Tombola implements new tech team to improve efficiency

Tombola has introduced a new senior team to help improve strategy, collaboration and vision across the operator’s numerous tech departments. The Application Modernisation Team (AMT) will operate as a small virtual team that will include senior developers and engineers, with the purpose of reviewing the operator’s technology landscape and to help solve group-wide challenges. The AMT will also review tombola’s existing technology capabilities and highlight external capabilities that could be implemented. The AMT will then be responsible for formulating a strategy to develop these capabilities and eventually deliver them. The AMT was formed because the bingo business wanted to introduce a level of management to ensure its large, separate development teams were all working to achieve the same goals, despite their relative autonomy and individual projects. The operator said the “complete technical freedom” afforded to its tech teams does increase the “risk that two different development teams solve the same or similar problems in two completely separate ways”. Tombola said this has cost the business time from a development and operational perspective. “This technical freedom is quite unique,” wrote tombola head of bingo operations James Conway. “You don’t see this in many organisations because of the challenges it creates. “The benefits are great though. The problem we have now is that the challenges are starting to encroach on the benefits. If we don’t start to consider and retrospectively review our technology landscape soon, the balance may start to tip in the wrong direction.” According to Conway, most businesses solve the silo problem by forming a separate technology architecture board or team that designs all system implementations. He suggested there were problems with this approach however, including a limit on innovation and restricting ideas to just a select few individuals throughout the business.