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What Is Platform as a Product & Why Should You ...

What Is Platform as a Product & Why Should You Care?

With the emergence of platform engineering, there is a high risk of over-engineering internal solutions for problems that are either low value or low frequency. Small short term gains can become long term weaknesses due to accidental complexity and/or poor return on investment, making the platform fragile.

Successful long term platform engineering approaches require: 1) a focus on reducing cognitive load first and foremost ; 2) collaborative design and evolution of the platform through adequate interactions that truly accelerate teams; and 3) treating the platform as a product.

But what does it mean to treat a “platform as a product”? What benefits does this give, and why would an organization adopt this approach?

In this talk, Manuel Pais, co-author of the book Team Topologies, explains why the “platform as a product” approach can be a powerful “engine for fast flow”, if done right. You will see how some forward thinking organizations like Adidas or Uswitch successfully followed this path to accelerate and simplify the delivery of software at scale.

Manuel Pais

July 09, 2024
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  1. TeamTopologies.com @TeamTopologies What is Platform as a Product & Why

    Should You Care? Manuel Pais co-author of Team Topologies Platform Engineering KAIGI - 9 July 2024
  2. Team Topologies 3 Organizing business and technology teams for fast

    flow Matthew Skelton & Manuel Pais IT Revolution Press, 2019 teamtopologies.com/book
  3. “innovative tools and concepts for structuring the next generation digital

    operating model” Charles T. Betz, Principal Analyst, Forrester Research 4
  4. 4 key metrics: ‘Accelerate’ 14 ⚠ lead time ⚠ deployment

    frequency ⚠ mean time to restore ⚠ change fail percentage
  5. “A digital platform is a foundation of self-service APIs, tools,

    services, knowledge and support which are arranged as a compelling internal product.” – Evan Bottcher, 2018 25 Source: https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html
  6. “Create a path of least resistance. Make the right thing

    the easiest thing to do.” – Evan Bottcher, 2018 31
  7. 63 Thinnest Viable Platform A small, curated set of complementary

    services or patterns that simplify and accelerate delivery when used together. “Use these N services in these ways...” Photo by Jean-Philippe Delberghe on Unsplash
  8. “My own definition of DevOps: Everything you do to overcome

    the friction between silos. All the rest is plain engineering.” – Patrick Debois, 2021 The DevOps Handbook (2nd edition) 67
  9. 71

  10. 73

  11. 74

  12. Product: Holistic User Experience Functionality + Design + Monetization +

    Content – Marty Cagan, 2010 89 Source: https://svpg.com/defining-product/
  13. 91

  14. 93

  15. 95

  16. 97

  17. 99 A platform is optional to use - no team

    is forced to use the platform
  18. 101

  19. 103 Platforms must be designed with the user in mind

    (internal teams) - focus on UX and DevEx
  20. 105 Platforms must help users to achieve goals by understanding

    user needs and simplifying tasks & workflows
  21. “People were spending more time having to interact with relatively

    low-level services thus spending their time on relatively low-value decisions.” - Paul Ingles 116
  22. 118

  23. 139

  24. 142

  25. 144

  26. 4 key metrics: ‘Accelerate’ 147 lead time deployment frequency mean

    time to restore (MTTR) change fail percentage
  27. 154

  28. 156 • new engineers shipping to production on week 1

    • reduced cloud costs by 10% across services thanks to cheaper instances 👀👀👀 Success Story!
  29. 157 Focus on the “last mile” of platform as a

    product: measure generated value.
  30. 161

  31. 162 • teams onboard the platform • applications using the

    platform • traffic served by the platform • ... Adoption Metrics
  32. 163 • teams onboard the platform • applications using the

    platform • traffic served by the platform • revenue served through platform services 👀👀👀 Adoption Metrics
  33. 166 1 Trusted platform Platform (services and team s) are

    trusted by product team s 2 Shared success stories Successes using the platform need to be shared w idely (qualitative value)
  34. 167 1 Trusted platform Platform (services and team s) are

    trusted by product team s 2 Shared success stories Successes using the platform need to be shared w idely (qualitative value) 3 Internal confidence M etrics on platform adoption, user satisfaction, reliability
  35. 168 1 Trusted platform Platform (services and team s) are

    trusted by product team s 2 Shared success stories Successes using the platform need to be shared w idely (qualitative value) 3 Internal confidence M etrics on platform adoption, user satisfaction, reliability 4 External confidence P&L m etrics around ROI, cost (control), tim e to m arket, flow
  36. 175

  37. 176

  38. 177 “most platform approaches [will] fail if technology remains the

    primary focus (…) companies that explicitly focus on team interactions, developer experience, feedback loops, and product management will leapfrog those who do not”
  39. 213 Copyright © Team Topologies Ltd 2024. All rights reserved.

    teamtopologies.com/ platform-engineering “Platform Engineering as a Way of Thinking and Team-of-Teams Design”