Test of Scale

REFLECTION SERIES

A couple of years back, me and a colleague were taking an interview when the candidate asked us what does it mean to have growth in Thoughtworks? Spontaneously we both answered - Scale!!

The last 6 years in the role of a Market Partner has been synonymous with scale. I was not only handling multiple clients, bigger projects & accounts, larger delivery engagements & teams but also most aspects of operations for this portfolio. I can proudly say that in the 6 years, I have been able to expand the portfolio tenfold.?

Our India MD has been a great mentor for me in these years and he has a knack of explaining complex things by making them simple. During one such conversation he said, "As you strategise (to handle growth & scale), first think if it can be implemented on your largest accounts, if not, it is not meant for scale and hence not worth the effort."

This was my “aha moment”. I had a couple of large accounts with nearly 200+ people working on each of them. These accounts were handling multiple complex programs for our clients. They were distributed across geographies and had multiple people from different cultures working together. If I was able to implement a strategy or solution on these accounts and still continue maintaining or improving the performance, efficiencies and effectiveness, then it meant I had a solution that works at scale.?

I started calling this my “Test of scale”.

My entire thought process changed. Now, every solution or strategy that I came up with had to go through the “test of scale”. I stopped spending time on coming up with solutions or strategies for smaller accounts or engagements. I would rather spend my effort and energy on thinking of changes that can be implemented at scale. And if they worked for the larger accounts, they would also work for the smaller ones.

I was fortunate to have 2 large engagements in my portfolio that were very? complex and diverse that I could leverage them to test my strategies & solutions for scale. You don't need exactly similar engagements to create your test of scale. Try it on your largest or most complex setups. You will definitely learn a lot from what you already have.

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My reflections from this,

• The most important thing was building a mindset for scale. Once you start thinking about scaling there will be no looking back.
• You need some kind of setup to experiment on, it can be the largest, the most complex within whatever structure you have.
• The test of scale needs to go through the test of implementation as well, else it’s only on paper. So try to experiment in whatever setup you have
• Lastly, learn from what did not work, tweak and improve the process