Welcome back to our series on managing self-managing teams! 👋 We’ve reached the final instalment, where we’ll dive into the crucial skill of crafting Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that truly work for your team. Let’s turn those dull metrics into powerful tools for success!

When Good Metrics Go Bad

Ever presented what you thought was a perfect set of KPIs, only to be met with blank stares or confused looks? You’re not alone. Many of us have faced the dreaded “Why are we measuring this again?” moment. So, how do we create KPIs that inspire “Aha!” moments instead of “Uh… what?”

The Essential Elements of Effective KPIs

Before we start, let’s review the key properties our KPIs should have:

1. Easily Measurable: No complex calculations or long running batch jobs required.
2. Team-Focused: Avoid singling out individuals.
3. Business-Aligned: Clearly linked to company goals.
4. Actionable: Provides clear direction for improvement.
5. Motivating: Inspires the team to perform better.

KPIs to Avoid

Just as important as knowing what to measure is knowing what not to measure. Here are some KPIs to steer clear of:

• Lines of Code: Quantity doesn’t equal quality.
• Number of Bugs Fixed: Could encourage writing buggy code just to fix it.
• Hours Worked: We’re after results, not time spent.
• Story Points: Often arbitrary and not indicative of real progress.

Real-World KPI Success: The Booking Completion Saga

Let me share a story from a company I once worked at. We implemented a KPI around booking completion that became a game-changer. Here’s what made it so effective:

1. Direct Business Impact: We measured “Incremental Bookings per Day.” This directly showed teams how much they were contributing to the company’s bottom line.
2. Instant Feedback: The real magic was in the immediacy. As soon as an A/B test was turned on, the numbers started ticking. Our experimentation system was linked to a real-time Kafka feed from the booking website.
3. Visible Results: We had TVs on office walls displaying dashboards of running experiments. This visibility created a buzz of excitement.
4. Celebration of Wins: When an experiment showed significant improvement, the Product Owner would take the team out for drinks the day it was taken, when the experiment run finished. It wasn’t uncommon to see teams celebrating their wins at the local bar area in the evenings with a bottle of something and shots on the table.

The excitement was so palpable that one developer even created a Slack bot in his spare time to check experiment results during dinner! He wasn’t going to wait to the next day in the office to see what the users thought about his new feature.

This KPI worked because it connected directly to business impact and provided instant, visible feedback. It almost gamified the process for the engineers, making it thrilling to see in real-time how users responded to new features. The high volume of bookings meant meaningful results appeared quickly, sometimes within minutes.

The result? A highly motivated team, numerous significant wins, and a culture of continuous improvement and celebration.

Aligning Team Metrics with Business Goals

Your KPIs should create a clear line from daily team activities to high-level business objectives. For example:

• Business Goal: Increase market share
• Team KPI: “Feature Adoption Rate” (How quickly users embrace new features)
• Daily Activity: Developing intuitive UI and smooth user on-boarding

Regular KPI Reviews

KPIs aren’t set-and-forget metrics. Schedule regular review sessions with your team to ensure your KPIs remain relevant and effective. Make these sessions collaborative and open to change.

The Ethics of KPIs

Remember these important principles:

1. Never use KPIs as weapons against your team. Using KPIs punitively creates a culture of fear and discourages risk-taking and innovation.
   Example: If a team’s “Time to Value” KPI is lagging, don’t use it to criticise or penalise the team. Instead, use it as a starting point for a constructive discussion about process improvements or resource needs.
2. Prioritise learning and improvement over hitting arbitrary numbers. Focusing solely on numbers can lead to short-term thinking and missed opportunities for meaningful growth.
   Example: If your “Feature Adoption Rate” isn’t meeting targets, don’t push features that aren’t ready. Instead, dig into why adoption is low. Are you building the right features? Is user education lacking? This approach leads to better products and sustained improvement.
3. Celebrate the intent and progress behind the metrics, not just the numbers themselves. This approach encourages a growth mindset and values effort and learning, which are crucial for long-term success.
   Example: Even if a new feature doesn’t immediately boost your “Enthusiastic User Ratio”, celebrate the team’s efforts in user research, innovative design, or technical challenges overcome. This keeps the team motivated and focused on continuous improvement.
4. Regularly review and adjust KPIs to ensure they remain relevant. As your product and market evolve, yesterday’s crucial metric might become irrelevant or even counterproductive.
   Example: If your product has matured, you might shift focus from a “New User Acquisition Rate” KPI to a “User Retention Rate” KPI, reflecting the changing priorities of your business.

By adhering to these principles, you create an environment where KPIs drive positive behaviour, foster learning, and contribute to both team satisfaction and business success. Remember, the goal of KPIs is to improve performance and guide decision-making, not to create pressure or assign blame.

Wrapping Up: The True Value of KPIs

The real power of KPIs lies not in the numbers, but in the conversations they spark, the behaviours they encourage, and the focus they provide. When done right, KPIs serve as a compass, guiding your team through the complex landscape of product development.

Craft KPIs that inspire, illuminate, and drive your team towards excellence. And remember, in high-performing teams, the best KPIs often become obsolete because the team internalises the principles behind them.

What’s the most effective KPI you’ve used? Or the least useful? Share your experiences in the comments below!

P.S. If this post helped you rethink your approach to KPIs, don’t hesitate to share it with your network. Let’s spread the word about better performance indicators!

Hey there, data-driven dynamos and agile aficionados! 👋 Ready to dive into the wild world of measuring team success? Buckle up, because we’re about to turn those vanity metrics upside down and discover what really matters in the land of self-organising teams!

The Metrics Maze: Don’t Get Lost in the Numbers

Picture this: You’re in a maze of mirrors, each one showing a different metric. Story points completed! Sprint velocity! Lines of code! Number of commits! It’s enough to make your head spin faster than a hard drive from 1995. 💿💫

But here’s the million-dollar question: Which of these actually tell you if your team is succeeding?

Spoiler alert: Probably none of them. 😱

The Great Metrics Showdown

Let’s break down some common metrics and see how they stack up:

1. Sprint Completion / Story Points

The Good: Easy to measure, gives a sense of progress. 
The Bad: Can be gamed faster than a speedrunner playing Minecraft. 
The Ugly: Focuses on output, not outcome.

2. Meeting Deadlines / Completing Projects

The Good: Aligns with business expectations. 
The Bad: Can lead to corner-cutting and technical debt. 
The Ugly: Doesn’t account for value delivered.

3. DevOps Metrics (Deployment Frequency, Lead Time, etc.)

The Good: Focuses on flow and efficiency. 
The Bad: Can be technical overkill for some teams. 
The Ugly: Doesn’t directly measure business impact.

4. Business Metrics / KPIs

The Good: Directly ties to business value. 
The Bad: Can be hard to attribute to specific team actions. 
The Ugly: Might be too long-term for sprint-by-sprint evaluation.

The Secret Sauce: Metrics That Actually Matter

“Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.” – Albert Einstein

Al wasn’t talking about Agile metrics, but he might as well have been. So what should we be measuring? Let’s cook up a recipe for metrics that actually matter:

1. A Dash of Business Impact: How many users did that new feature attract?
2. A Sprinkle of Team Health: How’s the team’s morale and collaboration?
3. A Pinch of Technical Excellence: Is the codebase getting better or turning into spaghetti?
4. A Dollop of Customer Satisfaction: Are users sending love letters or hate mail?

Mix these together, and you’ve got a metric feast that tells you how your team is really doing!

The Goldilocks Zone of Measurement

Remember Goldilocks? She wanted everything juuuust right. Your metrics should be the same:

• Not too many: Analysis paralysis is real, folks!
• Not too few: “Vibes” isn’t a metric (no matter how much we wish it was).
• Just right: Enough to guide decisions without needing a PhD in statistics.

The Metrics Makeover: Before and After

Let’s give some common metrics a makeover:

Before: Number of Story Points Completed ❌

After: Business Value Delivered per Sprint ✅

Instead of just counting points, assign business value to stories and track that. It’s like turning your backlog into a stock portfolio!

Before: Code Commit Frequency ❌

After: Feature Usage and User Engagement ✅

Who cares how often you commit if users aren’t clicking that shiny new button?

Before: Bug Count ❌

After: User-Reported Issues vs. Proactively Fixed Issues ✅

This shows both quality and how well you’re anticipating user needs. Crystal ball coding, anyone?

Some of your more technical metrics maybe SLAs as well, for example Quality, we want to deliver business value, without reducing quality.

The user engagement, you can usually glean from some kind of Web Analytics (Google, Analytics, etc), what ever you are using for this focus on the core user actions people are doing on your system, for example with ECommerce it usually Completed booking or step conversion in your funnel. Then these can be near real time even.

The Team Metrics Workshop: A Step-by-Step Guide

Want to revolutionise your team’s metrics? Try this workshop:

1. Metric Brainstorm: Have everyone write down metrics they think matter.
2. Business Value Voting: Get stakeholders to vote on which metrics tie closest to business goals.
3. Feasibility Check: Can you actually measure these things without hiring a team of data scientists?
4. Trial Run: Pick top 3-5 metrics and try them for a sprint.
5. Retrospective: Did these metrics help or just add noise?

Repeat until you find your team’s metric sweet spot!

The Metrics Mindset: It’s a Journey, Not a Destination

Here’s the thing about metrics for self-organising teams: They should evolve as your team evolves. What works for a new team might not work for a seasoned one. It’s like updating your wardrobe – what looked good in the 90s probably doesn’t cut it now (unless you’re going for that retro vibe).

The Golden Rules of Team Metrics

1. Measure what matters, not what’s easy.
2. If a metric doesn’t drive action, it’s just noise.
3. Team metrics should be about the team, not individuals.
4. Metrics should spark conversations, not end them.
5. When in doubt, ask the team what they think is important.

Wrapping Up: The Metric Mindfulness Movement

Measuring the success of self-organising teams isn’t about finding the perfect metric – it’s about finding the right combination of indicators that help your team improve and deliver value. It’s like being a DJ – you’re mixing different tracks to create the perfect sound for your audience.

Remember, the goal isn’t to hit some arbitrary numbers, it’s to build awesome products, delight users, and have a team that loves coming to work (or logging in) every day. If your metrics are helping with that, you’re on the right track!

So go forth, measure wisely, and may your charts always be up and to the right! 📈

What wild and wacky metrics have you seen in the wild? Got any metric horror stories or success sagas? Share in the comments – let’s start a metric revolution! 🚀

P.S. If this post helped you see metrics in a new light, share it faster than your CI/CD pipeline! Your fellow tech leads will thank you (maybe with actual thank-you metrics)!

Hey there, tech leads and engineering managers! 👋 Are you ready to level up your leadership game? Today, we’re diving into the delicate art of coaching self-organizing teams without accidentally morphing into the dreaded micromanager. Buckle up, because we’re about to walk the tightrope of hands-off management!

The Micromanager’s Dilemma

Picture this: You’re leading a team of brilliant devs. They’re self-organizing, they’re agile, they’re everything the tech blogs say they should be. But… they’re about to make a decision that makes your eye twitch. Do you:

A) Swoop in like a coding superhero and save the day? B) Bite your tongue so hard you taste binary? C) Find a way to guide without grabbing the wheel?

If you chose C, congratulations! You’re ready for the world of coaching self-organizing teams. If you chose A or B, don’t worry – we’ve all been there. Let’s explore how to nail that perfect balance.

The Golden Rule: Ask, Don’t Tell

“The art of leadership is saying no, not saying yes. It is very easy to say yes.” – Tony Blair

Okay, Tony wasn’t talking about tech leadership, but the principle applies. When you’re tempted to give directions, try asking questions instead. It’s like the difference between giving someone a fish and teaching them to fish – except in this case, you’re not even teaching. You’re just asking if they’ve considered using a fishing rod instead of their bare hands.

Example Time!

Let’s say your team is struggling with large, monolithic tasks that are slowing down the sprint. Instead of mandating “No task over 8 hours!”, try this:

You: “Hey team, I noticed our sprint completion rate is lower than usual. Any thoughts on why?”

Team: “Well, we have these huge tasks that only one person can work on…”

You: “Interesting. How might that be affecting our workflow?”

Team: “I guess it leads to a lot of ‘almost done’ stories at the end of the sprint.”

You: “Hmm, what could we do to address that?”

See what you did there? You guided them to the problem and let them find the solution. It’s like inception, but for project management!

The Five Whys: Not Just for Toddlers Anymore

Remember when kids go through that phase of asking “Why?” to everything? Turns out, they might be onto something. The Five Whys technique is a great way to dig into the root of a problem without telling the team what to do.

Here’s how it might go:

1. Why is our sprint completion rate low?
2. Why do we have a lot of long-running tasks?
3. Why are our tasks so big?
4. Why haven’t we broken them down further?
5. Why didn’t we realize this was an issue earlier?

By the fifth “why,” you’ve usually hit the root cause. And the best part? The team has discovered it themselves!

When in Doubt, Shu Ha Ri

No, that’s not a new sushi restaurant. Shu Ha Ri is a concept from martial arts that applies beautifully to coaching self-organizing teams:

• Shu (Follow): The team follows the rules and processes.
• Ha (Detach): The team starts to break away from rigid adherence.
• Ri (Fluent): The team creates their own rules and processes.

As a coach, your job is to recognize which stage your team is in and adapt accordingly. New team? Maybe they need more structure (Shu). Experienced team? Let them break some rules (Ha). Rockstar team? Stand back and watch them soar (Ri).

It’s a great way to introduce a process to them that isn’t overbearing, for example you can say how about we try “X” my way fora sprint or 2, see how you like it and evolve it from there.

The KPI Conundrum

“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.” – Albert Einstein

Al knew what he was talking about. When it comes to measuring the success of self-organizing teams, you need a KPI (Key Performance Indicator) that’s:

• Instantly measurable (because who has time for complex calculations?)
• Team-focused (no individual call-outs here)
• Connected to business value (because that’s why we’re all here, right?)

Avoid vanity metrics like lines of code or number of commits. Instead, focus on things like deployment frequency, lead time for changes, or even better – actual business impact metrics.

Why instantly measurable? it doesn’t necessarily need to be instant, as long as it’s timely, the sooner you know results the sooner you can change direction, and if its very timely you can even get to the point of gamification, but more on that in another post.

A good KPI sets the course for the team, can solve arguments and helps them course correct if they choose the wrong direction.

It’s also good to agree on SLAs for technical metrics (Quality etc) to make sure we don’t make a decision that trades off long term for short without knowing.

The Coaching Toolkit: Your Swiss Army Knife of Leadership

Here are some tools to keep in your back pocket:

1. The Silence Technique: Sometimes, the best thing you can say is nothing at all. Let the team fill the void. This will encourage your team to speak up on their own.
2. The Mirror: Reflect the team’s ideas back to them. It’s like a verbal rubber duck debugging session.
3. The Hypothetical: “What would happen if…” questions can open up new avenues of thinking.
4. The Devil’s Advocate: Challenge assumptions, but make it clear you’re playing a role, if you don’t make this clear you may come across overly negative and not supportive.
5. The Celebration: Recognize and celebrate when the team successfully self-organizes and solves problems.

Wrapping Up: The Zen of Hands-Off Management

Coaching self-organizing teams is a bit like being a gardener. You create the right conditions, you nurture, you occasionally prune, but ultimately, you let the plants do their thing. Sometimes you might get an odd-shaped tomato, but hey – it’s organic!

Remember, your goal is to make yourself progressively less necessary. If you’ve done your job right, the team should be able to function beautifully even when you’re on that beach vacation sipping piña coladas.

So go forth, ask questions, embrace the awkward silences, and watch your team bloom!

What’s your secret sauce for coaching self-organizing teams? Have you ever accidentally micromanaged and lived to tell the tale? Share your war stories in the comments – we promise not to judge (much)! 😉

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