Context

Our production workflow is outlined in full within the Production handbook. This is a summary overview, particularly aimed at new people, to get an overall sense of how we get things done.

Principles

<aside> ☝ This is the universal workflow that we believe in. This is a good way to get anything done, whether that’s making a meal, building a bridge, fixing the healthcare system or building a website. It doesn’t matter. This workflow is informed by agile scrum, Getting Things Done, Holocracy and other amazing work done by productivity experts to understand how work gets done most efficiently.

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• Organizations exist to fulfill Objectives*.* In some organizations these will be very aspirational, big picture changes that the organization wants to make in the world. In service-driven organizations, the Objective is typically to serve the client. Leadership is responsible for picking the Objectives and making them clear to the whole team. A single leader should be accountable for each Objective.
• Objectives are fulfilled through Projects, which are discrete chunks of work that will contribute to solving the Objective, and may take anywhere from one week to one year.
• All Projects are composed of Tasks, which are even smaller bits of work that can be accomplished mostly by a single person in a single week.
• Objectives, Projects, and Tasks solve a particular problem or make a particular improvement. This is the “acceptance criteria.” They should have clear constraints on the resources and time available to solve them, based on the organization‘s needs and what the acceptance criteria is worth.
• Objectives, Projects, and Tasks should have a single person who is made “accountable”. This person is judged by whether the acceptance criteria is met. This person must also have full ownership to make the direct decisions about the Objective/Project/Task, without interference. This person should volunteer to be accountable and should never be forced into it.
• Objectives, Projects and Tasks should have a publicly visible timeline. When there is a real consequence to delivering by a certain date, the Project or Task should have a deadline that is respected at all costs.
• Objectives, Projects, and Tasks must be visible to the whole team in a Shared System, with all relevant information documented and nothing kept in people’s heads. The Shared System must be the canonical source of truth about the plan, status, and challenges the team is handling. The team must use and review the shared system regularly to ensure that it is accurate and reflects the ideal plan at any given time.
• The team must agree on a Plan and organize it in the Shared System. The plan should include full clarity on what must happen now, loose clarity on what must happen soon, and a big-picture view of what must happen later.

Summary

• An organization’s purpose is to fulfill Objectives.
• Objectives are fulfilled through Projects.
• Projects are composed of Tasks.
• Objectives, Projects, and Tasks should be publicly visible in a Shared System in which all aspects are documented.
• The shared system is where the team should agree on a Plan.
• Any given Objective, Project, or Task has one accountable person who is judged on whether they fulfill the Objective, Project, or Task within the known constraints. People should choose what they want to be accountable for, knowing the constraints.