# Team Topologies by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais

5 Hacker News commenters recommended Team Topologies by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais and 3 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 4 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** People recommend it as a practical model for organizing software teams around cognitive load. Critics say it tries to force every organization into its prescribed formats.

## Why people recommend it

- Clear model for team cognitive load (2 comments): "the underlying message of not overloading teams with extremely broad feature areas is good" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48988059)) "this model (TT) is a proven solution to the problems of cognitive load" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48644374))
- Topics treated well (1 comments): "These topics are treated pretty well." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49501918))
- Fits most companies (1 comments): "I think those fit most companies." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46151468))

## What people warn about

- Forces one format on every organization (1 comments): "they'd try to force every organization to fit into the prescribed team and interaction formats" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48987932))
- Hard to parse quickly (1 comments): "it's hard to parse in a doomscrolling / i'll-give-this-5-seconds sense." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48934284))
- Much fluff, little substance (1 comments): "Management literature fluff with little substance, but many claims." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48648262))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [The Unaccountability Machine by Dan Davies](https://hackerapproved.com/p/unaccountability-machine.md): 11 recommend
- [Turn the Ship Around! by L. David Marquet](https://hackerapproved.com/p/turn-the-ship-around.md): 10 recommend
- [Shape Up by Ryan Singer](https://hackerapproved.com/p/shape-up.md): 6 recommend
- [Peopleware by Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister](https://hackerapproved.com/p/peopleware.md): 5 recommend
- [Army Leadership by US Army](https://hackerapproved.com/p/us-army-leadership-doctrine.md): 5 recommend

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1942788819?tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)
- [Bookshop.org](https://bookshop.org/a/130825/9781942788812) (affiliate link)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Team Topologies by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais", https://hackerapproved.com/p/team-topologies/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).