I’ve sponsored quite a few 1-2 person teams, and each team I’ve regretted it. To repeat: I have regretted it every single time.
Interesting. The best teams I’ve ever been on—by any and all metrics: innovation, quality, delivery speed, cohesion—were small, 2 or maximum 3 people. Conversely, the worst teams have uniformly been larger, 6 to 8 people. My experience was that communication overhead and the cost of building even rough consensus were always the bottlenecks, and worth optimizing for. But maybe I work on different problem domains, or in different types of organizations, than the author of this article.
Yes, typically 6–18mo, but shifting responsibilities slightly in that time. The most common pattern was that the small team would build and productionize a project to a steady state, and then fold it into the operational responsibilities of a larger group. The engineers would rotate through that larger group and form new, small teams when business needs arose.
Interesting. The best teams I’ve ever been on—by any and all metrics: innovation, quality, delivery speed, cohesion—were small, 2 or maximum 3 people. Conversely, the worst teams have uniformly been larger, 6 to 8 people. My experience was that communication overhead and the cost of building even rough consensus were always the bottlenecks, and worth optimizing for. But maybe I work on different problem domains, or in different types of organizations, than the author of this article.
How long were you on these 2-3 person teams? Did you have to maintain what you built for years?
Yes, typically 6–18mo, but shifting responsibilities slightly in that time. The most common pattern was that the small team would build and productionize a project to a steady state, and then fold it into the operational responsibilities of a larger group. The engineers would rotate through that larger group and form new, small teams when business needs arose.