Cross Team Ensembling Bringing developers together

Cross Team Ensembling increases networking, communication, knowledge sharing, and serendipity. These benefits persist beyond your sessions. It's a valuable tool to have in your toolbox.

"All the brilliant people working on the same thing, at the same time, in the same space, on the same computer." - Woody Zuill This is how Agile Coach Woody Zuill describes Ensemble Programming (also known as Mob Programming). Many agile teams are already using Ensemble Programming as an effective means to both improve code quality and increase knowledge sharing. However, Ensembles are generally each confined to a single development team. We also experienced the benefits of Ensembling within our own team, and we decided to try cross-team Ensembling in order to bring new skills and experiences into our team. In this talk, we'll give an overview of Ensembling, followed by our reasoning behind (and experiences with) cross-team Ensembling. We'll examine the key differences between single-team and cross-team Ensembling, and also raise points to consider when organizing and facilitating a cross-team Ensemble. We'll provide examples of how our team was able to upskill itself by working closely with colleagues external to the team – and how that collaboration helped identify and fix a security vulnerability! Finally, we'll talk about how cross-team Ensembling affected other teams and colleagues within the company. And, of course, we'll clear up common misconceptions about Ensembling and discuss what effects cross-team Ensembling might have in your organization (in order to avoid potential unpleasant surprises). You can expect to walk out this talk with: - an understanding of what cross-team Ensembling is - reasons that convince you that cross-team Ensembling is worth a try - reasons that convince your boss/manager/peers that cross-team Ensembling is worth a try - tips for effectively organizing and facilitating cross-team Ensembles