1. Replace Status Meetings with Asynchronous Rituals
- Weekly async check-ins: open automatically every Monday with three prompts.
- Roll-up views: squad updates auto-compile into a portfolio dashboard.
- Decision logs: approvals happen in-app and capture context, owner, and timestamp.
How to act
- Pilot with one squad for 2 sprints; retire two meetings to fund the experiment.
- Use lightweight prompts: “What moved? What’s blocked? What’s next?”
- Adopt a two-minute rule: skimmable updates win participation.
Tip: If it takes more than five minutes to write, it belongs in a doc — not a check-in.
2. Guardrails Over Gatekeepers
Templates set policy; automation enforces it so velocity and compliance can coexist.
- Approval matrices: route by amount, risk, or customer tier.
- SLAs by type: incidents get 1-hour reviews, experiments get 24 hours.
- Audit trail: every approval and exception lives next to the work.
approval:
spend <= 2k: SquadLead
2k < spend <= 25k: Director
> 25k: CFO
sla:
incident: 1h
feature: 24h