Books
Shape Up
Stop running in circles and ship work that matters. Written by the innovators behind Basecamp — one of the biggest and longest-running software as a service apps — the book gives teams the tools to address the risks and unknowns at each stage of the product development process. Full of eye-opening insights, Shape Up will help you break free of “best practices” that aren’t really working, think deeper about the right problems, and start shipping meaningful projects your team can celebrate.
Productivity is through the roof. It’s infinitely easier to produce good work on time with a clearly shaped pitch upfront and a generous deadline of six weeks.John, Addition
We are now a much more united team. There is no boundary between product and engineering.Simone, Meltwater
We’re actually SHIPPING real features and the team seems more energized.Mike, SynchroNet
We have more focus and purpose. We actively make a bet and stick with it for a pre-determined timeframe.Filip, Lime Technologies
The team has a lot more room for creativity and autonomy on what they deliver. It has been great.John, User Interviews
Full list of essays included
- Introduction
- Foreword by Jason Fried
- Acknowledgements
- 1: Introduction
- Part 1: Shaping
- 2: Principles of Shaping
- 3: Set Boundaries
- 4: Find the Elements
- 5: Risks and Rabbit Holes
- 6: Write the Pitch
- Part 2: Betting
- 7: Bets, Not Backlogs
- 8: The Betting Table
- 9: Place Your Bets
Join the Shape Up forum
If you’re implementing methods from Shape Up at your own company, this is for you. You’ll find deep dives on subjects covered in the book, and practical insights from peers who are implementing Shape Up at their own companies.
Visit the forumI already see my team thinking deeper about the problems they’re solving. By owning scope within the pitch they are making early tradeoff decisions and focusing on delivering value rather than blindly implementing a product requirement.Matt, Automattic
[Before] I totally felt like a delivery manager and had no time at all to think deeply about what to do next. Now, when a cycle is ongoing, I easily get to use 80-90% of my time to figure out the right thing to tackle next.David, store2be
Our team is happier, calmer, and more productive. We’re doing our best work.Dan, Hatch Loyalty
Now, it’s much more common for us to ship something meaningful in six weeks and show faster progress to customers.Phil, Close.com
I finally feel ahead of things and much more confident about the work I give to the team, the understanding of the problem and validity of the solution.Aylon, Actionstep
