Untangling software delivery with Team Topologies, flow metrics, and careful decoupling - Conflux

The key predictive IT delivery metrics uncovered by the book Accelerate and the State of DevOps Reports - aka “DORA metrics” - point the way towards flow-centric operating models for every modern enterprise building and running software-enriched services. However, improving flow of value within an organization is often difficult due to cross-team dependencies and coupling: everything is tangled. In an organization with 700 software engineers, if 60% of the time is spent waiting on other teams - a typical industry flow efficiency - the financial penalty of dependencies and coupling is high. It is vital, therefore, to invest in decoupling and removing team dependencies - untangling - to enable value to flow better and more efficiently.

In this talk, Matthew Skelton - founder at Conflux and co-author of the book Team Topologies - explores techniques and metrics to help you untangle your software delivery, together with real-world examples of organizations successfully applying Team Topologies and related approaches to decouple teams and improve flow:

Independent Service Heuristics (ISH)
User Needs Mapping (UNM)
The 4 key metrics (DORA)
Flow efficiency and proxy measures

Increasingly, the ideas and patterns in Team Topologies (TT) are being applied worldwide not just in software/IT but increasingly in non-IT contexts like legal services, healthcare, education, and HR, resulting in quicker time-to-market and better ROI. These applications of TT point the way to an operating model for fast flow organizations.

Talk K28

VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcayzfzRIvk&list=PLKK5zTDXqzFNt1OTjhlrCnhVl1UO2QMbk&index=18

Transcript

1. Untangling software delivery with
   Team Topologies, flow metrics, and
   careful decoupling
   Matthew Skelton, Conflux - co-author of Team Topologies
   DORA community Talk & Learn | 2023-08-24
   K28
   

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2. Photo goes here
   Matthew Skelton
   Founder at Conflux
   Co-author of Team Topologies
   LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/matthewskelton
   Mastodon: mastodon.social/@matthewskelton
   2
   

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3. Team Topologies
   Organizing business and
   technology teams for fast flow
   Matthew Skelton & Manuel Pais
   IT Revolution Press, September 2019
   Order via stores worldwide:
   teamtopologies.com/book
   3
   

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5. Team Topologies is the leading
   approach to organizing business and
   technology teams for fast flow,
   providing a practical, step-by‑step,
   adaptive model for organizational
   design and team interaction.
   5
   

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6. 6
   Continuously ‘untangle’
   business concepts
   

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7. 7
   Find and adjust team &
   system boundaries for flow
   

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8. 8
   Minimize hand-offs
   

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9. 9
   Avoid blocking
   dependencies
   

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10. 10
    Move some decision-making
    to teams
    

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11. 11
    Team Topologies exposes any
    lack of clarity in purpose,
    conflict in priorities, or
    misalignment of incentives
    

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13. The cost of tangled software
    DORA metrics & TT to the rescue!
    Real examples of detangling
    How to detangle with metrics & TT
    13
    

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14. 14
    flow
    

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15. 15
    Use balanced health metrics
    (DORA, flow, cost, blockers,
    etc.) + TT techniques (TIM,
    ISH, UNM) to help find good
    boundaries for fast flow by
    untangling (decoupling)
    separate services
    

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16. The cost of tangled software
    16
    

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17. 17
    If each engineer in the
    organization is blocked for
    1 hour per working day,
    how much does this cost?
    

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18. 18
    ● Fully-loaded cost: €160k per year
    ● 260 paid days per year
    ● Total of 400 engineers
    

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19. 19
    Engineer fully
    weighted cost per
    year
    Engineer cost per day
    Hours blocked
    per 8-hour day
    Days blocked per
    260-day year
    Cost of blockers
    per engineer per
    year
    Number of
    engineers
    Total cost of
    blockers per year
    €160,000.00 €615.38 1 32.5 €20,000.00 400 €8,000,000.00
    €8 million per year 💥
    

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20. Untangling ≃ Decoupling
    20
    

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21. Decoupling: separating
    things that do not need
    to be together
    21
    

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22. View Slide

23. Decoupling enables
    shorter time-to-value
    23
    

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24. Decoupling enables
    multiple, independent
    flows of change, each
    with its own cadence
    24
    

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25. 25
    Multiple, independent flows
    

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26. Decoupling of teams &
    technology
    vs
    Mingling of ideas for
    learning
    26
    

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27. Decoupling: teams,
    software, technology,
    deployments, data,
    business concepts, ...
    27
    

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28. Mingling: principles,
    practices, learning,
    techniques, approaches, ...
    28
    

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29. Team autonomy is a
    means to an end: rapid
    flow of change
    29
    

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30. Instead of trying to measure
    “team autonomy” directly,
    prefer measures like rapid flow,
    rapid feedback, minimal
    blocking dependencies… 💡
    30
    

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31. Sidenote:
    Decoupling for reliability
    31
    

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32. Decoupling reduces
    the number of ways
    the software can fail
    (failure modes)
    32
    

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33. Decoupling helps to
    prevent cascading
    failure (W → X → Y → Z)
    33
    

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34. Decoupling helps
    contain the “blast”
    when errors occur
    34
    

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36. 36
    Blast contained!
    36
    

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37. DORA metrics &
    Team Topologies to the
    rescue!
    37
    

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38. 🔍
    Use the 4 Key Metrics
    from Accelerate
    and add “blocker count”
    38
    

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39. Accelerate
    Building and Scaling High Performing
    Technology Organizations
    Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, Gene Kim
    IT Revolution Press, 2018
    Order via stores worldwide:
    https://itrevolution.com/book/accelerate/
    39
    

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40. 4 key metrics: ‘Accelerate’
    lead time
    deployment frequency
    Mean Time To Restore
    change fail percentage
    

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41. 4 key metrics: ‘Accelerate’
    lead time
    deployment frequency
    Mean Time To Restore
    change fail percentage
    Encourage fast flow
    

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42. 4 key metrics: ‘Accelerate’
    lead time
    deployment frequency
    Mean Time To Restore
    change fail percentage
    Encourage operability
    

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43. What % of lead time is actual work?
    Example: 120 hours / (120+630) x 100 = 16%
    Flow Efficiency
    43
    

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44. Measure ‘wait time’?
    https://www.isixsigma.com/methodology/lean-methodology/identify-constraints-and-reduce-wait-time-processes/ 44
    

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45. Measuring ‘wait time’ is hard
    Count the number of blocking waits as a proxy ✨
    45
    

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46. 4 key metrics & ‘blocker count’
    lead time
    deployment frequency
    Mean Time To Restore
    change fail percentage
    ‘blocker count’ as a proxy
    for flow efficiency
    46
    

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47. Use 4 key metrics 📊 +
    “blocker count” to assess
    and find better service &
    team boundaries for flow
    47
    

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48. “If we adjusted the
    service & team boundary
    here, would it improve
    the 4 key metrics?” 💓
    48
    

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49. “If we adjusted the
    service & team boundary
    here, reduce the blocker
    count?” 📉
    49
    

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50. Techniques from the
    Team Topologies community
    50
    

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51. 51
    Independent
    Service Heuristics
    (ISH)
    

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52. 52
    “The Independent Service Heuristics (ISH)
    are rules-of-thumb (clues) for identifying
    candidate value streams and domain
    boundaries by seeing if they could be run
    as a separate SaaS/cloud product.”
    https://teamtopologies.com/ish
    

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53. 53
    User Needs
    Mapping (UNM)
    

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54. 54
    “User Needs Mapping attempts to capture
    the first 4 steps of the Wardley Mapping
    process … for identifying potential team
    [and service] boundary”
    https://teamtopologies.com/unm
    

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55. 55
    Team Interaction
    Modeling (TIM)
    

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56. 56
    “[Team Interaction Modeling helps] to
    describe how to re-organize … teams and
    their interactions to achieve better flow and
    deliver value faster.”
    https://teamtopologies.com/tim
    

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57. Real examples of detangling
    for fast flow
    57
    

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58. Case Study
    JP Morgan
    58
    

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59. Case Study
    “How JP Morgan Applied Team
    Topologies to Improve Flow in a Market
    Leading Enterprise Platform”
    59
    https://www.youtube.com/
    watch?v=y3OL7dv2l48
    Fast Flow Conf 💖
    https://www.fastflowconf.com/
    

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60. Case Study
    60
    

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61. Case Study
    “60% of dependencies
    reduced through better
    team design” 💥
    61
    

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62. 62
    Engineer fully
    weighted cost per
    year
    Engineer cost per day
    Hours blocked
    per 8-hour day
    Days blocked per
    260-day year
    Cost of blockers
    per engineer per
    year
    Number of
    engineers
    Total cost of
    blockers per year
    €160,000.00 €615.38 1 32.5 €20,000.00 400 €8,000,000.00
    €8 million per year 💥
    Remember this?
    [Note: these are not figures from JP Morgan]
    

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63. Case Study
    63
    

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64. ● Financial advice
    ● Founded 2009
    ● Consumers & companies
    ● 'Explainable AI'
    ● Increasingly successful
    64
    

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65. < 2019: growth
    x 6
    65
    

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66. Mid-2019
    HALT!
    66
    

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67. September 2019
    67
    

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68. Independent Service Heuristics
    https://github.com/TeamTopologies/Independent-Service-Heuristics
    Rules-of-thumb for identifying
    candidate value streams and
    domain boundaries by seeing
    if they could be run as a
    separate SaaS/cloud product.
    68
    

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69. 2020: New arch
    69
    

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70. “Team Topologies ... has given us the
    tools we were looking for and have
    helped us to build a plan and have
    confidence that we know where we’re
    going and how to get there.”
    Richard Marshall, CTO, Wealth Wizards
    70
    

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71. Concepts
    ● Stream-aligned: build & run
    ● Boundaries that help flow
    ● Supporting team types: reduce
    cognitive load on Stream teams
    71
    

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72. Results
    ● Clear patterns and language
    ● Framework for design decisions
    ● Confidence in scaling approach
    72
    https://medium.com/ww-engineering/to-monolith-or-to-microservice-f8c3f967e63c
    

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73. Thanks to:
    Richard Marshall
    CTO, Wealth Wizards
    (to 2021)
    73
    Further details: https://teamtopologies.com/wealthwizards
    

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74. Case Study
    GOV.UK Home Office
    74
    

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75. Case Study
    “How the Home Office’s Immigration
    Technology department reduced its
    cloud costs by 40%”
    75
    https://www.gov.uk/government/case-studies/how-
    the-home-offices-immigration-technology-departm
    ent-reduced-its-cloud-costs-by-40
    

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76. 76
    https://www.gov.uk/government/case-studies/how-the-home-offices-immigration-technology-department-reduced-its-cloud-costs-by-40
    

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77. Case Study
    Making service owners
    accountable for the $
    spend for their service
    helps to clarify service
    boundaries 💡
    77
    

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78. Use cost metrics as a
    “financial scalpel” 🔪 to
    split services apart for
    fast flow
    78
    

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79. How to detangle with metrics
    & Team Topologies
    79
    

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80. 🔍
    Track dependencies and
    separate as “blocking”
    vs “non-blocking”
    80
    

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81. ⏳ ⏳
    Blocking
    Non-
    Blocking
    81
    

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82. 🔍
    Use tools like
    CodeScene to detect
    hidden coupling 82
    82
    

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83. 83
    “Measure how well your organization aligns with your architecture” 💥
    https://codescene.com/
    

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84. 🔍
    Use the Team
    Dependencies Tracking
    tool on GitHub 84
    84
    

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85. https://github.com/TeamTopologies/
    Team-Dependencies-Tracking
    Team Dependencies Tracking
    CC BY-SA
    Inspired by details
    from Spotify
    85
    

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86. Use team dependencies
    tracking to find and remove
    dependencies that hurt
    flow
    86
    

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87. Team First
    Look at your organisation through
    the lens of teams, rather than just
    the people they work for.
    teamform.co
    87
    

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88. The cost of tangled software
    DORA metrics & TT to the rescue!
    Real examples of detangling
    How to detangle with metrics & TT
    88
    

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89. 89
    “You too can save
    €8 million per year
    by decoupling for
    fast flow”
    

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90. 90
    Use balanced health metrics
    (DORA, flow, cost, blockers,
    etc.) + TT techniques (ISH,
    UNM, TIM) to help find good
    boundaries for fast flow by
    untangling (decoupling)
    separate services
    

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91. 91
    What’s your perspective?
    Which aspects resonate?
    Which things feel incorrect?
    

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92. 92
    expert-led group learning for adopting
    fast flow and Team Topologies
    confluxhq.com
    

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93. thank you
    confluxhq.com
    Copyright (c) 2017-2023 Conflux group of companies. All Rights Reserved.
    The name “Conflux” and the filled C device are Registered Trademarks ® in multiple jurisdictions.
    

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