How to empower engineering teams to improve, at scale

With fast flow approaches like Continuous Delivery and Team Topologies, there will be a range of different practices and techniques across different teams and streams. How can you find and emphasise the good practices? How do teams know what good looks like? And how can you assess these practices across tens or hundreds of teams on a regular basis? Join experts Benedict Steele (Armakuni) and Matthew Skelton (Conflux) as they discuss the Multi-team Software Delivery Assessment (MSDA), an open approach to assessing and empowering engineering teams.

- Armakuni: https://armakuni.com
- Conflux: https://confluxhq.com
- Multi-team Software Delivery Assessment: https://softwaredeliveryassessment.com

Transcript

1. How to empower engineering
   teams to improve, at scale
   Matthew Skelton and Benedict Steele
   1
   

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2. Photo goes here
   Benedict Steele
   Chief Delivery Officer, Armakuni
   20 years in technology, product, and engineering
   

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3. Photo goes here
   Matthew Skelton
   Founder, Conflux
   Co-author of Team Topologies
   

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4. Empower engineering teams to improve,
   at scale:
   ➔ Use the Multi-team Software Delivery
   Assessment (MSDA)
   ➔ Accelerate effective adoption via a
   partner like Armakuni or Conflux
   4
   

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6. Different practices and
   techniques across different
   teams and streams
   6
   

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7. How do teams know
   what good looks like?
   7
   

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8. Assess these practices across
   tens or hundreds of teams …
   8
   

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9. … on a regular basis?
   9
   

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10. Empower the teams to improve
    10
    

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11. 11
    Multi-team Software
    Delivery Assessment
    (MSDA)
    

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12. 12
    Holistic exploration of
    the team - covering
    people, process, and
    tools
    

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13. 13
    Testing and
    Testability
    Team Health
    Deployment
    Flow
    Operability
    Continuous Delivery
    Reliability and SRE On-call
    Security Team Topologies
    

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14. 14
    Discover
    Delivery
    Blockers
    Establish
    Team
    Metrics
    Accelerate
    Change
    Initiatives
    

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15. 15
    Engaged
    Teams
    Teams are engaged by
    the assessment process
    and show increased
    enthusiasm for change
    and improvements
    Clear
    Position
    Increased clarity on the
    current state of software
    delivery within the
    organisation and a clear
    picture of where to go
    next
    Energized
    for Change
    The organisation is ready
    to tackle improvements
    and new ways of
    working, including rolling
    out further assessments
    

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16. 16
    The core of the Assessment uses a Creative
    Commons license (CC BY-SA), giving you the
    freedom to adapt and extend the material as
    your organisation grows and changes.
    SoftwareDeliveryAssessment.com
    

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17. 17
    ● 200+ teams
    ● Many different organisations
    ● Multiple verticals incl. Finance, Media, Charity, Health,
    Government, Insurance, B2B, B2C
    ● Organisations of all sizes from start-up/scale-ups to long
    lived institutions
    ● Teams as diverse as AI/ML, CoTS, Infrastructure,
    Application Development, Mobile Apps
    Where have we deployed this?
    

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18. Case Study
    GOV.UK - 2018
    18
    

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19. Case Study
    19
    700+ people in total
    70+ engineering teams, 7 locations
    Time-critical delivery (#Brexit)
    Most of 2018
    

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20. Engineering Assessments
    20
    6 dimensions [in 2018]:
    Team Health, Deployment, Continuous
    Delivery, Flow, Operability, Testing
    “Viral” facilitation model
    

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21. Engineering Assessments
    21
    Criteria taken from existing sources:
    Spotify Team Health Check, DevOps for the Modern
    Enterprise, Continuous Delivery, Accelerate, Team
    Guide to Software Operability, Team Guide to
    Software Testability
    

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25. Case Study
    25
    Media Company
    2020 - 2022
    

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26. 26
    Over 250 people
    35+ engineering teams
    7 depts
    Globally distributed
    Over 250 applications
    Diverse mix of technology
    

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27. 27
    👍
    👎
    

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29. ● Knowledge drain
    ● Task switching
    ● Relearning
    ● Rework
    ● Partially completed work
    ● Overly complicated solutions
    ● Siloed work
    ● Unsupported legacy software
    ● Waiting around
    ● Defects
    ● Single points of failure
    ● Handoffs between teams
    ● Unnecessary features
    ● Unnecessary processes
    ● Manual work
    ● Poor communication
    What were we looking for?
    29
    How many of these problems seem familiar?
    

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31. 31
    MSDA
    + Westrum Organisational Culture
    + Employee Advocacy (eNPS)
    + Psychological Safety
    + DORA 4 Key Metrics
    + Stakeholder mapping
    

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32. The Four States of Competence
    The Four States of Competence by Noel Burch, of Gordon Training International.
    32
    Concious
    Incompetence
    “I know what I don’t know”
    Conscious
    Competence
    “I can do what I know”
    Unconcious
    Incompetence
    “I don’t know what I don’t know”
    Unconscious
    Competence
    “What I know is second nature”
    Consciousness
    Competence
    

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33. 33
    “Armakuni have provided us with the
    evidence to present to the board to
    drive change. The views they have
    given us lead to clear, measurable
    action that we can communicate
    throughout the organisation.”
    Technology Platforms Director -
    Media Company
    

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35. MSDA can make you rich 🤓
    35
    

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36. 36
    What Ak & Conflux have learnt
    Success patterns for MSDA
    from Armakuni & Conflux
    

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37. Aim to help the teams gain a shared
    understanding and shared mental
    models
    39
    

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38. Look for the delta - explore the
    difference between high and low
    scores
    40
    

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39. Move the team from ‘unconscious
    incompetence’ to ‘concious
    incomptence’ and beyond
    41
    

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40. Make time for improvements
    42
    

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41. Never use MSDA to make direct
    comparisons between teams ⚠
    43
    

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42. Start small:
    work with 1 or 2 teams initially
    44
    

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43. The purpose is team empowerment,
    not “judgement”
    45
    

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44. Viral facilitation works best in a
    Generative culture
    46
    

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45. Beware of “parroting” - facilitators
    need to understand the value of the
    practices in the assessment
    47
    

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46. Facilitators need genuine curiosity
    48
    

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47. 49
    agilestationery.com
    

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48. 51
    SoftwareDeliveryAssessment.com
    

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49. empower engineering teams to improve,
    at scale:
    ➔ use the Multi-team Software Delivery
    Assessment (MSDA)
    ➔ accelerate effective adoption via a
    partner like Armakuni or Conflux
    54
    

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50. 55
    thank you
    armakuni.com confluxhq.com
    SoftwareDeliveryAssessment.com
    Copyright © 2022 Conflux group of companies. All RIghts Reserved.
    

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