Radical Agilitywith Autonomous Teams and Microservices

pekka.kosonen@zalando.fi / @zosonen

Scan Agile, Helsinki, 8th of March 2016

background image based on

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CERN_Server_03.jpg

by Florian Hirzinger - www.fh-ap.com

● Engineering site (backend and mobile, product and UX)

● Opened on August 26th 2015

Zalando Helsinki tech hub

ZALANDO KEY NUMBERS

150.000+PRODUCT CHOICES

130M+VISITS / MONTH

2.2 B€

NET

SALES 2014

15MARKETS

1.500+ BRANDS

~10 000EMPLOYEES

The reality hit

Some time a go we realized we’re in a situation

where…

we had a monolith which was hard to develop

further

built on not-a-very-modern tech stack

control killed the innovation

slow to release new features

teams didn’t have E2E responsibility

Some of the believes used in the redesign

- - Conway’s law - organizational design

reflects the outcome

- - Motivation 3.0

And three major areas to be changed

1) Culture

2) Organization

3) Architecture and Technologies used

FROM CONTROL & COMMAND TO PURPOSE AND TRUST

A Purpose-driven organization

composed of autonomous teams

which deliver clearly defined

products

As service-oriented architecture

composed of loosely coupled

elements that have bounded

context

Radical Agility combines architecture and organization

PURPOSE - AUTONOMY - MASTERY

PURPOSE

AUTONOMY

MASTERY

DELIVERY

LEAD

PEOPLE

LEAD

OKR

https://github.com/zalando/zalando-rules-of-play

MICRO

SERVICEShttps://github.com/zalando/zalando-rules-of-play

API FIRST

https://github.com/zalando/zalando-rules-of-play

REST

SAAS

CLOUD

OPENSOURCEhttps://github.com/zalando/zalando-rules-of-play https://zalando.github.io

What are the challenges with Radical Agility?

Trust can be misused (individual / team level)

Limited coordination may lead to overlaps and gaps

Freedom to select tech stack probably not great for short term productivity

People HAVE to be self-organized

Requires more communication, social skills and willingness to reach out

Radical Agility – does it really work?

Takeaways

Radical Agility in a nutshell - Purpose, Autonomy and Mastery. Small

autonomous teams with E2E ownership and power to make decisions.

Zalando Helsinki – Continuously growing and hiring software professionals.

Getting sh*t done – soon releasing our first product!

Thank you and happy Women’s Day!

https://tech.zalando.com/