A template for defining a Team API. A Team API is a description and specification that a team can define that tells others how to interact with that team.
Based on some of the ideas in the book Team Topologies by Matthew Skelton @matthewskelton and Manuel Pais @manupaisable. See pages 47-49 of the book Team Topologies.
See teamtopologies.com for more details about Team Topologies.
Copyright © 2018-2020 Team Topologies - Licenced under CC BY-SA 4.0
It can be useful to define a "Team API" for each team, to improve the team's clarity of purpose and help other groups understand how that team fits into the broader organization. Use this template to help teams think about how they would define their Team API.
Each team should answer the questions and fill in the details below. Remember that the answers and details will be a point-in-time snapshot of team relationships and team interactions.
Date:
- Team name and focus:
- Team type:
- Part of a Platform? (y/n) Details:
- Do we provide a service to other teams? (y/n) Details:
- What kind of Service Level Expectations do other teams have of us?
- Software owned and evolved by this team:
- Versioning approaches:
- Wiki search terms:
- Chat tool channels: #_____________ #_____________ #_____________
- Time of daily sync meeting:
Team type: (Stream-Aligned, Enabling, Complicated Subsystem, Platform)
- Our services and systems:
- Ways of working:
- Wider cross-team or organisational improvements:
| Team name/focus | Interaction Mode | Purpose | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . |
Team Interaction Modes: (Collaboration, X-as-a-Service, Facilitating)
| Team name/focus | Interaction Mode | Purpose | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . | |||
| . |
To help gather the information you could facilitate a session where everyone contributes to create your initial Team API.