Designate a team member to be interruptible, and rotate the responsibility

Overview

Live systems require support. Whether it's responding to incidents, triaging bugs, or answering questions from other teams, these interruptions can be disruptive to engineering work. Constant context switching reduces productivity and increases cognitive load, making it harder for engineers to focus and lowering team morale.

To make this process more efficient, designate a team member to be the primary point of contact for interruptions. This person can handle incoming requests, triage issues, and escalate as necessary, allowing the rest of the team to focus on their work without constant disruptions.

How to do it

• Checked item: Create and maintain a shared calendar or list to track who is designated as the interruptible team member for each period (e.g., week, sprint). Share it with the team and anyone who might want to interrupt your team.
• Checked item: Put every team member on the rotation to share the responsibility and avoid burnout.
• Checked item: Use "shadowing" to onboard new team members by having them observe the interruptible role before taking it on themselves.
• Checked item: Establish clear guidelines on what types of interruptions should be directed to the interruptible team member.
• Checked item: Push interruptive communications (support tickets, incident alerts, questions) to a shared channel or system where the whole team has visibility so additional team members can step in and get up to speed quickly if needed.
• Checked item: Keep a record of common issues and their resolutions to help the interruptible team member respond more efficiently and help team members with less context gain it.

Details

Build the rotation

The rotation should be planned in advance to ensure that everyone knows when they are on call. A shared calendar or list can help keep track of who is responsible for handling interruptions during each period. The rotation should be fair and equitable, with each team member taking their turn.

Don't put new team members on the rotation immediately. Instead, have them shadow an experienced team member to learn how the communication and work should go before taking on the responsibility themselves.

Finally, make building the schedule a collaborative effort. It can be done in a few minutes at the end of a standup, for example. This will allow everyone on the team to speak up if they have scheduling conflicts or preferences.

Make it less annoying

Being the interruptible team member can be a roller coaster. Some days may be boring, with few interruptions. Other days might be hectic, with constant requests. To make the experience more manageable, find ways to make it more bearable.

As someone who isn't currently the interruptible team member, provide support whenever you have time. Be mindful of not getting in the way, but answer their questions, help them resolve issues, and share the load when possible.

Make support duties part of the team's retro. Talk about what went well, what could be improved, and how to make the process smoother for everyone involved. Everyone will be on the rotation eventually, so it's in everyone's best interest to make it work well.

Finally, consider letting the interruptible team member work on low-stakes tasks during downtime. One example is letting them pick their own tech debt tickets out of the backlog. This can help them feel productive even when there are few interruptions, and it will give them a chance to chip away at tasks that might be important to them.