Marcin Floryan
Tech Tribe Lead, Playback Tribe
@mfloryan #ABD18
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@mfloryan #ABD18
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the team structure
works well for us because it is
well-aligned with our culture, our
technical architecture and
platform, our product, and
even our workspace
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What’s the story?
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What’s the story?
‣Key Takeaways
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What’s the story?
‣Key Takeaways
‣Principles and practices
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What’s the story?
‣Key Takeaways
‣Principles and practices
‣A year in the Playback Tribe
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What’s the story?
‣Key Takeaways
‣Principles and practices
‣A year in the Playback Tribe
‣Summary
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What’s the story?
‣Key Takeaways
‣Principles and practices
‣A year in the Playback Tribe
‣Summary
‣Questions?
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Tweetable nuggets of wisdom™
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Tweetable nuggets of wisdom™
‣We operate in complex adaptive systems and we need to
pick our tools accordingly
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Tweetable nuggets of wisdom™
‣We operate in complex adaptive systems and we need to
pick our tools accordingly
‣Setting expectations and following up is crucial for success
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Tweetable nuggets of wisdom™
‣We operate in complex adaptive systems and we need to
pick our tools accordingly
‣Setting expectations and following up is crucial for success
‣Be realistic, things take much longer than you may want
them to take
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Tweetable nuggets of wisdom™
‣We operate in complex adaptive systems and we need to
pick our tools accordingly
‣Setting expectations and following up is crucial for success
‣Be realistic, things take much longer than you may want
them to take
‣Go back to basics to build the foundations
@mfloryan #ABD18
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What are your
principles?
@mfloryan #ABD18
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@mfloryan #ABD18
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Transparency
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Top 3 Check-in
• Creates transparency
in two directions
• Helps with focus
• Spreads by example
• Sparks conversations
!
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Collaboration
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Tribe Standup
• Started as OKR sync
• Became Delivery
Standup
• Now a Tribe Standup
• Representatives from
every squad meet once
a week
Focus
Commitment
Belonging
Learning
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Big room planning
• Run every quarter
• Seeded with goals
(company, mission, tribe,
squad)
• Every squads presents
their ideas
• Leads present priorities
• Together we agree on the
work and create OKRs
#
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Feedback loops
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Taps with squads
• Leads meet with every
squad
• Usually 1-2 per Quarter
• Four topics:
• Impact
• Delivery
• Health
• Help
!
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Lunch with the leads
• Informal opportunity
for a conversation
• Easy sign-up
• Close connection
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Aligned
Autonomy
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Setting clear expectations
• People need
expectations
• Defining clear
boundaries enables
autonomy
• Autonomy comes with
responsibility
$
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Setting clear expectations
• People need
expectations
• Defining clear
boundaries enables
autonomy
• Autonomy comes with
responsibility
$
Autonomy isn't a benefit; it's an
expectation of responsibility.
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Setting clear expectations
• People need
expectations
• Defining clear
boundaries enables
autonomy
• Autonomy comes with
responsibility
$
Autonomy isn't a benefit; it's an
expectation of responsibility.
@jchyip
Creating aspirations collaboratively
• Review outcomes of
the conversations
• Vote on the most
relevant “to focus on”
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Aspirations
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Aspirations
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Aspirations
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Aspirations
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Aspirations
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Aspirations
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Psychological safety
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Introduction workshops
First we create a shared
understanding
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Getting data
Understand what is the
“current state”
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Action-focused squad workshops
• Each squad (and
leadership team)
worked on practical
actions
• Some were tiny, some
lead to interesting new
practices
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No content
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Feedback jar
• We run a series of
workshops on giving
and receiving feedback
• We needed a tool to
help people visualise
progress
#
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Mistakes column
• Existing culture of
blame-free incident
post-mortems
• Wanted local practice
as a regular reminder
• Small things reflected
upon weekly
$
What’s not to like about this code
• How to get better
talking about problems
in code
• Separate author and
the code that is written
• Identify “problems”
• Mob-programming
session to fix them
$
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Revisiting aspirations
• A year later we’re
closing the loop
• Now we’ll create a new
iteration
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• Knowledge sharing
• Enhanced feeling of
belonging
• Creates inspiration
• Helps people grow
Job Rotation
!
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What kind of practice?
‣ Distinguish between different types of
practice
‣ Establish an allergic reaction to Best
Practice
‣ Use Good Practice when it’s evident
‣ Focus on developing Emergent Practice
By Snowded - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https:/
/commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33783436
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Inspiration for your set of principles
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Summary
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Summary
‣ Things take a long time
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Summary
‣ Things take a long time
‣ Choose your own practices
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Summary
‣ Things take a long time
‣ Choose your own practices
‣ Practices coherent with you set of principles / values
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Summary
‣ Things take a long time
‣ Choose your own practices
‣ Practices coherent with you set of principles / values
‣ Every new practice is an experiment
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Summary
‣ Things take a long time
‣ Choose your own practices
‣ Practices coherent with you set of principles / values
‣ Every new practice is an experiment
‣ Never stop iterating, create a good rhythm
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Summary
‣ Things take a long time
‣ Choose your own practices
‣ Practices coherent with you set of principles / values
‣ Every new practice is an experiment
‣ Never stop iterating, create a good rhythm
‣ Don’t scale things up, break things down
@mfloryan #ABD18
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“Things become better when
we accept them as they are;
not as we want them to be.”
From Tobbe Gyllebring (@drunkcod)
via Gitte Klitgaard (@nativewired)
@mfloryan #ABD18
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Thank you!
Marcin Floryan
Tech Tribe Lead at Spotify
Questions? @mfloryan
Looks like a place you want to work at? Ask me!