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TeamTopologies.com
@TeamTopologies
What is
Platform as a Product?
Clues from Team Topologies
Matthew Skelton
co-author of Team Topologies
WTFinar - Container Solutions - 19 Nov 2020
@matthewpskelton
Matthew Skelton
2
Co-author of the book Team Topologies
Founder at Conflux - confluxdigital.net
Experience as: software developer,
system architect, technical director,
change enabler, conference organizer...
Twitter: @matthewpskelton
Team Topologies
4
Organizing business and
technology teams for fast flow
Matthew Skelton & Manuel Pais
IT Revolution Press (2019)
teamtopologies.com/book
“innovative tools and concepts for
structuring the next generation
digital operating model”
Charles T. Betz,
Principal Analyst, Forrester Research
5
What is “Platform as a
Product” and why should I
adopt this approach?
6
7
What is a Platform?
What really is a Product?
Examples: P-as-a-P
Getting Started
What is a Platform?
8
“A digital platform is a foundation of
self-service APIs, tools, services,
knowledge and support which are
arranged as a compelling internal
product.”
– Evan Bottcher, 2018
9Source: https://martinfowler.com/articles/talk-about-platforms.html
“A digital platform is a foundation of
self-service APIs, tools, services
knowledge and support which are
arranged as a compelling internal
product.”
– Evan Bottcher, 2018
10
“A digital platform is a foundation of
self-service APIs, tools, services,
knowledge and support which are
arranged as a compelling internal
product.”
– Evan Bottcher, 2018
11
“A digital platform is a foundation of
self-service APIs, tools, services,
knowledge and support which are
arranged as a compelling internal
product.”
– Evan Bottcher, 2018
12
13
https://www.thoughtworks.com/radar
14
Adopt: Applying product
management to internal
platforms
Trial: Platform engineering
product teams
15
“...we’ve been using the
concepts from Team
Topologies to split platform
teams in our projects into
enablement teams, core
“platform within a platform”
teams and stream-focused
teams.”
-- ThoughtWorks Tech Radar, Vol.22, p.10
16
A platform is a curated
experience for engineers
(the customers of the
platform).
17
treat the platform as a
product (reliable, usable, fit
for purpose) for voluntary
internal customers
Platform as a Product
“Create a path of
least resistance.
Make the right thing
the easiest thing to do.”
– Evan Bottcher, 2018
18
19
20
21
22
23
Team Cognitive Load
“Cognitive load is the total
amount of mental effort
being used in the working
memory”
- John Sweller
24
Intrinsic (skills)
Extraneous (mechanism)
Germane (domain focus)
25
Intrinsic
Extraneous
Germane
26
“How are
classes
defined in
Java?”
Intrinsic
Extraneous
Germane
27
“How do I
deploy this
app,
again?”
Intrinsic
Extraneous
Germane
28
“How do
bank
transfers
work?”
Intrinsic (skills)
Extraneous (mechanics)
Germane (domain focus)
29
(Intrinsic)
] Extraneous [
Germane
30
The platform should not
*increase* the cognitive load
on teams using the platform
35
36
Thinnest Viable Platform
37
38
Thinnest Viable Platform
smallest set of APIs, documentation,
and tools needed to accelerate teams
developing modern software services
and systems
“software developers love building
platforms and, without strong product
management input, will create a
bigger platform than needed.”
- Allan Kelly
39
40
Example: Thinnest Viable Platform
A small, curated set of complementary
services or patterns to use together to
simplify and accelerate delivery.
“Use these N services in these ways...”
Photo by Jean-Philippe Delberghe on Unsplash
A good platform is just
“big enough” but no bigger
41
42
Platform evolution via
Team Interaction Modes
43
44
strong collaboration with
stream-aligned teams for
any new service or evolution
Platform Behaviors
45
46
47
provide support and great
documentation for stable
services
Platform Behaviors
48
Clarify (platform) service
boundaries and provide
abstractions to reduce the
cognitive load on teams.
49
50
2019
Addressed critical
cross-functional
needs (GDPR,
security, alerts +
SLOs as a service)
Adoption by HMRT
(Highest Maturity
& Revenue Team)
2017
Infra platform
started with few
services
First customer
(centralized
logging, metrics,
auto scaling)
2018
Started using SLAs
and SLOs, clarifying
reliability/latency/etc
Growing traffic in
platform vs AWS
What really is a
Product?
51
“product (...) is anything that can be
offered to a market to satisfy the
desire or need of a customer”
- Wikipedia
52Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_(business)
Product = Holistic User Experience
➔ Functionality
➔ Design
➔ Monetization
➔ Content
– Marty Cagan, 2010
53Source: https://svpg.com/defining-product/
54
55
A product is optional to
use - no-one is forced to
use the product
56
57
A product is carefully
designed and curated
58
59
A product simplifies
something for users
60
61
A product evolves to take
advantage of technology
changes
62
A platform is a curated
experience for engineers
(the customers of the
platform).
63
A platform is optional to
use - no team is forced to
use the platform
64
Platforms must advocate
for their platform
product and “market” it
to internal teams
65
A platform is carefully
designed and curated
66
Platforms must be
designed with the user in
mind (internal teams) -
focus on UX and DevEx
67
A platform simplifies
something for users
68
Platforms must help
users to achieve goals by
understanding user
needs and simplifying
tasks
69
A platform evolves to take
advantage of technology
changes
70
Platforms must evolve
the capabilities they
offer (adding/removing)
with a clear roadmap or
trajectory
71
A platform uses modern
product management
(and service management)
72
73
A platform needs modern
product management
(and service management)
as demonstrated by SaaS
companies
74
product metrics
Platform Metrics
4 key metrics: ‘Accelerate’
75
lead time
deployment frequency
mean time to restore (MTTR)
change fail percentage
76
product metrics
user satisfaction metrics
Platform Metrics
77
78
product metrics
user satisfaction metrics
adoption & engagement metrics
Platform Metrics
79
80
product metrics
user satisfaction metrics
adoption & engagement metrics
reliability metrics
Platform Metrics
82
product metrics
(Accelerate metrics for platform services)
user satisfaction metrics
(Accelerate metrics for business services, NPS, etc)
adoption & engagement metrics
(% teams onboard, per platform and per service)
reliability metrics
(SLOs, latency, #Incidents, etc)
Platform Metrics
83
The success of platform
teams is the success of
stream-aligned teams
Examples:
Platform as a Product
84
CaseStudy
85
86
Source: https://teamtopologies.com/industry-examples/organizational-evolution-accelerating-delivery-of-comparison-services-uswitch
Organizational evolution for
accelerating delivery of
comparison services at Uswitch
87
Flow of change
88
Low-level AWS service calls (EC2, IAM, STS, Autoscaling, etc.) from January 2015 to January 2017
“We didn’t change our organization
because we wanted to use
Kubernetes, we used Kubernetes
because we wanted to change
our organization.”
- Paul Ingles
89
90
Low-level AWS service calls since Kubernetes adoption in January 2017
92
enable stream-aligned
teams to deliver work
autonomously with
self-service capabilities ...
Platform Purpose
93
… in order to reduce
extraneous cognitive load
on stream-aligned teams
Platform Purpose
“We wanted to scale our teams but
maintain the principles of what
helped us move fast: autonomy,
work with minimal coordination,
self-service infrastructure.”
- Paul Ingles
95
Treat the platform
as a product
96
Reliable
Fit for Purpose
Focused on DevEx
97
“Kubernetes helps us in a few ways:
- Application-focused abstractions
- Operate and configure clusters to
minimise coordination ”
- Paul Ingles 101
105
2018
Infra platform
started with few
services
First customer
(centralized
logging, metrics,
auto scaling)
106
2018
Infra platform
started with few
services
First customer
(centralized
logging, metrics,
auto scaling)
2019
Started using SLAs
and SLOs, clarifying
reliability/latency/etc
Growing traffic in
platform vs AWS
107
...
Addressed critical
cross-functional
needs (GDPR,
security, alerts +
SLOs as a service)
Adoption by HMMT
(Highest Money
Making Team)
2018
Infra platform
started with few
services
First customer
(centralized
logging, metrics,
auto scaling)
2019
Started using SLAs
and SLOs, clarifying
reliability/latency/etc
Growing traffic in
platform vs AWS
108
2019
Addressed critical
cross-functional
needs (GDPR,
security, alerts +
SLOs as a service)
Adoption by HMRT
(Highest Maturity
& Revenue Team)
2017
Infra platform
started with few
services
First customer
(centralized
logging, metrics,
auto scaling)
2018
Started using SLAs
and SLOs, clarifying
reliability/latency/etc
Growing traffic in
platform vs AWS
109
Flow of change
CaseStudy
110
CaseStudy
111https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOjdXeGp44E
CaseStudy
112https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOjdXeGp44E
113
https://engineering.atspotify.com/2020/08/27/how-we-improved-developer-productivity-for-our-devops-teams/
What is “Platform as a
Product” and why should I
adopt this approach?
114
115
A platform is optional to
use - no team is forced to
use the platform
116
A platform is carefully
designed and curated
117
A platform simplifies
something for users
118
A platform evolves to take
advantage of technology
changes
119
A platform uses modern
product management
(and service management)
120
Happier users (engineers)
No technology bloat
Designed to evolve
Getting Started
with
Platform as a Product
121
How well can the team understand the
platform abstractions they need to use
on a regular basis?
1 - Assess cognitive load
122
github.com/TeamTopologies/Team-Cognitive-Load-Assessment
What does your platform actually do?
Is this what users need?
What is the UX/DevEx of using the
platform? What should it be?
2 - Define your platform
123
Who is responsible for what? Who is
impacted? How do you collaborate on
new platform internal services?
Collaboration vs X-as-a-Service
3 - Team Interactions
124
Zalando Kubernetes at Zalando
Mercedes DevOps Adoption at Mercedes-Benz.io
Twilio Platforms at Twilio: Unlocking Developer Effectiveness
Adidas Where Cloud Native Meets the Sporting Goods Industry
ITV ITV's Common Platform v2 Better, Faster, Cheaper, Happier
MAN Truck & Bus How to Manage Cloud Infrastructure at MAN Truck & Bus
Farfetch UX I DevOps - The Trojan Horse for Implementing a DevOps Culture
More platform examples
125
126
https://techbeacon.com/devops/how-reduce-cognitive-load-increase-flow-5-real-world-examples
How to reduce cognitive load and
increase flow: 5 real-world examples
Resources
127
teamtopologies.com/resources
(links, slides, video)
github.com/teamtopologies
(templates, assessments, etc)
Thank you!
info@teamtopologies.com
128
Matthew Skelton, Conflux
@matthewpskelton
Manuel Pais, Independent
@manupaisable
Copyright © Conflux Digital Ltd 2018-2020. All rights reserved.
Registered in England and Wales, number 10890964
Icons made by Freepik from www.flaticon.com - used under license

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