Conway's Law

Melvin Conway is a computer programmer who published his thesis, known as Conway's Law, in 1968:

Any organization that designs a system (defined broadly) will produce a design whose structure is a copy of the organization's communication structure. (Conway's Law. www.melconway.com/Home/Conways_Law.html, accessed June 2016)

Think about the organizations you have worked for and the projects you have been involved with. I guess you can recognize Conway's law in them. A product mirrors the structure of the developing organization because the organization structure constrains the solution space for the products accordingly. And, vice versa, the organization mirrors the product structure because the organization optimizes its work units by aligning them with the product structure.

You may have noticed that Conway said "communication structure" and not "organization structure". The organization structure is visible and is often explicitly documented...