After the launch: the difficult teenage years

Anna Shipman
Tech Director of Customer Products, Financial Times
@annashipman
After the launch: the
diﬃcult teenage years

It was a monolith that
could only be released
out of hours
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It was released monthly
@annashipman

There was no way to move
to continuous deployment
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The site was slow
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It wasn’t responsive
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No-one owned
the whole thing
@annashipman

A small team worked on a
prototype called “Next”
@annashipman

Microservices, Node.js,
focus on speed, shipping
and measurement
@annashipman

5% of users opted in to
the “Next” beta
@annashipman

Launched to everyone
in October 2016
@annashipman

Now it ships hundreds
of times a week
@annashipman

The site is much faster
@annashipman

It has an A/B testing
framework built in
@annashipman

It allows measurement
@annashipman

Recency, frequency,
volume (RFV) is our
engagement metric
@annashipman

An engagement score above
18.2 = likely to resubscribe
@annashipman

A/B testing means we may
not release features
@annashipman

@annashipman
Mean % drop in article views between variants and control
Page load time 7 days impact 28 days
1 second slower -4.9% -4.6%
2 second slower — -5.0%
3 second slower -7.2% -7.9%

1 second delay = -£millions
@annashipman

I joined the FT in April 2018
@annashipman

@annashipmanPhoto credit: Helen Hayward

There were some problems
@annashipman

@annashipman
Not sure of the value of the work
Not owning or guiding a system just jamming bits in
“Need more developers”
Areas of code people didn’t want to touch
Having to deploy things in a certain order
Duplication of code
Some of the people who set technical direction had moved to other projects
Feature changes felt too bitty

These are the three main
themes in the diﬀicult
teenage years
@annashipman

Lack of clear vision
@annashipman

Tech feels like it’s drifting
@annashipman

Things aren’t communicated
as well as they used to be
@annashipman

Your strategy for getting out
of the diﬀicult teenage years
@annashipman

1. Diagnosis
2. Vision
3. How to get there
@annashipman

I’m not going to debate
vision vs mission vs blah
@annashipman

Vision is where
you want to get to
@annashipman

You need a vision so you
know what you are
aiming for
@annashipman

So the team know what they
are aiming for and why
@annashipman

So people outside the team
know where you’re going
@annashipman

So you know what
success looks like
@annashipman

The vision for launch is
easy to communicate
@annashipman

“Everything will
be amazing”
@annashipman

The new thing will replace
something everyone
knows the ﬂaws of
@annashipman

In the run-up to launch
people hear what they
want to hear
@annashipman

Launch date clears the mind,
allows descoping
@annashipman

Next’s vision for launch
@annashipman

- Fast
- Responsive
- Can experiment
- Measure everything
@annashipman

The vision after the launch
needs more effort
@annashipman

Reality hits home
@annashipman

Not *everything* is amazing
@annashipman

Some problems
remain unresolved
@annashipman

People come back to ask
for descoped features
@annashipman

Now you no longer have
the deadline, why is
that feature out?
@annashipman

Goals are not ﬁnish lines
@annashipman

You need to put more eﬀort
into defending the vision
than before the launch
@annashipman

More eﬀort than
you imagine
@annashipman

It needs to be very clear
@annashipman

Setting the vision for
after the launch
@annashipman

It might be the same vision
as for the launch
@annashipman

You shouldn’t need to
understand the structure
of government
@annashipman

Launch:
Replace Directgov
@annashipman

After the launch:
Replace the other sites
@annashipman

Your vision for after the
launch might be diﬀerent
but clear
@annashipman

Or you might need
a new vision
@annashipman

We bought in an external
facilitator to help with the
FT.com product vision
@annashipman

You might want to
involve a lot of people
@annashipman

Advantage: more people
feel ownership
@annashipman

Disadvantage: potential of
design by committee
@annashipman

You don’t need to
hire a consultant
@annashipman

You can do this with a small
team or by yourself
@annashipman

We want FT.com tech
to be maintainable
and supportable
@annashipman

We don’t want another
rebuild in a few years
@annashipman

No next “Next”
@annashipman

Vision is crucial
@annashipman

You have to work harder to
clarify and defend the
vision after launch
@annashipman

It is not too late
@annashipman

Also: it’s all about
communication
@annashipman

Identify the highest impact
areas to work on
@annashipman

Corners cut to get the site
live come back to bite
@annashipman

There might be things left
out of the launch
@annashipman

What are the areas to focus
on now to get to your vision?
@annashipman

What are the highest impact
steps you can take?
@annashipman

How to work out the steps
@annashipman

You might just know what
the ﬁrst steps are
@annashipman

Listen to the patterns in
what people say
@annashipman

@annashipmanPhoto credit: @itsallgonewrong

Send surveys or ask
people to vote
@annashipman

Spotify healthcheck can
give you an idea of
areas to focus on
@annashipman

Look for artefacts
e.g. tech principles,
dashboards
@annashipman

A live site is diﬀerent to a
site in development
@annashipman

How does out of hours
support work?
@annashipman

How do you handle critical
security vulnerabilities?
@annashipman

How do you act on
customer feedback?
@annashipman

But be careful about how
you interpret the results
@annashipman

We’re working on our
measurement so your tips
are very welcome!
@annashipman

You need to tell people what
the next steps are
@annashipman

It’s a new phase
@annashipman

Some people will
have moved on
@annashipman

The areas we
are focusing on
@annashipman

Making our out of hours
process sustainable
@annashipman

Refreshing and
communicating our
tech principles
@annashipman

Measuring the quality and
simplicity of our systems
@annashipman

We are 2+ years
on from launch
@annashipman

It’s not too late
@annashipman

The priorities for your tech
will be different after launch
@annashipman

You should focus on the
highest impact areas
@annashipman

You must communicate
the vision
@annashipman

You must communicate
your tech priorities
@annashipman

Talk about it more than
you think is necessary
@annashipman

Repeat yourself until you
are bored of your
own voice saying it
@annashipman

It will be new to someone
each time you say it
@annashipman

Put a lot of eﬀort into
communicating
@annashipman

Inside your team so people
know what to focus on
@annashipman

Outside the team so
people understand the
direction of travel
@annashipman

Some ideas about
how to communicate
@annashipman

Create a wiki page for your
vision and priorities
@annashipman

Update on progress in a
newsletter
@annashipman

Give regular tech talks,
show and tells
@annashipman

@annashipmanPhoto credit: @benterrett

“It will feel like propaganda
to you but no-one
will notice”
— Russell Davies, former Director of
Strategy at GDS
@annashipman

Public blog posts
are very useful
@annashipman

They are most useful
for new starters
@annashipman

Blog about the launch
and what it replaced
@annashipman

Blog about technical
decisions as you go on
@annashipman

Useful for you as it
helps you clarify
@annashipman

You may have to create
channels for communication
@annashipman

It’s all about communication!
@annashipman

You can have the best vision
and strategy but if no-one
knows about it it’s worthless
@annashipman

To get out of the diﬀicult
teenage years:
@annashipman

Set a clear vision
for after the launch
@annashipman

Create a plan that focuses
on the highest impact areas
@annashipman

Communicate them!
@annashipman

It’s not too late to address
any of these things
@annashipman

It’s also not too late to join
us on this journey!
roles.ft.com
@annashipman

Thanks!
roles.ft.com
@annashipman

After the launch: the difficult teenage years

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