Defining the Team's Way of Working (WoW)

Defining Team's Way of Working (WoW)

Why Defining a Team's Way of Working (WoW) is Important

Defining a team's Way of Working (WoW) is essential for establishing clear processes, expectations, and collaboration patterns within a Disciplined Agile (DA) team. A well-defined WoW creates a shared understanding among team members about how they'll work together to achieve their goals. It reduces confusion, enhances team cohesion, and ultimately leads to higher productivity and better outcomes.

What is the Team's Way of Working (WoW)?

The Team's Way of Working refers to the collection of practices, tools, techniques, and strategies a team chooses to adopt to effectively deliver value. In Disciplined Agile, teams are empowered to select and evolve their own process tailored to their specific context rather than following a prescribed set of practices. This approach recognizes that each team faces unique challenges and operates in different environments.

A team's WoW includes decisions about:
- Which agile lifecycle will be followed (Scrum, Kanban, etc.)
- How the team will organize and coordinate work
- Communication protocols and information sharing
- Technical practices and quality standards
- Approach to planning and estimation
- How the team will learn and improve

How Defining the Team's WoW Works

Defining a team's WoW typically happens during team formation or at the start of a new initiative, but it's continuously refined through regular retrospectives. The process includes:

1. Context Analysis: Understanding the team's environment, constraints, and goals

2. Process Selection: Choosing an initial process framework as a starting point (e.g., Scrum, Kanban)

3. Process Tailoring: Adapting the chosen framework by selecting appropriate practices from the DA toolkit based on the team's specific context

4. Explicit Agreement: Documenting and gaining consensus on the selected practices

5. Continuous Improvement: Regularly evaluating and evolving the WoW through retrospectives and experimentation

The DA toolkit provides options for various process areas, allowing teams to make informed choices about which practices best fit their situation.

Exam Tips: Answering Questions on Defining the Team's Way of Working (WoW)

1. Emphasize Context-Specificity: Highlight that there's no one-size-fits-all approach. The right WoW depends on team size, domain complexity, geographic distribution, organizational culture, and other contextual factors.

2. Focus on Choice: Remember that DA is about making conscious choices between viable alternatives, not following prescriptive processes. When answering questions, stress the importance of teams actively choosing their practices rather than applying practices by default.

3. Understand the Goal-Question-Metric Approach: Be familiar with how teams can use goals, questions, and metrics to guide their WoW decisions and measure effectiveness.

4. Know the Process Blades: Familiarize yourself with the various process blades in DA (such as Inception, Construction, Governance) and how they fit together.

5. Recognize the Evolutionary Approach: Emphasize that defining WoW is not a one-time activity but an ongoing process of experimentation and improvement.

6. Understand the Roles Involved: Know who participates in defining the WoW (team members, Team Lead/Scrum Master, Product Owner) and their responsibilities.

7. Connect to DA Principles: Link your answers to the underlying principles of DA such as 'Delight Customers,' 'Be Awesome,' and 'Context Counts.'

8. Cite Practical Examples: Where appropriate, provide examples of how different teams might define their WoW differently based on their unique situations.

When faced with scenario-based questions, analyze the context provided and recommend WoW practices that would be most appropriate for that specific situation, explaining your reasoning based on DA principles.