I’m interviewing the founders of Team Topologies this week as they naturally came up in every interview on platform engineering. What should I asked them?

What would the founders write in a hypothetical addendum based on what they have learnt since the publication of the book in 2019?

Why do people have so much trouble understanding team-first and why will it never truly work?

@Lucas what do you mean why will it never truly work? can you elaborate? thanks!

Why do many organizations either ignore Conway’s law or refuse to believe it has an impact on their organization and architecture?

Their methods apply best to high growth & steady state organizations. Given the current economic climate, what about in lean situations? Would they change their recommendations or collapse approaches at all?

@Jennifer Riggins It has been my experience that few people understand what it means to be a team. Team members may not only share successes and failures but also responsibilities, duties and rights. Especially when external influences affect the team, e.g. because in hierarchical environments the communication with a team usually happens through a dedicated person or because within the team specialists represent their own areas, it happens that a team is not seen as a unit which then negatively affects the communication with and within the team. Team Topologies deals with this in the chapter "Team-First Thinking" and provides some answers under the heading "Team Members Need a Team-First Mindset". But what if the disruptive factors lie outside the team or are even to be found in the organization's culture? My, admittedly somewhat dystopian question, aims more in the direction of how this change in thinking can be achieved without immediately removing all "team toxic" people, because this is simply not always possible, especially if these people are not team members.

I'm interested in if they have seen any particular types of organisations struggle in adopting their approaches.

thanks so much y’all this was great!