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Platform Engineering Team Structures That Work
Ninety percent of organizations now have platform teams, but most just renamed their ops team and expected different results. This episode breaks down the team sizes, reporting structures, and interaction patterns backed by DORA 2025 data that separate successful platform teams from glorified ticket handlers.
Full episode page: https://platformengineeringplaybook.com/podcasts/00057-platform-engineering-team-structures
In this episode, we cover:
- DORA 2025 shows 90% of orgs have platforms, 76% have dedicated teams—when done right, 8% individual productivity boost and 10% team productivity boost
- Optimal team size is 6-12 people (Spotify squads, Microsoft 5-9)—small enough for ownership, large enough for complete capabilities
- Reporting structure matters: companies with 100+ engineers need dedicated platform leader to shield from competing priorities
- Team Topologies interaction patterns: start Collaboration mode while building, evolve to X-as-a-Service when mature
- Success metrics: self-service rate >90%, developer happiness tracking, DORA metrics for consuming teams
- Anti-patterns to avoid: rebranding without role change, underinvestment after launch, skill concentration trap, Field of Dreams (building without validation)
Plus news on Sim (Apache 2.0 n8n alternative), Docker Hub credential leaks (10K+ images exposed), Meta's BPF-LSM replacing SELinux, Litestream VFS for S3, GitHub login failures, and GPT-5.2 launch.
Sources:
- DORA 2025 Report: https://dora.dev/
- Team Topologies: https://teamtopologies.com/
- Spotify Engineering Culture: https://engineering.atspotify.com/
- Backstage: https://backstage.io/
#DevOps #PlatformEngineering #TeamTopologies #DORA #EngineeringLeadership #DevEx #InternalDeveloperPlatform #SRE #CloudNative
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By vibesreNinety percent of organizations now have platform teams, but most just renamed their ops team and expected different results. This episode breaks down the team sizes, reporting structures, and interaction patterns backed by DORA 2025 data that separate successful platform teams from glorified ticket handlers.
Full episode page: https://platformengineeringplaybook.com/podcasts/00057-platform-engineering-team-structures
In this episode, we cover:
- DORA 2025 shows 90% of orgs have platforms, 76% have dedicated teams—when done right, 8% individual productivity boost and 10% team productivity boost
- Optimal team size is 6-12 people (Spotify squads, Microsoft 5-9)—small enough for ownership, large enough for complete capabilities
- Reporting structure matters: companies with 100+ engineers need dedicated platform leader to shield from competing priorities
- Team Topologies interaction patterns: start Collaboration mode while building, evolve to X-as-a-Service when mature
- Success metrics: self-service rate >90%, developer happiness tracking, DORA metrics for consuming teams
- Anti-patterns to avoid: rebranding without role change, underinvestment after launch, skill concentration trap, Field of Dreams (building without validation)
Plus news on Sim (Apache 2.0 n8n alternative), Docker Hub credential leaks (10K+ images exposed), Meta's BPF-LSM replacing SELinux, Litestream VFS for S3, GitHub login failures, and GPT-5.2 launch.
Sources:
- DORA 2025 Report: https://dora.dev/
- Team Topologies: https://teamtopologies.com/
- Spotify Engineering Culture: https://engineering.atspotify.com/
- Backstage: https://backstage.io/
#DevOps #PlatformEngineering #TeamTopologies #DORA #EngineeringLeadership #DevEx #InternalDeveloperPlatform #SRE #CloudNative