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Project Use Cases

Examples of projects I've managed that created significant value for Mailchimp

Product Increment Planning
SAFe style

Director of Project Mgmt - Mailchimp

Challenge:

Teams were working independently with no framework for visibility to leadership. Change requests from leadership were frequent, altered scope and created communication collisions

Experiment:

Teams came together and planned for quarterly increments. These plans were presented in front of the entire company and kept in a public place. Teams showcased work in regular increments to leadership for any visionary guidance.

Results:

  • Complete transparency

  • Clear direction for development teams

  • Feedback loops that didn't exist before

  • Opportunities for course corrections and changes

Wall of ideas

Organizing Dev Teams into Domains

Director of Project Mgmt - Mailchimp

Challenge:

Teams wanted more autonomy to solve business problems and act as independently as possible - including staffing their own squads.

Experiment:

Break the development organization up into business domains and allow those larger teams to self organize into multiple squads to create value for our customers. This required a framework to allow for autonomy but at the same time keep an eye on accountability and great communication.

Results:

  • An organized division of work by business need

  • Domain leaders responsible for their domains

  • Autonomy that the teams asked for

  • An official framework for software development

Rugby Team

Release Management Enhancements

Project Management Consultant - Mailchimp

Challenge:

Release management for teams working on the same or dependent code that have the freedom to release at will can create undesirable collisions. 

Experiment:

A framework of light but intentional communication was put in place. Release plans were revamped for simplicity, a spreadsheet of releases was made available to help with coordination of date choices and a release slack channel just for this purpose with a repeatable pattern for use and sign off sealed the deal!

Results:

  • Almost absent of collisions when the framework is followed

  • Opportunities for great questions - which should be released first and why?

  • Communication availability for anyone who wanted it - anyone could observe and be informed

  • Engineers didn't feel like they were alone anymore

Communication Tower
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