This document discusses how RunKeeper uses Atlassian tools to support their agile development process. It describes how RunKeeper has multiple teams working on different platforms and releases. It outlines how RunKeeper uses JIRA, Confluence and other Atlassian tools to plan work, track issues, automate tasks, and communicate across teams in ways tailored to each team's needs and preferences. The goal is to empower teams while maintaining structure, speed and quality in their fast-paced agile environment.

1. Sprinting Ahead:
How RunKeeper Uses Atlassian Tools in a
Fast-Paced Agile World
Doug Williams • VP of Engineering • @dcwusa
Rebecca O’Dette • Dir. of Program Management • @rebecca_odette

2. Sprinting Ahead:
How RunKeeper Uses Atlassian Tools in a
Fast-Paced Agile World
Doug Williams • VP of Engineering • @dcwusa
Rebecca O’Dette • Dir. of Program Management • @rebecca_odette

3. Doug Williams
VP Engineering
Rebecca O’Dette
Director of Program Management

4. OUR MISSION:
ENABLE ACTIVE LIVING FOR
EVERY BODY

5. GUIDANCE AND
MOTIVATION CHANGES LIVES

7. RunKeeper and Breeze!

8. Our Challenges !
• Multiple teams – and partners
• Multiple platforms
• Multiple releases

9. Our Teams
The Humanity of Teams
Balancing Tools & Processes
Communications Styles

10. Our Teams
The Humanity of Teams
Balancing Tools & Processes
Communications Styles

11. The RunKeeper Team!
Ensure moving fast together – via Agile and Atlassian

12. Our Values

13. • #1 Value - Users come first !
USERS COME FIRST

14. SPEED & QUALITY
ARE TOP PRIORITIES

15. RESPECT
TEAM INDIVIDUALITY

16. Goal:
Deliver better things out to users
faster, while keeping quality high and
our teams happy.

17. Team Evolution

19. 2014!
Larger, scrappy, “get it done” crew"
New skills, roles & functions"
Robust multi-team Agile set up"

20. Agile at RunKeeper !
Scrum
Backlog
Time boxed “sprints”
Specific team roles
Scrum ceremonies
Story points & velocity
Kanban
Scrum-ban
Backlog
Continuous “pull” flow
No specific roles/
ceremonies
Lead & cycle time
Backlog
Standups
Retrospectives
Iteration cycles

21. Today’s Agile Teams at RunKeeper
RunKeeper
Scrum
Kanban
Scrum-ban
Data
Marketing/Community
RunKeeper
User Support
Breeze
Devops

22. Our Teams
The Humanity of Teams
Balancing Tools & Processes
Communications Styles

23. Teams Are Made Of Humans
And one size does NOT fit all…

24. Except...

25. Democratic Process
Team members opt-in
Optimize their own process
Respect roles and key decision makers

26. Daily Standups!
Vary by team – “made of humans”
Teams select what works for them

27. Team Culture
Celebrate success
Personal Relationships
Have fun!

28. Our Teams
The Humanity of Teams
Balancing Tools & Processes
Communications Styles

29. Balancing Act Between Tools & Process!
Tools & Process
to Empower &
Enhance
Teams using the
tool/process should
be part of the
decision
Optimization not Overhead

30. Considerations for Tools & Process!
þ What problem are you trying to solve?"
þ If there were no constraints how would you solve this problem?"
þ Would being explicit about who / what / where / when / how to
improve the situation?"
þ What’s specific to your company that needs to be considered?"
"

31. Our Atlassian Toolbox
Integrations with these tools / services

32. Keeping It Simple & Structured with Atlassian
• JIRA + Confluence = 1 login
• JIRA Agile – Plan & Work modes
• Logical workflow + minimum # of steps
• Reduce Admin time

33. Keeping It Simple & Structured with Atlassian
JIRA + Confluence = 1 login & easy access to day-to-day info across teams
Login from Google
Apps Menu
Filter by project & custom scrum team field
for board view for each team

34. Keeping It Simple & Structured with Atlassian
JIRA Agile – Plan & Work modes + Quick filters
Make it easy for teams to see what’s coming & what’s current
Fast access to sprints & Quick Filters for what’s important to the team:
per person, by sprint & important team labels

35. Scrum Team Plan & Work Views
Our Backlog
For team
planning &
everyone has
access to
what’s coming
up
Our digital “scrum board”
Transparent status for in
person and remote team
members

36. Kanban Work View
Work in
progress
limits to keep
work moving
Always ready
prioritized
backlog

37. Keeping It Simple & Structured with Atlassian
Logical workflow + minimum # of steps to move from idea to release
Consistent workflow steps across teams / projects =
Everyone knows the workflow & easy admin setup

38. Keeping It Simple & Structured with Atlassian
Reduce Admin time
Share workflows, schemes, issue types, etc. across teams
Examples we use across Scrum specific teams

39. Simplify with Automation
• Stop wasting time copying & pasting
• Reduce duplicate data entry
• Get info to the right people
• Team reminders in Hipchat

40. Simplify with Automation
Stop wasting time copying & pasting
Get work in your queue fast by creating JIRA issues from emails
Emails to
datarequest@rk.com
are automatically
created as “issue”
tickets and added to
the queue

41. Simplify with Automation
Reduce duplicate data entry
Pull from parent tickets: release versions, labels, epics, assignee, etc..
Set up workflow Post Functions to
pull from parent on issue “Open”
Automatically pull content when creating
2+ issues at once

42. Simplify with Automation
Get info to the right people
Auto assign issues by project, issue type, component
“Issue”
created from
email goes to
triage queue
Post Function assigns to
QA Lead

43. Simplify with Automation
Confluence “blueprints” for quick & consistent document formatting
Retrospective
“blueprint” makes
it easy & quick to
capture meeting
notes

44. Simplify with Automation
Team reminders in Hipchat for standing meetings, tasks & GitHub updates
Zapier
automated
reminders
Automated GitHub updates

45. Our Teams
The Humanity of Teams
Balancing Tools & Processes
Communications Styles

46. People & teams have different
ways and preferences for giving
AND receiving information

47. Communication & Different Styles
• Encourage use of multiple channels
• Consider the message, medium, and audience
• Who I need help from? Who else needs to know about this?
• People give/receive information differently

48. Communication & Different Styles
Consider the message, medium, and audience
– Is your message informational, complex, real-time, require collaboration ?
– Confluence is great for documenting, sharing & collaborating
Task lists + @
mentions make
actions and
owners clear

49. Communication & Different Styles
Encourage use of multiple channels
– Standups, in person, emails, hipchat – written, video
– One of our primary forms of communication is hipchat gifs
Our GIF bot Steve
PreBotaine pulls GIFs
in HipChat based on
your specified search
criteria

50. Team Calendars for Communication
Central hub for our release
planning & scheduling
Automatically pull in JIRA
Sprints & Release Versions
Call out release milestones
+ Easy to use for visual
project planning with teams
+ Per product / project
calendars everyone can view

51. Communication & Different Styles
Who I need help from?
Who else needs to know about this?

52. Sprinting Ahead!
• Trust your teams
• Teams are made of humans
• Ensure balance between tools & processes
• Encourage a wide-range of communication styles
#atlassian

53. Thank you!!