Great Teams Build Great Software
Better the teamwork, better the culture -> codebase -> product and happier are the customers!
Intro
The recent emergence of AI has made it easier to build software, but if one person builds an application with the help of AI → would it really be great?
Well, it might be, but can we easily make improvements or adjustments based on the needs of the users? And can we scale it to the number of users we would want?
When the software becomes an actual business, the only way we can have long-term success and growth is if we have a great group of people all working together to achieve the one goal → delight the customers!
And all of this is not possible without great teamwork. Teamwork is the essence of building great software long-term. Let’s get more into this next.
Great teamwork is the essence of great software
If you anytime played any of the team sports, you will find this very relatable.
Being successful in basketball, football or volleyball is not possible without great teamwork and the same is true with building software.
Every person who is a part of the organization has a certain role that is contributing to the overall success.
We have different roles inside engineering, like QA, backend, frontend, devOps, architects, managers, etc. And then we have different roles across the whole organization, which are customer success, sales, product management, marketing, etc.
The only way to have successful software is that everyone work together and focus on the same goal. The better we do that, the better we have the culture, the codebase, the product and ultimately, the happier are the customers!
The worst thing that can happen inside the organization is that different departments are not working together but they are individually working only for their own success. I’ve been there and it’s not a great experience.
Sales blame the product department for not delivering expected results, product blames engineering for not delivering what is needed and engineering blames product for creating unrealistic expectations.
After this bad experience, my personal mission became to inspire great teamwork not only inside my team but across the whole organization everywhere I go.
Inspiring great teamwork is my personal mission
If you are a regular reader of this newsletter or your read my daily posts on LinkedIn or Twitter/X you may notice some quite common themes.
I write a lot about how important teamwork is and how important are traits like helping others, being a great person to work with and being able to communicate well in our great industry.
Hence, I also created two shirts, which I proudly wear when doing exercise! One shirt has the quote “Software Development is a team sport” and the other has “Great teams build great software”, which is also the title of this article.
Similarly to what I do via newsletter and on social media, I also do within my role as a CTO. I put in my best effort to inspire good teamwork within my team and the overall organization. I’ll share with you some of the things that I do next!
How I inspire teamwork inside my team
There are a lot of different things that you can do to inspire great teamwork. Here are the ones that I believe have the biggest impact.
Setting correct expectations
What I do is, I already set the right expectations when I’m hiring for a new role and then once again when a new person joins my team. I find this extremely important because:
We inspire the actions of individuals by the way we measure their success.
It’s important to define exactly what success looks like and people will automatically focus on showcasing the actions that are in line with the success.
Here are the example questions that help me to measure the success and productivity of engineers:
Are they focusing on building the RIGHT things and challenging requirements.
How much are they helping others.
How are they contributing to the success of the whole team/organization.
What improvements have they implemented and ensure they get adopted by other engineers.
You can read more about what I measure and what not here: How I measure developer productivity (paid article).
Give frequent feedback
I believe that frequent feedback is one of the best things you can do for your team. It ensures that your people know how they are doing in their roles and are not second-guessing themselves.
And they also receive actionable insights for their growth. I believe giving feedback plays a big part in coaching and mentoring and therefore I do it on every 1:1 meeting I have with my direct reports. I do 1:1 meetings every 2 weeks.
You can read more about how I do 1:1 meetings here: How to have great 1:1 meetings (paid article) - you will also find 🎁 Notion template for great 1:1 meetings at the bottom! It’s the same template that I use for all 1:1 meetings.
Be a great role model for your team
Do exactly what you expect your people to do. Uplift and empower your people, help and support them and overall just be there for your people.
You can be surprised how big of a difference it makes when you actively show the right behaviors. It’s much clearer for everyone to embrace them!