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Aligning Teams and Architecture for Fast Flow -...

Aligning Teams and Architecture for Fast Flow - A Use Case

Are you always in meetings with other teams to get things done? Are changes in your software system time-consuming? Is your software system getting too complex?

Delivering valuable software quickly and efficiently is often the goal of software projects. However, achieving fast flow can be challenging, especially as a software product grows in complexity and size. I had the same experience at a Dutch energy network operator.

Clearly, this was not where we wanted to be. We wanted to empower teams and create value continuously. To do this, we had to restructure the architecture and the team's responsibilities. In this talk, I will share how you can recognise that the current alignment of teams and architecture is problematic. After that, I will show the actions we took in our journey of improvement (and the reasoning behind them). Our approach has influences from Domain-Driven Design, Conway's Law, Team Topologies, and more.

This talk will be a combination of theory and practice. In that way, you can take advantage of our lessons learned!

Paul van der Slot

May 18, 2023
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  1. Paul van der Slot 2 Freelance Hands-on Architect - Domain-Driven

    Design Enthusiast Started working for Alliander in 2021 - First as a Software Engineer, later as an (Socio Technical) Architect
  2. Alliander Background: Alliander Kleinverbruik 4 - Biggest energy network operator

    in The Netherlands - Almost 6 million connections at customers
  3. Kleinverbruik (KV) small consumption Background: Alliander Kleinverbruik 5 - Connections

    of households and small businesses - Main Process: customer request to energy supply
  4. 8 Challenges changed 7,5% more work each year -> from

    reducing cost to being able to handle the work Background: Alliander Kleinverbruik
  5. 9 Doing the work gets harder -> scarcity on electrical

    network Background: Alliander Kleinverbruik
  6. 17 Situation at Kleinverbruik Could this be fixed with Aligning

    Teams and Architecture around business domains?
  7. A bit of theory: Why Aligning Teams and Architecture? Why

    Aligning Teams and Architecture? 18
  8. —Melvin E. Conway Conway’s Law “An organizations system design, will

    be a copy of the organizations communication structure” Why Aligning Teams and Architecture? 19
  9. 20 Why Aligning Teams and Architecture? Ruth Malan “If the

    architecture of the system and the architecture of the organization are at odds, the architecture of the organization wins”.
  10. 21 Why Aligning Teams and Architecture? Databases Business logic UIs

    Frontend devs Backend devs DBAs Teams Architecture Conway’s Law Fast Flow
  11. —Kent Beck “Pull the things that are unrelated further apart,

    and put the things that are related closer together” Why Aligning Teams and Architecture? 23
  12. 27 Why Aligning Teams and Architecture? Teams Architecture Support Sales

    Billing Billing team Sales team Support team Conway’s Law Inverse Conway Maneuver Fast Flow
  13. 29 Need for (Business) Socio technical architecture!! Both the technical

    and social (organizational) aspects of architecture need to be co-designed for the joint optimal solution. Why Aligning Teams and Architecture?
  14. 33 • Improving inside your team doesn’t help • Need

    to zoom out -> holistic view of the system Problem Indicators Problem indicators we are looking at
  15. 34 Problem Indicators Dependencies / Meetings Shared codebase No clear

    purpose Cognitive load to high Context switching
  16. 37 Problem Indicators Cognitive load to high It is getting

    too much for your brain! • How long does is take to onboard new team members? • How long does it take to implement/coordinate changes? • How often are there faults during deployments?
  17. 39 Problem Indicators Context switching Too many responsibilities You’ll work

    on unrelated features • Too many concepts • Unrelated information • Hard to see the bigger picture
  18. 41 Problem Indicators • Lack of focus • Motivation drops

    • No Mastery on the domain • No Autonomy on optimizing software around that purpose No clear purpose Not empowered around a purpose
  19. 43 Problem Indicators Teams not organized around independent value streams:

    An end-to-end process with value. Why do they block fast flow?
  20. 44 Problem Indicators Independent value streams have fast flow because

    the team is empowered to make nearly all of the decisions within the value stream. From discovery, to implementing in code, to deploying into production, to getting feedback Why do they block fast flow?
  21. 46 Problem Indicators 2 options for a team: - Team

    is responsible for a value stream. Why do they block fast flow?
  22. 47 Problem Indicators 2 options for a team: - Team

    is responsible for a value stream. - Team is reducing complexity of a value stream via a platform or complicated subsystem. Why do they block fast flow?
  23. 50 Extra: Some of the other teams didn’t feel empowered

    to get creative and innovative around a business problem Assessing the current situation
  24. 51 Team Topology once made Assessing the current situation •

    Some problem indicators where noticed • No clear view on how to improve • Just never revisited the team topology
  25. 59 Splitting anti-patterns Improving, where to start? Split by Layer

    -> DBA team, Backend team, Frontend team Split by Entity -> Customer, Product, Case nick-tune-tech-strategy-blog Layer / Entity
  26. 60 Splitting anti-patterns Improving, where to start? Split by Layer

    -> DBA team, Backend team, Frontend team Split by Entity -> Customer, Product, Case nick-tune-tech-strategy-blog Layer / Entity
  27. 62 Create a shared business view Created a prototype of

    how we wanted to solve the KV problems. -by Business & Tech How to identify loosely coupled domains?
  28. 64 Finding domain boundaries Input: prototype Goal: - How would

    the prototype work - Finding the domain boundaries How to identify loosely coupled domains?
  29. 65 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    How to identify loosely coupled domains?
  30. 66 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    Example Heuristics: • Language changed How to identify loosely coupled domains?
  31. 67 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    Example Heuristics: • Language changed • Purpose changed How to identify loosely coupled domains?
  32. 68 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    Example Heuristics: • Language changed • Purpose changed • User group changed How to identify loosely coupled domains?
  33. 69 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    How to identify loosely coupled domains? Pivotal events! Event Storming – Alberto Brandolini
  34. 70 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    How to identify loosely coupled domains? Pivotal events! Event Storming – Alberto Brandolini Quotation Signed Intake Work Preparation
  35. 71 Finding domain boundaries – where to pay attention to?

    How to identify loosely coupled domains? Event Storming – Alberto Brandolini
  36. 74 Steps taken at Kleinverbruik How to identify loosely coupled

    domains? 1 – Identify Core process steps 2 – Centralize common concepts 3 – Reduce complexity in most important domain
  37. 75 How to identify loosely coupled domains? Purpose: Agreement of

    the work and certainty of realisation date 1 – Core process steps
  38. 76 2 – centralize common concepts How to identify loosely

    coupled domains? Goal: creating ownership for common concepts & reducing complexity for the core process
  39. 79 3 – Reduce complexity in most important domain Look

    at cognitive load! How to identify loosely coupled domains? Intake domain: • Core domain • Still quite big • Majority of the new differentiating features in this domain
  40. 82 Domains are not static How to identify loosely coupled

    domains? Business priority and understanding will evolve
  41. 83 Finding the right boundaries is not easy. How to

    identify loosely coupled domains? Don’t rush into decisions! Changing the boundaries is not for free.
  42. 88 Heuristics Mapping teams on the domains • 1 team

    per domain (ownership) • Use cognitive load to determine if a team can handle (multiple) domains
  43. 89 Heuristics Mapping teams on the domains • 1 team

    per domain (ownership) • Use cognitive load to determine if a team can handle (multiple) domains • Decide together with the teams!
  44. 92 What did we do at KV New team New

    domain, no team yet Assign teams (hard choices)
  45. 93

  46. 94

  47. 95

  48. 96 Do it bit by bit Most urgent first Learn

    along the way Mapping teams on the domains
  49. “We are able to deliver more, because of the reduced

    dependencies” - Product Owner What are the benefits? 106 “It strengthens my feeling of ownership, so I can create a clear product vision on my domain” - Product Owner
  50. “We are able to deliver more, because of the reduced

    dependencies” - Product Owner What are the benefits? 107 “It strengthens my feeling of ownership, so I can create a clear product vision on my domain” - Product Owner “Teams are empowered to own their architecture inside a domain. Architects mostly have to think about inter-domain / extra-domain problems” - Solutions Architect
  51. “We are able to deliver more, because of the reduced

    dependencies” - Product Owner What are the benefits? 108 “It strengthens my feeling of ownership, so I can create a clear product vision on my domain” - Product Owner “Teams are empowered to own their architecture inside a domain. Architects mostly have to think about inter-domain / extra-domain problems” - Solutions Architect “I understand the purpose of my domain better. I can get creative in solving real business problems” - Software Developer “Because we own the whole domain, tackling tech debt becomes easier” - Software Developer
  52. Aligning Teams and Architecture for Fast Flow 109 Team Topology

    makers Business Architecture You cannot create fast flow alone! Co-design!
  53. CREDITS: This presentation template was created by Slidesgo, including icons

    by Flaticon, and infographics & images by Freepik Thanks! 113 Aligning Teams and Architecture for Fast Flow