Lightning talk presentation for Culture and Methods conference Spotify hosted in NYC 2016.

1. How things don’t quite
work at Spotify…
and how we’re trying to solve it
Jason Yip
Agile Coach, Monetization Tribe, Spotify NYC
jyip@spotify.com
@jchyip
https://jchyip.blogspot.com
https://medium.com/@jchyip

2. There’s a Toyota saying
“No problem is a problem”?

3. “No problem is a problem”
describes what is
expected with an
improvement mindset

4. Fixed mindset:
Problems
undermine how
great you are.

5. Growth
mindset:
Problems are
challenges and
opportunities to
improve.

6. I’m going to assume
everyone here has a
growth / improvement
mindset.

7. I’m not going to talk
about what’s great at
Spotify.

8. I’m going to talk about
what doesn’t quite work.

33. Lightning round...

34. “An interested observer should be able
to walk into the team workspace and get
a general idea of how the project is
going in 15 seconds. He should be able
to get more information about real or
potential problems by looking more
closely.”
Kent Beck on Informative Workspaces

35. Most Squads don’t have
Informative Workspaces.

36. Some Squads, especially
newer ones won’t be
familiar with what we
might consider Agile
basics -- partly due to
growth rate.

37. Squads are nominally
responsible for managing
delivery -- not every
Squad is good at it

38. Not everyone
understands the
distinction between
autonomy and
laissez-faire (aka do
whatever you feel like).

39. There seems to more
time spent discussing
individual performance
and growth than team
performance and growth.

40. How should I
think about all
this?

41. Autonomy means you are
free to act.

42. Autonomy also means
you have to face your
difficulties and think and
think and think and solve
problems yourself.

43. Autonomy means you
succeed by never giving
up.

44. Thank you
for your
attention