Newsletter (FEBRUARY 2025): Team Topologies Interaction Modes: Breaking Through Common Misconceptions

Written By Ana Ciobotaru
 
 
 

This edition was curated by Eduardo da Silva



Many companies are looking at Team Topologies when trying to improve organizational efficiency and delivery speed. However, the three fundamental interaction modes - Collaboration, X-as-a-Service, and Facilitating - are often overlooked, misunderstood and misapplied, leading to decreased effectiveness and increased organizational friction rather than the intended benefits.

The Collaboration Confusion

The most common misunderstanding of Collaboration mode is treating it as an indefinite state of teams "working together." Organizations often fall into the trap of permanent collaboration, creating what they call "hybrid teams" or "joint task forces" that never seem to end. This directly contradicts the fundamental principle of the Collaboration mode from Team Topologies: it must be temporary and focused on specific learning objectives. When collaboration becomes permanent, it creates hidden dependencies, increases cognitive load, and ultimately slows down the delivery of value rather than accelerating it. In fact, this “indefinite and unclear collaboration” model is not a “Collaboration” as, in Team Topologies, it is an “Undefined Interaction”, which in time may also affect the nature of the teams involved in that interaction, as represented in the following diagram.

The XaaS you don't need or want

X-as-a-Service (or self-servicing interaction) is frequently reduced to simply "creating an API" or "building a platform." This oversimplification leads platform teams to adopt a “build, and they will come” philosophy without listening to their customers and building what they need. The result? Consuming teams spend more time figuring out how to use the service than they save by using it. Or they simply don’t use those services as they are not helping improve their flow (and reduce their cognitive load).

True X-as-a-Service emerges from consumer teams' needs. This requires treating internal services as products, complete with user research, clear documentation, and evolution based on user feedback. To accomplish that,  X-as-a-Service tends to emerge or evolve by leveraging other interaction modes, such as “collaboration” with potential users to understand what they truly need. Often times, some of those teams are already exploring ways to solve the problems at hand - and such Collaboration can help discover that and leverage those learnings when consolidating platforms that can help the stream-aligned teams in the organization.

The Facilitating Fallacy

Perhaps the most misused mode is Facilitating, often confused with traditional consulting or permanent support roles. Organizations create enabling teams that can become crutches rather than catalysts, leading to pushing things into the teams that they were supposed to in the first place. When those facilitating interactions are loosely defined and unclear, they will also become undefined interactions, and with those behaviors, the team also stops being an Enabling Team.

True Facilitating has clear entry and goals, focuses on knowledge transfer or addressing some missing capability, and aims to make itself unnecessary - a concept many find uncomfortable but is essential for organizational growth. This approach allows organizations to support people who know about a certain topic to help others in need of those skills and abilities, which helps improve the overall effectiveness of the organization.

Breaking the Cycle of Misuse

These misunderstandings often stem from trying to fit new patterns into old organizational habits. Real improvement requires understanding that:

  1. Interaction modes are dynamic, not static. Teams should flow between different modes based on their current needs and objectives. Interaction modes evolution tends to be triggered by the needs of teams in the organization - typically from something that is blocking their flow of change.

  2. Each mode has a specific purpose and timeframe. Collaboration should end when learning objectives are met, X-as-a-Service should evolve based on user needs, and Facilitating should decrease as teams upskill or the missing capability is addressed.

  3. Success metrics for each interaction mode are different. Collaboration success isn't measured by how long teams work together but by what they learn, decide, and create with that. X-as-a-Service success isn't about the number of APIs but about service adoption and user satisfaction. Facilitating success is measured by how quickly teams become self-sufficient on the topic of the interaction.

Moving Forward

To effectively leverage these interaction modes, organizations need to:

  • Set clear boundaries and timeframes for each interaction mode

  • Establish explicit exit criteria, especially for Collaboration and Facilitation modes

  • Regularly review and adjust interactions to ensure they haven't drifted from their intended purpose

  • Focus on measuring the right outcomes for each mode

Understanding and correctly applying these interaction modes isn't just about following a framework - it's about creating an environment where teams can work effectively while maintaining their autonomy. When properly implemented, these modes reduce cognitive load, increase delivery speed, and create more resilient organizations.

If you want to dive deeper into Team Topologies interaction modes and understand their critical role in enabling fast flow, Manuel Pais and Matthew Skelton explore this topic in depth in their video-based course, Team Topologies Distilled. In this course, they dedicate an entire chapter to explaining how the right interaction modes—Collaboration, X-as-a-Service, and Facilitating—can help teams work together effectively while minimizing cognitive load. Check out Team Topologies Distilled to gain practical insights and real-world examples of applying these modes in your organization.

What’s Coming Up Next?

We are gathering all Team Topologies events on our Events page and would love to hear your feedback about the ones you have attended or the ones that we have missed.

Join the Community

Over 500 active members are already engaging with practitioners, authors, and enthusiasts in the Team Topologies Community. Launched just over a month ago, the community is quickly becoming the go-to hub for sharing knowledge and seeking guidance on learning Team Topologies or applying its concepts to optimize business and teams for faster flow. Join one of the popular spaces, such as "For Fast Flow" or "For Leaders," to get your questions answered by Team Topologies experts or even the authors themselves. Let's collaborate to explore new use cases and build a valuable knowledge-sharing database that benefits everyone.

Let's welcome our new Team Topologies Advocates:

If you're passionate about Team Topologies and want to become an advocate, we would love to have you join us. Or, if you have a story to share, we would be honored to feature it on the website.

If you'd like to share your experiences or need assistance, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

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Ana Ciobotaru
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