The Between
The in-between hosts necessity but not much in the way of excitement.
It is the connecting tissue between high-impact projects without which
those projects could not be completed. But the in-between, as I’m
calling it, is subtle in its importance and will often be forgotten in
the excitement of a new project.
The in-between is not bureaucracy, though. It is the communication,
the automation, the documentation and the process by which innovation
thrives. And just as the in-between is easy to forget, it is easy to
over-endulge. It is true, albeit unfortunate, that the in-between is
doing its job when it is least noticed. If process, tooling,
documentation or communication becomes a topic of conversation during a
project, then something has gone wrong.
Some things to note when the connective tissue is missing or not
functioning properly:
- Teams are unaware of why they’re doing what they’re doing
- Sprint planning takes along time and stories routinely
cross sprint boundaries. - Handoffs are messy and frought with misunderstandings
- The maintenance burden after a project phase is completed is
high. - Regressions in the system after a project is complete are very high.
That is, the cycle of a) bug reported b) bug fixed and c) bug reported
again is frequent. - Team morale is low and in-fighting is common-place.
The health of the in-between can sink an idea as much as the idea
itself.