This document discusses high performance teams and provides tips for building them. It notes that the best programmers can be 10 times more productive than the worst. Highly successful companies like Instagram and Stack Overflow started small but grew rapidly by focusing on optimization and continual improvement. Negative feedback should be about ideas and code, not people, and delivered privately. Teams perform best when they work together toward shared goals, embrace change, and celebrate each other's successes. Simplicity is important to minimize work.

1. High PerformanceHigh Performance
TeamsTeams

2. Marco CecconiMarco Cecconi
@sklivvz@sklivvz

3. 10x programmer10x programmer
"the ratio of initial coding time between the best and
worst programmers was about 20 to 1; the ratio of
debugging times over 25 to 1; of program size 5 to 1; and
of program execution speed about 10 to 1."
https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/a/18129
7/23622

5. InstagramInstagram
Built in 2010
1 million users in 2010
10 million users in 2011
50 million users in 2012
Sold for US$1 billion in 2012
13 employees
of which ~5 engineers

6. Stack OverflowStack Overflow
Built in 2008
10 million pageviews per day by 2013
Top developer website in North Korea
~10 core developers

8. A bozo explosionA bozo explosion

10. Smart
Gets things done

11. Negative feedback...
...is fundamental

12. Negative feedbackNegative feedback
Always about the team
Or about the code
Or product
Always in public
Never about specific people (in public)

13. The negativeThe negative
productivityproductivity
developerdeveloper

15. PositivePositive
John adds a feature (1 day)
Sam adds a feature (1 day)
Anna adds a feature (1 day)
3 features, 3 person-days
NegativeNegative
John adds a bad feature (1 day)
Sam fixes John's feature with John (2 days)
Anna adds a feature (1 day)
2 features, 4 person-days
How to FixHow to Fix
John leaves the team (0 days)
Sam adds a feature (1 day)
Anna adds a feature (1 day)
2 features, 2 person-days

16. Your tools are slow ⌛Your tools are slow ⌛
Optimize all your cycle times
Feature to deployment
Commit to production
Save to commit
Bug to fix
No really, do it
I'm serious

17. “ Today I accidentally found out what happens if you
disable L1 cache on stackexchange. Short answer: very bad
things. — Marc Gravell (@marcgravell)
All code has bugs
Even with unit tests
And integration tests
And feature tests
And manual testing
A side passage on bugs

18. YAGNIYAGNI
In a large, *large* proportion of cases,
you do not need:
Kubernetes
Ansible
Microservices
Any services

20. SimplicitySimplicity
“ Simplicity--the art of maximizing the amount
of work not done--is essential.
-- Agile Manifesto, 2001

21. Team playTeam play
1. Does your team achieve goals by working together?
2. Does your team negotiate scope during development?
3. Is your team focused on delivery 100% of the time?
4. Does everybody know what value they are delivering right
now?
5. Is your team happy?
6. Do you constantly measure and optimize performance of all
aspects of your team life?
7. Does your team welcome and embrace change?
8. Do you have rules lawyers?
9. Is your team brutal on code, and this does not upset team
members?

22. RecapRecap
Select and keep highly skilled developers only
Enable them by giving the best tools
Let them build stuff quickly and simply
Direct them to success by telling them where they
need to improve
But always celebrate them, they are an awesome
team!

23. Shameless plugShameless plug

25. Historical
European
Martial
Arts
Many historically accurate fight styles
Longsword
Sword and buckler
Side sword
...
My wife is starting a group in Trento
Chat with me if interested
Many competitions across Europe
Rome and Turing big in Italy
Swordfish in Göteborg
Dutch Lions Cup in Rotterdam
Also Helsinki, Orebro, London...

26. Follow me on twitter for regular insights
@sklivvz
More in-depth team leadership
https://sklivvz.com/posts/team-leadership-for-high-
performance-teams