drafted a message to explain the changes, tying it to other companies, and asked for their ideas to improve it. The lesson learned was to spend 80% of the time talking about why the changes were made and to validate them with external or data-based sources. Additionally, it is best to test the message with first-line managers first to anticipate any questions or issues.

Sharing The Tech Lead Role

At Doctolib, developers are involved in the process of developing new features from beginning to end. A "Tech Holder" is assigned to each project, and developers from all levels can take on this role. This has helped the developers to grow and develop, and has improved the quality of the product and code. A retrospective meeting was held to improve the process, and the feedback was positive.

A Career Path Based On Enjoyment

A year ago, the author was unsure whether to pursue a full-time career in people management or to split their time between technical work and people management. After analyzing their day-to-day activities and reading "Apprenticeship Patterns" by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, the author found that they enjoyed both the technical and people management sides of engineering management. They now work part-time in both roles and advise others in the same situation to examine their tasks to identify what they enjoy doing most.

Maintaining Team Processes After Restructuring

Doctolib needed to split their mixed team of 13 people into two teams, each focussed on one of their two main objectives. They identified who would go where and then evaluated each person to determine the best fits. They took three months to make the changes and used team retrospectives and short feedback loops to keep their culture and processes. They also used more precise indicators to measure how many features they were delivering. In the end, the teams were happy with the changes and the slow, methodical approach was successful.

How to Inspire People to Use Home-grown Products & Drive Adoption

In order to increase internal adoption of a product, a company organized a discussion with leaders from the consulting/services side of the organization to determine why they weren't using the product. To further increase adoption, the company developed a video training program and an in-person training program for the sales team, consultants team, and the engineering team. As a result of these efforts, the company won an award for the most innovative products of 2017. The lesson learned is that collaboration with others can lead to greater success than working alone.

Reducing Tension In A Hostile Environment & turn things around

The company was working with a customer who had purchased their product, but the mid-level managers and engineers were skeptical. The team was met with a hostile environment and were not given a desk to work at. Despite this, the team persisted and built a relationship with the customer, showing them the value of the product and solving their problems. By the end of the month, the customer had changed their mind and chose to continue using the product. The lesson learned was that relationship building and patience can go a long way, and as a manager, it is important to absorb pressure to create a smooth path for the team.

The Importance Of Personality In Hiring Good Engineers

The author was an Engineering Manager at Saama Technologies in 2013 and was under pressure to hire 11 engineers quickly. He interviewed 600 candidates and shortlisted a few, taking into account their personalities and communication skills, as well as their technical abilities. He then worked with his management to create a special budget for salaries and bonuses, and continued to talk to the candidates until they joined the company. The team was a success and the author learned that it is important to never take shortcuts when it comes to hiring, and to consider the environment, culture, and personalities of the company and team when selecting a candidate.

Achieving Team Scalability

The CTO of a startup was tasked with scaling from 2 developers to 10 in a year, which seemed impossible. He found a way to rebuild the product to make it easier for newcomers to enter, by cutting the product into two isolated parts and limiting its functionalities. This allowed developers to be onboarded in two weeks to a month, rather than three to six months. This experience taught the CTO that the way you build your product and structure your company can have a huge impact on scalability.

When Agile Isn’t Agile

The company had switched to Agile processes, but without understanding it, it resulted in a huge mess. The product manager switched back to cascade processes, and worked hard to get back on track. After the team had shown it could fulfill working releases, the product manager gradually introduced more agility and flexibility, and eventually reached a much more Agile method of working.

Reversing A Team’s Culture Of Fear

When joining a software company, the manager asked the new employee to work on an old product first. The employee quickly identified a culture of blame and fear within the company, so decided to take action. He requested to work on the old product and told his team that he would be the only one to blame for any mistakes. This approach was successful and the team was able to collaborate and learn without fear.

Stepping Back To Develop Your Engineers

The Director of Engineering at the Rubicon Project wanted to be involved in a machine learning project, but realized it would be a great opportunity for the most senior engineer on the team to show their skills. Despite challenges, the project was successful and the stakeholders were enthusiastic. The Director learned an important lesson in trusting their team and giving them the opportunity to grow.

Bringing A Team Together

The manager of a small engineering team at the Rubicon Project implemented weekly team meetings to encourage collaboration and open discussion. This allowed the engineers to become informed together and discuss concerns as a group. The team meetings also included interesting topics and articles to discuss, which helped the engineers come out of their shells and engage with the rest of the team. As a result, the team has grown to nine engineers and the team has become more comfortable with presenting ideas to each other.

When Engineers Struggle To Adapt To Rapid Changes

Chartboost, a tech company, has experienced rapid growth and change over the past 7 years. This has caused some engineers to struggle to adapt to the changing demands of the company. As a result, the company has become more conscious of hiring people who can adapt to change and are comfortable with the company's vision. The manager has also taken steps to ensure they have a good sense of what is coming up in the future.

When More Engineers Means Decreased Productivity

Chartboost went from a team of two to a team of six, but it took six months to get to a point where their team of six was as productive as the two-person team. It's important to add structure and ensure that everyone has a full picture of what is going on. As the team grows, it's important to adjust and reenvision the structure to ensure efficiency.

Trusting Engineering Teams With Product Management

The CTO of an engineering team split the team into two smaller squads in order to fix communication issues. To scale his role, he delegated tasks to the squads and allowed them to self-organize. This led to the team using user story mapping and hiring more well-rounded candidates based on trust.

When Communication Problems Are Symptoms Of A Bigger Issue

The CTO of Badger Maps experienced communication and productivity issues due to the large size of their team. To address this, they split the team into two smaller Scrum teams and implemented the concept of "Scrum of Scrums" and guilds. This resulted in improved communication and productivity. The lesson learned is to address issues quickly when they arise, as it can be difficult to get the engine moving again if the issue is ignored.

Increasing Team Velocity By Increasing Team Autonomy

Xello tracked team velocity across their engineering teams and noticed some teams were not performing as expected. To fix this, they reduced communication channels by putting a dedicated UX person on each team and empowered them to make all decisions, and set up KPI's to measure teams against quarterly objectives. This improved team velocity and ensured teams were making the right decisions. The lesson learned was to ensure people are aligned with the company's mission and strategy, and to ensure they have autonomy to move quickly without relying on others.

Controlling Your Technical Debt

The VP of Engineering at Xello identified that their teams were taking on too much technical debt and set out to identify the cause. They used Jira to track debt, improved their testing, and focussed more on requirements. The lesson learned was to track technical debt independently and to track how much debt is taken on during each development cycle to prevent it from accumulating.

Improving Collaboration Through Plans Of Attack

To improve collaboration between teams in different locations, a process was implemented where Plan of Attacks (POAs) were published on a public channel. This gave people from different locations the chance to see what their colleagues were working on and provided a checklist for people to go through. Although the process has helped with team visibility and cross-formation, there are still issues with engagement with the tool. To address this, people are now explicitly asked to tag three people on their POAs to ensure at least three people review the documents and provide comment.

How To Reorganize Teams To Boost Morale

When Womply's teams were reorganized every quarter, it affected their velocity, cohesion, and morale. To create more permanent teams, the engineering manager gathered input from individual engineers and divided them into small task forces based on past camaraderie. It's important to communicate and listen to people's feedback, and to let them know when reorganization is happening and why. This will set the team up for success and prevent frustration.

Internal Communication - Why Explain Why?

Womply decided to roll out an all-star culture, but the founder's quick explanation led to people filling in the blanks with their own assumptions. To address this, the team drafted a message to explain the changes, tying it to other companies, and asked for their ideas to improve it. The lesson learned was to spend 80% of the time talking about why the changes were made and to validate them with external or data-based sources. Additionally, it is best to test the message with first-line managers first to anticipate any questions or issues.

Sharing The Tech Lead Role

At Doctolib, developers are involved in the process of developing new features from beginning to end. A "Tech Holder" is assigned to each project, and developers from all levels can take on this role. This has helped the developers to grow and develop, and has improved the quality of the product and code. A retrospective meeting was held to improve the process, and the feedback was positive.

A Career Path Based On Enjoyment

A year ago, the author was unsure whether to pursue a full-time career in people management or to split their time between technical work and people management. After analyzing their day-to-day activities and reading "Apprenticeship Patterns" by Dave Hoover and Adewale Oshineye, the author found that they enjoyed both the technical and people management sides of engineering management. They now work part-time in both roles and advise others in the same situation to examine their tasks to identify what they enjoy doing most.

Maintaining Team Processes After Restructuring

Doctolib needed to split their mixed team of 13 people into two teams, each focussed on one of their two main objectives. They identified who would go where and then evaluated each person to determine the best fits. They took three months to make the changes and used team retrospectives and short feedback loops to keep their culture and processes. They also used more precise indicators to measure how many features they were delivering. In the end, the teams were happy with the changes and the slow, methodical approach was successful.

How to Inspire People to Use Home-grown Products & Drive Adoption

In order to increase internal adoption of a product, a company organized a discussion with leaders from the consulting/services side of the organization to determine why they weren't using the product. To further increase adoption, the company developed a video training program and an in-person training program for the sales team, consultants team, and the engineering team. As a result of these efforts, the company won an award for the most innovative products of 2017. The lesson learned is that collaboration with others can lead to greater success than working alone.

Reducing Tension In A Hostile Environment & turn things around

The company was working with a customer who had purchased their product, but the mid-level managers and engineers were skeptical. The team was met with a hostile environment and were not given a desk to work at. Despite this, the team persisted and built a relationship with the customer, showing them the value of the product and solving their problems. By the end of the month, the customer had changed their mind and chose to continue using the product. The lesson learned was that relationship building and patience can go a long way, and as a manager, it is important to absorb pressure to create a smooth path for the team.

The Importance Of Personality In Hiring Good Engineers

The author was an Engineering Manager at Saama Technologies in 2013 and was under pressure to hire 11 engineers quickly. He interviewed 600 candidates and shortlisted a few, taking into account their personalities and communication skills, as well as their technical abilities. He then worked with his management to create a special budget for salaries and bonuses, and continued to talk to the candidates until they joined the company. The team was a success and the author learned that it is important to never take shortcuts when it comes to hiring, and to consider the environment, culture, and personalities of the company and team when selecting a candidate.

Achieving Team Scalability

The CTO of a startup was tasked with scaling from 2 developers to 10 in a year, which seemed impossible. He found a way to rebuild the product to make it easier for newcomers to enter, by cutting the product into two isolated parts and limiting its functionalities. This allowed developers to be onboarded in two weeks to a month, rather than three to six months. This experience taught the CTO that the way you build your product and structure your company can have a huge impact on scalability.

When Agile Isn’t Agile

The company had switched to Agile processes, but without understanding it, it resulted in a huge mess. The product manager switched back to cascade processes, and worked hard to get back on track. After the team had shown it could fulfill working releases, the product manager gradually introduced more agility and flexibility, and eventually reached a much more Agile method of working.

Reversing A Team’s Culture Of Fear

When joining a software company, the manager asked the new employee to work on an old product first. The employee quickly identified a culture of blame and fear within the company, so decided to take action. He requested to work on the old product and told his team that he would be the only one to blame for any mistakes. This approach was successful and the team was able to collaborate and learn without fear.

Stepping Back To Develop Your Engineers

The Director of Engineering at the Rubicon Project wanted to be involved in a machine learning project, but realized it would be a great opportunity for the most senior engineer on the team to show their skills. Despite challenges, the project was successful and the stakeholders were enthusiastic. The Director learned an important lesson in trusting their team and giving them the opportunity to grow.

Bringing A Team Together

The manager of a small engineering team at the Rubicon Project implemented weekly team meetings to encourage collaboration and open discussion. This allowed the engineers to become informed together and discuss concerns as a group. The team meetings also included interesting topics and articles to discuss, which helped the engineers come out of their shells and engage with the rest of the team. As a result, the team has grown to nine engineers and the team has become more comfortable with presenting ideas to each other.

When Engineers Struggle To Adapt To Rapid Changes

Chartboost, a tech company, has experienced rapid growth and change over the past 7 years. This has caused some engineers to struggle to adapt to the changing demands of the company. As a result, the company has become more conscious of hiring people who can adapt to change and are comfortable with the company's vision. The manager has also taken steps to ensure they have a good sense of what is coming up in the future.

When More Engineers Means Decreased Productivity

Chartboost went from a team of two to a team of six, but it took six months to get to a point where their team of six was as productive as the two-person team. It's important to add structure and ensure that everyone has a full picture of what is going on. As the team grows, it's important to adjust and reenvision the structure to ensure efficiency.

Trusting Engineering Teams With Product Management

The CTO of an engineering team split the team into two smaller squads in order to fix communication issues. To scale his role, he delegated tasks to the squads and allowed them to self-organize. This led to the team using user story mapping and hiring more well-rounded candidates based on trust.

When Communication Problems Are Symptoms Of A Bigger Issue

The CTO of Badger Maps experienced communication and productivity issues due to the large size of their team. To address this, they split the team into two smaller Scrum teams and implemented the concept of "Scrum of Scrums" and guilds. This resulted in improved communication and productivity. The lesson learned is to address issues quickly when they arise, as it can be difficult to get the engine moving again if the issue is ignored.