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When I worked at IBM Cloud they copied the Spotify model of squads and tribes and guilds. I remember having to watch a video about it on my first day.

lonesword 6y ago
When I worked at a startup we copied the Spotify model as well. We called it "functional teams" and so on but the idea was the same - we watched the spotify videos as well. To be honest it helped. I think this is a point in IBM's favor because they saw something better, and adopted it even though "it was not invented here".
2sk21 6y ago
Indeed, it was the same in the Watson group where I worked about 6 years ago. It was pure cargo cult activity that ultimately resulted in much lower productivity.
- jonfw 6y ago
  I actually liked my experience with the guild structure, as somebody new to the industry. I had my specialty, was the leader in my team in my particular specialty, but that's mostly because I was the only one in my team with the specialty. The guild structure got me the opportunity to network with people who were more experienced in that area
laputan_machine 6y ago
Where I work we have teams and guilds. Guilds operate every other Friday, they work on cross-team concepts (e.g. automation, ai/ml, security, open source). Some guilds work better than others. The downside is around ownership (e.g. A guild creates a useful tool that ends up being used throughout the org, who fixes the critical bugs that arise?) We originally cargo-culted the Spotify model, but changed it to fit how we want to work, it seems OK.
namdnay 6y ago
Woah I think we've stumbled on something here.. Spotify seem to be the source/example of all these new management fads. I remember having to sit through that hand-drawn sketch video (is there a name for these things?) describing how Spotify does SAFe (if you don't know what this is, pretend you never read it and continue your life as usual, please) and how awesome it is and why we all need to do it.
- Qwertious 6y ago
  What sort of thing is SAFe? Is it some sort of unsuccessful corporate pantomime of a successful practice?
  - kthejoker2 6y ago
    The A stands for Agile if that gives you a clue ...
  - shp0ngle 6y ago
    it’s “scaled agile framework”. Move on.
  - azemetre 6y ago
    Opinions are my own, but it’s basically a worst version of agile (safe = scaled agile framework) that removes all autonomy from teams and gives upper management/leadership more power in making decisions at the team level. If you never heard of Allen Holub look him up on YouTube/Twitter. He’s one of the same voices when it comes to agile frameworks.

lonesword 6y ago

When I worked at a startup we copied the Spotify model as well. We called it "functional teams" and so on but the idea was the same - we watched the spotify videos as well. To be honest it helped. I think this is a point in IBM's favor because they saw something better, and adopted it even though "it was not invented here".

2sk21 6y ago

Indeed, it was the same in the Watson group where I worked about 6 years ago. It was pure cargo cult activity that ultimately resulted in much lower productivity.

jonfw 6y ago
I actually liked my experience with the guild structure, as somebody new to the industry. I had my specialty, was the leader in my team in my particular specialty, but that's mostly because I was the only one in my team with the specialty. The guild structure got me the opportunity to network with people who were more experienced in that area

laputan_machine 6y ago

Where I work we have teams and guilds. Guilds operate every other Friday, they work on cross-team concepts (e.g. automation, ai/ml, security, open source). Some guilds work better than others. The downside is around ownership (e.g. A guild creates a useful tool that ends up being used throughout the org, who fixes the critical bugs that arise?) We originally cargo-culted the Spotify model, but changed it to fit how we want to work, it seems OK.

namdnay 6y ago

Woah I think we've stumbled on something here.. Spotify seem to be the source/example of all these new management fads. I remember having to sit through that hand-drawn sketch video (is there a name for these things?) describing how Spotify does SAFe (if you don't know what this is, pretend you never read it and continue your life as usual, please) and how awesome it is and why we all need to do it.

Qwertious 6y ago
What sort of thing is SAFe? Is it some sort of unsuccessful corporate pantomime of a successful practice?
- kthejoker2 6y ago
  The A stands for Agile if that gives you a clue ...
- shp0ngle 6y ago
  it’s “scaled agile framework”. Move on.
- azemetre 6y ago
  Opinions are my own, but it’s basically a worst version of agile (safe = scaled agile framework) that removes all autonomy from teams and gives upper management/leadership more power in making decisions at the team level. If you never heard of Allen Holub look him up on YouTube/Twitter. He’s one of the same voices when it comes to agile frameworks.