Thin Vertical Slices: When cake gets complicated (Invited Speaker)
In a team aligned by layer rather than product, thin vertical slicing was a foreign concept that “wouldn't work” in our context. With a new project came a new opportunity to work across components in a cross-functional team. Although the UI layer was small, we were able to introduce thin vertical slices in a way that made sense for the project and for the team. In this talk we cover two distinct perspectives on introducing thin vertical slices to a team that traditionally broke up the backlog by component, i.e. ‘horizontal layers’. This is not a technical deep dive on how to create thin vertical slices. Rather, this is the story of introducing a new concept to the team, making it work in our context, the challenges we faced, and how we overcame them. The cake analogy is often used when talking about thin vertical slices, but in our experience it’s more complicated than that.
Outline/Structure of the Talk
30 min talk
Learning Outcome
* Why Thin Vertical Slices is a good idea
* Preconditions that helped us introduce a new concept to the team
* Different ways to cultivate understanding of what’s in each slice
* Things to keep in mind when slicing
Target Audience
Anyone with an understanding of basic agile principles, including Thin Vertical Slices. It's not a technical deep dive so is accessible for all roles.