Team Workflow
Anti-patterns in how teams assign, coordinate, and manage the flow of work.
Quality and Delivery Anti-Patterns
Start here. Find the anti-patterns your team is facing and learn the path to solving them.
3 minute read
Every team migrating to continuous delivery faces obstacles. Most are not unique to your team, your technology, or your industry. This section catalogs the anti-patterns that hurt quality, increase rework, and make delivery timelines unpredictable - then provides a concrete path to fix each one.
Start with the problem you feel most. Each page links to the practices and migration phases that address it.
Not sure which anti-pattern applies? Try the Dysfunction Symptoms section - are you seeing these problems? Let’s learn why.
Anti-pattern index
Sorted by quality impact so you can prioritize what to fix first.
| Anti-pattern | Category | Quality impact |
|---|---|---|
| Long-Lived Feature Branches | Branching & Integration | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Integration Deferred | Branching & Integration | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Manual Testing Only | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Manual Regression Testing Gates | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Rubber-Stamping AI-Generated Code | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Missing Deployment Pipeline | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Untestable Architecture | Architecture | Quality Impact: Critical |
| Monolithic Work Items | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: High |
| Unbounded WIP | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: High |
| Big-Bang Feature Delivery | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: High |
| Undone Work | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: High |
| Push-Based Work Assignment | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: High |
| Cherry-Pick Releases | Branching & Integration | Quality Impact: High |
| Release Branches with Extensive Backporting | Branching & Integration | Quality Impact: High |
| Testing Only at the End | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: High |
| Inverted Test Pyramid | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: High |
| QA Signoff as a Release Gate | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: High |
| No Contract Testing Between Services | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: High |
| Manually Triggered Tests | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: High |
| Manual Deployments | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| Snowflake Environments | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| No Infrastructure as Code | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| Configuration Embedded in Artifacts | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| No Environment Parity | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| Shared Test Environments | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| Ad Hoc Secret Management | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| No Deployment Health Checks | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: High |
| Blind Operations | Monitoring & Observability | Quality Impact: High |
| Tightly Coupled Monolith | Architecture | Quality Impact: High |
| Premature Microservices | Architecture | Quality Impact: High |
| Distributed Monolith | Architecture | Quality Impact: High |
| Horizontal Slicing | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: Medium |
| Knowledge Silos | Team Workflow | Quality Impact: Medium |
| Code Coverage Mandates | Testing & Quality | Quality Impact: Medium |
| Pipeline Definitions Not in Version Control | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: Medium |
| No Build Caching or Optimization | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: Medium |
| Hard-Coded Environment Assumptions | Pipeline & Infrastructure | Quality Impact: Medium |
| Shared Database Across Services | Architecture | Quality Impact: Medium |
Branching and Integration
Anti-patterns in how teams branch, merge, and integrate code that prevent continuous integration and delivery.
Testing
Anti-patterns in test strategy, test architecture, and quality practices that block continuous delivery.
Pipeline and Infrastructure
Anti-patterns in build pipelines, deployment automation, and infrastructure management that block continuous delivery.
Organizational and Cultural
Anti-patterns in team culture, management practices, and organizational structure that block continuous delivery.
Monitoring and Observability
Anti-patterns in monitoring, alerting, and observability that block continuous delivery.
Architecture
Anti-patterns in system architecture and design that block continuous delivery.