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Conway's Law & Continious Delivery

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allan kelly
allan kelly

This document discusses Conway's Law and its implications for continuous delivery. It summarizes Conway's Law, which states that organizations will inevitably produce systems that mirror their own communication structures. It then provides recommendations for continuous delivery based on Conway's Law, such as starting with small, cross-functional teams to minimize communication barriers and reflecting the business needs. The document emphasizes growing teams and systems incrementally to align organizational design with system architecture over time.

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Conway’s Law & Organizational Change Continuous Delivery Allan Kelly London allan@softwarestrategy.co.uk January 2014 http://www.softwarestrategy.co.uk Twitter: @allankelly.net
Allan Kelly…  Consulting on software development & strategy  Training for Agile Author – Changing Software Development: Learning to be Agile (2008, Wiley) – Business Patterns for Software Developers (2012, Wiley - ISBN: 978-1119999249) – Xanpan: Reflections on agile (work in progress) https://leanpub.com/xanpan Chapters in… • Business Analysis and Leadership, Pullan & Archer 2013 • 97 Things Every Programmer Should Know, Henney, 2010 • Context Encapsulation in Pattern Languages of Program Design, vol #5, 2006
Conway’s Law? Continuous Delivery? Jonathon’s Run Fall, Pennsylvania by Hubert Stoffels (http://flickr.com/photos/22195940@N00) Creative Commons License
The Laws which Rule over Us Moore’s Law Computing power doubles every 1824 months Metcalf’s Law Conway’s Law Brook’s Law Goodhart’s Law Network becomes more useful the more devices are connected to it Organizations design systems which copy the organization Adding more people to a late project makes it later Making a target from a measure changes the measure
Conway’s Law organizations which design systems (in the broad sense used here) are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations Melvin Conway, Datamation, 1968 http://www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law.html
Raymond on Conway Conway’s Law prov. The rule that organization of the software and the organization of the software team will be congruent; originally stated as ‘If you have four groups working on a compiler, you’ll get a 4-pass compiler’. Eric Raymond, Hacker’s Dictionary, 1996
Coplien & Harrison If the parts of an organization (e.g. teams, departments, or subdivisions) do not closely reflect the essential parts of the product, or if the relationship between organizations do not reflect the relationships between product parts, then the project will be in trouble. ... Therefore: Make sure the organizations is compatible with the product architecture. Coplien & Harrison, Organizational Patterns of Agile Software Development, 2004
The Holomorphic Force Definition: Homomorphism is a structure-preserving map between two structures Taken from algebra Leads to Reverse Conway’s Law: “Organizations with long lived systems will adopt a structure modeled on the system”
Kelly’s Corollary Organization design is system design. Architect the organization to architect the system. e.g. Separate Teams -> Separate Modules Allan Kelly Many times since 2005 e.g. Collective Code Ownership leads to more integrated team & code
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Shiptriplet2wiki.jpg CCL image from Lance Rolf Why do large systems disintegrate? 3 steps to disintegration (from Conway): 1. Designers realize the system will be large … irresistible the temptation to assign too many people to a design effort 2. Conventional management of large design organization causes its communication structure to disintegrate 3. Homomorphism: system structure disintegrates to reflect design organization
Kelly’s Laws Project scope will always increase in proportion to resources Kelly’s first law of project complexity Inside every large project there is a small one struggling to get out Kelly’s second law of project complexity
May the Force be with you Can you break Conway’s Law? No The (Homomorphic) force is stronger than you Use the (Homomorphic) force, Matthew
Go against it and you’ll get a mess Use the force Work with it Wood picture from Böhringer, Creative Commons License http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Zebrano01.jpg
Therefore… • Advice for CD
Whole team: Include everyone • Developers, Testers, Analysts, Product Managers, etc. etc. – Don’t add communication barriers • Absorb/Embed the business – Keep communication paths short • One team to rule them all – No communication divide – No “us & them” – One goal
Start small: Delay staffing • Minimize communication boundaries • Start with smallest team possible – Minimally Viable Team – Slightly smaller than you think you need – Co-locate! • Get a small system working – Piecemeal growth – Grow the team with the system
Multi-skilled Willing Staff • All hands, one team – Minimize titles Every man an rifle man • Don’t use technologies that require black arts specialists – e.g. Databases which need DBA Debbie Does Development Chris Oldwood US Marine Corps
Ameba teams • Start small – 1, prototype or research – 2, get going: Engineer & BA • Grow • Split as appropriate – Focus team – 1 project or area • Fully staff each team – stand alone
Team & Duration Prefer – Short and Fast Over – Long and Thin • • • • Faster time to market Higher Rate On Investment Less resource contention Requires clear prioritization & closure
#NoProjects • Keep the team together – Grow them, shrink them, – Bend them, shake them – But never disband them • Why break up a performing team? – Flow the work to the team – Continuous flow
Avoid Rock-Stars • • • • • Expensive (but talented) Temperamental Unpredictable Prone to outages Demand flowers – And chocolates Are these attributes you want for your system?
Conway’s Second Law? This point of view has produced the observation that there's never enough time to do something right, but there's always enough time to do it over. Melvin Conway, Datamation, 1968 http://www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law.html
You must remember this… What ever you do…. Start small and grow … incremental is not a dirty word
Read all about it How to Committee invent? – Original paper, Mel Conway – http://www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law .html What do we think about Conway’s Law now? – Hvatum & Kelly, 2005 – http://www.allankelly.net/static/presentations/Eu roPLoP2005/ConwaysLawFocusGroup.pdf
Questions? Allan Kelly allan@softwarestrategy.co.uk http://www.softwarestrategy.co.uk Twitter: @allankellynet Xanpan: Reflections on agile (work in progress) https://leanpub.com/xanpan

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Conway's Law & Continious Delivery

  • 1. Conway’s Law & Organizational Change Continuous Delivery Allan Kelly London allan@softwarestrategy.co.uk January 2014 http://www.softwarestrategy.co.uk Twitter: @allankelly.net
  • 2. Allan Kelly…  Consulting on software development & strategy  Training for Agile Author – Changing Software Development: Learning to be Agile (2008, Wiley) – Business Patterns for Software Developers (2012, Wiley - ISBN: 978-1119999249) – Xanpan: Reflections on agile (work in progress) https://leanpub.com/xanpan Chapters in… • Business Analysis and Leadership, Pullan & Archer 2013 • 97 Things Every Programmer Should Know, Henney, 2010 • Context Encapsulation in Pattern Languages of Program Design, vol #5, 2006
  • 3. Conway’s Law? Continuous Delivery? Jonathon’s Run Fall, Pennsylvania by Hubert Stoffels (http://flickr.com/photos/22195940@N00) Creative Commons License
  • 4. The Laws which Rule over Us Moore’s Law Computing power doubles every 1824 months Metcalf’s Law Conway’s Law Brook’s Law Goodhart’s Law Network becomes more useful the more devices are connected to it Organizations design systems which copy the organization Adding more people to a late project makes it later Making a target from a measure changes the measure
  • 5. Conway’s Law organizations which design systems (in the broad sense used here) are constrained to produce designs which are copies of the communication structures of these organizations Melvin Conway, Datamation, 1968 http://www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law.html
  • 6. Raymond on Conway Conway’s Law prov. The rule that organization of the software and the organization of the software team will be congruent; originally stated as ‘If you have four groups working on a compiler, you’ll get a 4-pass compiler’. Eric Raymond, Hacker’s Dictionary, 1996
  • 7. Coplien & Harrison If the parts of an organization (e.g. teams, departments, or subdivisions) do not closely reflect the essential parts of the product, or if the relationship between organizations do not reflect the relationships between product parts, then the project will be in trouble. ... Therefore: Make sure the organizations is compatible with the product architecture. Coplien & Harrison, Organizational Patterns of Agile Software Development, 2004
  • 8. The Holomorphic Force Definition: Homomorphism is a structure-preserving map between two structures Taken from algebra Leads to Reverse Conway’s Law: “Organizations with long lived systems will adopt a structure modeled on the system”
  • 9. Kelly’s Corollary Organization design is system design. Architect the organization to architect the system. e.g. Separate Teams -> Separate Modules Allan Kelly Many times since 2005 e.g. Collective Code Ownership leads to more integrated team & code
  • 10. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Shiptriplet2wiki.jpg CCL image from Lance Rolf Why do large systems disintegrate? 3 steps to disintegration (from Conway): 1. Designers realize the system will be large … irresistible the temptation to assign too many people to a design effort 2. Conventional management of large design organization causes its communication structure to disintegrate 3. Homomorphism: system structure disintegrates to reflect design organization
  • 11. Kelly’s Laws Project scope will always increase in proportion to resources Kelly’s first law of project complexity Inside every large project there is a small one struggling to get out Kelly’s second law of project complexity
  • 12. May the Force be with you Can you break Conway’s Law? No The (Homomorphic) force is stronger than you Use the (Homomorphic) force, Matthew
  • 13. Go against it and you’ll get a mess Use the force Work with it Wood picture from Böhringer, Creative Commons License http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Zebrano01.jpg
  • 15. Whole team: Include everyone • Developers, Testers, Analysts, Product Managers, etc. etc. – Don’t add communication barriers • Absorb/Embed the business – Keep communication paths short • One team to rule them all – No communication divide – No “us & them” – One goal
  • 16. Start small: Delay staffing • Minimize communication boundaries • Start with smallest team possible – Minimally Viable Team – Slightly smaller than you think you need – Co-locate! • Get a small system working – Piecemeal growth – Grow the team with the system
  • 17. Multi-skilled Willing Staff • All hands, one team – Minimize titles Every man an rifle man • Don’t use technologies that require black arts specialists – e.g. Databases which need DBA Debbie Does Development Chris Oldwood US Marine Corps
  • 18. Ameba teams • Start small – 1, prototype or research – 2, get going: Engineer & BA • Grow • Split as appropriate – Focus team – 1 project or area • Fully staff each team – stand alone
  • 19. Team & Duration Prefer – Short and Fast Over – Long and Thin • • • • Faster time to market Higher Rate On Investment Less resource contention Requires clear prioritization & closure
  • 20. #NoProjects • Keep the team together – Grow them, shrink them, – Bend them, shake them – But never disband them • Why break up a performing team? – Flow the work to the team – Continuous flow
  • 21. Avoid Rock-Stars • • • • • Expensive (but talented) Temperamental Unpredictable Prone to outages Demand flowers – And chocolates Are these attributes you want for your system?
  • 22. Conway’s Second Law? This point of view has produced the observation that there's never enough time to do something right, but there's always enough time to do it over. Melvin Conway, Datamation, 1968 http://www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law.html
  • 23. You must remember this… What ever you do…. Start small and grow … incremental is not a dirty word
  • 24. Read all about it How to Committee invent? – Original paper, Mel Conway – http://www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law .html What do we think about Conway’s Law now? – Hvatum & Kelly, 2005 – http://www.allankelly.net/static/presentations/Eu roPLoP2005/ConwaysLawFocusGroup.pdf