Presentation about effective product development culture as an evolution of Spotify Engineering Culture for the Bosch internal Community of Practice Agile conference

1. 1
Effective product
development culture (2022)
Jason Yip
Staff Agile Coach
Spotify Advertising R&D
@jchyip
jyip@spotify.com
https://jchyip.medium.com

2. 2
How Spotify builds products - Crisp's Blog
Over 9 years ago

3. 3
Spotify Engineering Culture (part 1) - Crisp's Blog
Over 8 years ago

4. 4
Over 7 years ago
Spotify Engineering Culture (part 2) - Crisp's Blog

5. 5
Almost 6 years
ago
Spotify Rhythm - how we get aligned (slides from my talk at Agile Sverige) - Crisp's Blog

6. 6
How Spotify builds products (2013) Spotify Engineering Culture Part 1 (2014)
Spotify Engineering Culture Part 2 (2014) Spotify Rhythm (2016)
? (2022)
What’s happened in
the last 6ish years?

7. 7
Effective product
development culture, not
just effective engineering
culture

8. 8
Technology
(aka Engineering)
Product Design Insights
Typically Technology / Engineering has the
most people BUT only considering Engineering
culture is incomplete

9. 9
Effective product
development culture, not
just Spotify product
development culture
(hopefully more useful to learn from)

10. 10
Culture is made up of 3
levels

11. 11
Artifacts
Espoused beliefs
and values
Basic underlying
assumptions
Taken-for-granted
beliefs

12. Basic underlying assumptions are
usually not mentioned for the same
reason we don’t typically mention
that gravity exists.
They are core beliefs that are
taken-for-granted.
12

13. 13
Artifacts
Espoused beliefs
and values
Basic underlying
assumptions
Ideals, goals,
values,
aspirations

14. “Espoused beliefs and values” have
to be espoused because they are
chosen as guiding principles.
They are not something just
assumed.
14

15. 15
Artifacts
Espoused beliefs
and values
Basic underlying
assumptions
Observable
structures,
processes,
behaviours

16. “Artefacts” are what’s observable in
the culture.
This means practices and the things
practices leave behind.
16

17. Artifacts
Espoused beliefs
and values
Basic underlying
assumptions
Key practices
Guiding
principles
Core beliefs

18. 18
Core Beliefs
01
02
03
Effective
product
development
culture in 3
levels
Guiding Principles
Key Practices

19. 19
Core Beliefs

20. REMINDER: Core Beliefs are basic
underlying assumptions.
It’s useful to try to be explicit
otherwise everything else might not
make any sense.
20

21. We’re in it together
01
02
03
3 core
beliefs
People are trustworthy
Sustainable, high
performance comes from
a playful, growth mindset

22. “We’re in it together” is an assumption of
belonging and shared purpose
22

23. 23

24. 24

25. If “we’re in it together”, helping
each other makes sense.
If we’re not in it together helping
each other doesn’t make any sense.
25

26. “People are trustworthy” is an assumption
of good intent and competence
26

27. 27
Theory X Theory Y
Workers are selfish,
lazy, dumb, and work
only for their
paycheck
Workers enjoy their
work, are motivated,
intelligent, and
trustworthy
Management is all
about rewards and
punishment, that is,
extrinsic motivation
Management is
about coaching and
removing obstacles
to intrinsic
motivation

28. “People are trustworthy” leads to
transparency and autonomy.
28

29. 29

30. “People aren’t trustworthy” leads
to secrecy and micromanagement.
30

31. 31

32. Sustainable, high performance
comes from a playful, growth
mindset
32

33. A growth mindset is the belief that
intelligence/talent/capability is something
that can be developed.
33

34. 34
Carol Dweck: A Summary of The Two Mindsets (fs.blog)

35. Playfulness is a more sustainable path to
high performance
35

36. 36

37. We’re in it together
01
02
03
3 core
beliefs
People are trustworthy
Sustainable, high
performance comes from
a playful, growth mindset

38. 38
Guiding
Principles

39. REMINDER: Guiding principles are
chosen, not assumed. There may be
other ways to do things, but we
choose these principles because we
believe they’re more effective.
39

40. Consent over consensus
01
02
03
9 guiding
principles
(I’ll only
expand on 3)
The basic unit of product development is the team,
not the individual
04
05
06
07
08
09
Autonomy is enabled by clear intent and
technical excellence
Cross-pollination over imposed standards
Developing products is about developing people
Think big, work small
Speed generates quality
Limit the “blast radius”
Don’t just borrow wisdom; think for yourself

41. Autonomy is enabled by clear intent
and technical excellence
41

42. We’re interested in “aligned autonomy”
not “do whatever I feel like autonomy”.
42
“We’re in it together”

43. 43
http://blog.crisp.se/2016/08/23/henrikkniberg/alignment-at-scale-agile-africa-keynote

44. 44
http://www.davidmarquet.com/our-story/

45. Technology can constrain autonomy.
45

46. 46

47. Think big, work small
47

48. 48
TBM 4/52: Think Big, Work Small (Part 2) - by John Cutler (substack.com)
Think Big/Small Think Small
AKA high
alignment, low
autonomy
AKA aligned
autonomy

49. Don’t just borrow wisdom, think for
yourself
49

50. “Stop trying to borrow wisdom and think for
yourself. Face your difficulties and think and
think and think and solve your problems
yourself. Suffering and difficulties provide
opportunities to become better. Success is
never giving up.”
Taiichi Ohno
50
Stop trying to borrow wisdom and think for yourself | by Jason Yip | Medium

51. 51

52. “Models are for the obedience of fools and
the guidance of the wise.”
Jason Yip
52
(Spotify) Models are for the obedience of fools and the guidance of the wise - Jason Yip - Medium

53. 53
Key Practices

54. REMINDER: Key practices are the
observable consequences of our
core beliefs and guiding principles.
These are the most likely to evolve
as we learn of better options.
54

55. Aligned, autonomous, cross-disciplinary teams
01
02
03
7 key
practices
(I’ll only
expand on 3)
TDD, evolutionary design, pairing/ensemble
04
05
06
07
Continuous Delivery; Release Trains as-needed
Heartbeat retrospectives; blameless postmortems
T-shaping
Decoupled architecture and gradual rollout
Continuous Research, Continuous Design,
Continuous Delivery

56. Aligned, autonomous,
cross-disciplinary teams
56

57. 1. All the skills needed;
2. Assigned/sign up for a problem to solve,
not a list of features to build;
3. Accountable for outcomes (aligned to
broader strategy) not just outputs
57
Empowered Product Teams - Silicon Valley Product Group : Silicon Valley Product Group (svpg.com)

58. 58

59. TDD, evolutionary design, pairing/ensemble
59

60. AKA the practices of collaborative technical
excellence
60

61. 61

62. T-shaping
62

63. 63
Why T-shaped people?. A T-shaped person is capable in many… | by Jason Yip | Medium

64. 64
How might this
be applied at
Bosch?

65. 65

66. “The lesson is that a good or right
culture is a function of the degree to
which shared tacit assumptions
create the kind of strategy that is
functional in the organization’s
environment.”
Edgar Schein
66

67. There is no universally good or bad product
development culture, just culture that is
more or less useful to achieve your goals.
67

68. Think Big, Work Small applies to culture
change too.
68

69. 69
Questions?