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Hi Jan,
> On Feb 12, 2017, at 12:21 PM, Jan Michelfeit [email protected] [extremeprogramming] <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> Separating the teams smells with waterfall, but does joining the two groups together in a team outweigh the cost in this case?
> Does it make sense to split the frontend team and perhaps make the backend part more cross-functional towards the core of the system instead?
> Does anyone have successful experience with frontend+backend teams without full-stack developers (or teams with little shared knowledge in general)?
Well, the point of cross-functional teams is that the individuals may share little knowledge but together they have enough to b build a whole thing. So unless no front-end change requires a back-end change, and vice versa, I’d expect combining these people to work better.
Naturally, full-stack developers are more useful than half-stack ones. The way you get those is to give people experience with the other side of the stack. So imagine the next time a story comes along requiring both sides, we pair up one from each side and they work together to get the thing done. Or imagine mobbing with a larger group of at least a couple from each side. Pretty soon the Java programmers know some Javascript and the Javascript people know some Java. They all become more flexible and valuable.
Now there are things to learn, like how to go in very small slices, and how to build up the design incrementally so that designs are built rapidly instead of in advance. (I’d bet that after they’re finally built, they often get changed anyway, or people wish they were.) All those things have been learned by many teams before yours, and people have been glad they did it.
The team would have to want to learn to work that way, of course. What’s their view?
Ron Jeffries
ronjeffries.com <http://ronjeffries.com/>
Sometimes people just don't want the flower. Sometimes you have to let them walk away.
— Amanda Palmer