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Building and scaling effective distributed teams
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Lindsay Holmwood
November 27, 2017
Education
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Building and scaling effective distributed teams
Lindsay Holmwood
November 27, 2017
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Transcript
Building and scaling effective distributed teams Lindsay Holmwood
About me Worked in and lead distributed software engineering teams
for 7 years
About me Lead teams with follow-the-sun coverage
About me Currently at Envato leading distributed team of 15
The journey 0. Fundamentals 1. Starting out 2. Growing the
team 3. Scaling to the whole org
Inclusion Practices Technology Sponsorship
No management buy in? Don’t even bother.
Starting out
Inclusion Practices Technology Sponsorship
Regular face to face catchups. Ideal: once a quarter
Regular face to face catchups. Likely: once a year
Establish rituals
Multiple internet connections Dongle with lots of data
Multiple internet connections Don’t skimp on quality (fast upload a
must)
Multiple internet connections Move to areas with NBN
Multiple internet connections Have backup equipment
Instant messaging Non-negotiable, primary comms method
Instant messaging Your lifeline to your team.
Instant messaging Scheduled do not disturb time
Instant messaging Announce start/stop
Ceremonies: Daily standup Rotate the facilitation responsibility
Ceremonies: Retrospectives Discuss and refactor practices
Leadership participation Show endorsement. Build empathy.
Growing the team
Inclusion Practices Technology Sponsorship
The basics Even more important!
The basics Bring in coaches to observe and facilitate.
Hack: Greet everyone to check
Hack: Ask questions in the negative “Does anyone disagree?” not
“Do we all agree?”
Team design: Time zone coverage How many time zones? How
much time zone overlap?
Team design: Time zone coverage Add people in new time
zones in pairs.
Team design: Time zone coverage Beginning & end of day
standups.
Team design: Time zone coverage Record crucial meetings.
Team design: Antipattern: Forcing everyone to work at exactly the
same time
Team design: Antipattern: Communication in physical spaces that excludes remoters
Team design: Antipattern: Activities that exclude remoters (use of whiteboards)
(in-person icebreakers)
Google Quick Draw
Team design: Defining question How would this decision make me
feel if I was working from home?
Leadership participation Show endorsement. Build empathy.
Scaling to the whole org
Inclusion Practices Technology Sponsorship
What does it take to make distributed teams a first
class citizen in the organisation?
The executive and management working remotely at least 2 days
a week.
Guilds Share lessons learnt with other teams
Feedback loops Keep refactoring your ways of working.
Feedback loops “What got us here won’t get us there."
Thank you! (and questions?)