What is an Agile Squad from the Spotify Model?
An Agile Squad in the Spotify model is an Agile Team dedicated to a long term mission that builds features to the business. It works like a mini-startup.
Table Of Contents
- What is an Agile Squad from the Spotify Model?
- What are the characteristics of an Agile Squad?
- Furthermore, what are the key roles in an Agile Squad in the Spotify Model?
- At last, what are the other concerns about Agile Squad?
- What’s next? Learn more about Agile at Scale
- Here is a collection of references about the Spotify Model
What are the characteristics of an Agile Squad?
- Autonomous to remove as far as possible dependencies
- Cross-functional to cover all aspects to address business needs
- Multi-skilled to specify, develop, test and deploy in production features
- Covering both development and production: “You built it, you run it”
- Co-located to enforce optimal collaboration. Space and visual management are also key levers to support team work
- Long-lived (> min 12-18 months) to reach optimal velocity
- Stable but not fixed: size of the team and skill mix adapt to the business needs
Furthermore, what are the key roles in an Agile Squad in the Spotify Model?
- Product Owner: from the business and still involve in his/her day to day activity in operations. Carries the voice of the customer, maximizes value and validates features.
- 3 roles that are not in the Spotify Model that are part of this model:
- Scrum Master: supports the Agile practices in addition to delivering features like the rest of the team. This is not the manager of the Agile Squad even if he/she supports the delivery, pairing with the Product Owner.
- Tech Lead: leads product technical design and implementation and supports Craftsmanship and DevOps practices in addition to delivering features like the rest of the team.
- Production Lead: makes sure that team properly follows production processes and acts as coordinator in the team regarding production topics. He/she is also part of the delivery of the features.
At last, what are the other concerns about Agile Squad?
Additional points regarding characteristics of the Agile Squad
- Collocation is not optional except for the PO. This implies relocation of the Team Members when team are distributed at the beginning of the journey. Ratio of staff between location may remain unchanged but at the level of the Tribe.
- As far as possible Agile Squads are aligned on a product and are persistent on this scope. This enables over time increase of knowledge both on business and technologies of the area.
- Ceremonies are the same like Scrum. We use also them when there is no delivery sprint like in Kanban framework.
- Depending on the complexity of the work environment either technical or functional, team members may be only T-shape skilled. But the Agile Squad covers all the required skills for the mission. Building multi-skilling is important for the resilience and the flexibility of the Agile Squad.
Additional responsibilities related to Production and Architecture Leagues
- Senior functional and technical roles are the representatives of the Agile Squad for the functional and the technical architecture Leagues.
- Production Lead is the representative of the Agile Squad for the Production League.
Vocabulary: other market terms different from Spotify Model vocabulary
- Spotify uses the just the word Squad for Agile Squad. Another term less used in the market but probably more relevant is Feature Team. Indeed, it stresses the fact that the team is aligned on the flow and can deliver features not just technical items.
- Instead of Scrum Master, we can use the expression Agile Master to be framework agnostic. The Agile Squad can be either Scrum, Kanban or another Agile framework. There is a need to use Scrum as soon as there are many dependencies with other Agile Squads and they have to synchronize. Sprints enforce delivery meeting points with other teams.
What’s next? Learn more about Agile at Scale
Check my other posts about Agile at Scale:
- Review my posts on Agile at Scale foundations:
- What are
- What are the team topologies?
- How to synchronize Agile Squads in Agile at Scale when there are dependencies?
- Check another of my posts introducing Agile at Scale that leverages the book “Doing Agile Right”.
- Review my post on the Agile best practices from the GAO the Government Accountability Office from the USA.
- Read my posts on advanced topics around Agile at Scale:
- What are Leagues in Agile at Scale?
- How to design Agile Squads so they are aligned on the Value Chains.
- Why going for horizontal management? What does it mean and what is the value?
- How roles are reallocated with Agile at Scale?
- Check my posts on project management in Agile at Scale
- What is the impact of Agile on Project Management?
- How does Project Portfolio Management change with Agile at Scale?
- Then, how does Cost of Delay Divided by Duration (CD3) contribute to Agile at Scale?
- How does Beyond Budgeting support Agile at Scale?
- Can an Agile Project be fixed price?
- How to manage Release Management in Agile?
- Review my posts on how to forge a good strategy:
- What are competition and competitive advantage?
- What is a good strategy?