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The DIVS model

In this blog post, we present the DIVS model, a lightweight agile process designed for startups with small teams. This is the methodology we use within Alphaus.

DIVS

Background

As a mid-to-late stage startup (started 2015), we had our fair share of using different development processes within our teams over the years. I remember when I joined Alphaus, the current process didn't really have a name. Which was okay since we only had less than five engineers. We had a physical Kanban board, we met every Monday morning to discuss what we did the previous week along with the actual progress, and what we need to do for the week as well. It was simple, effective, and didn't really get in the way.

Now, or at the time of this writing at least, we have four teams with about 5-9 engineers each across multiple countries, doing full-remote development. Before DIVS, our recurring pattern of process usually starts with Scrum, then tweak it a bit to become some sort of a variation of Scrumban, but usually lighter weight. We would call it "Scrumban" or just "Scrum" even though it's really not. And this really went on even when the company pivoted from our previous product to Ripple. There were some efforts into standardizing our process in the past but I would consider them unsuccessful since interestingly, when we started our newest product, Octo, the new team still went through our usual pattern: started with Scrum, then ended up with a not-Scrum-but-still-called-Scrum process. Personally, I don't really mind these dynamics too much since for me, as long as the team does the tweaking, the trade-offs are usually manageable (for them).

Then I came across this article from The Pragmatic Engineer, talking about some of the common processes used in Big Tech. What's really curious to me is that the process that usually sticks with us is closer to the Plan -> Build -> Ship methods commonly used in these companies, than say, Scrum, or Scrumban: the names we call our tweaked methods.

The model

The details of the DIVS model is presented here. It means Design, Iterate, Validate, Ship. It's by no means a novel idea; it's a formalization of what we already do, which is common, and familiar. And I don't think this is unique to Alphaus. I'm sure a lot of startups started with Scrum and ended with a revised version but still call it Scrum, or a version of the Plan -> Build -> Ship method but without a "formal" name. The DIVS model is our proposal to put a name to that tweaked version.

DIVS was designed to be lightweight. Or at least lightweight enough to not get in the way of a startup's preference for speed in development. It's also made to be generic enough to be tweaked as it is intended to be tweaked by teams.

Feedback

We intentionally put it in a public repository (with an MIT licence) for easier feedback, comments, or modifications. Tell us what you think of it.