# How the BBC Reorganized for Its WebCore Website Initiative

DevFeed: [How the BBC Reorganized for Its WebCore Website Initiative](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/refactor-organisation-19175.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://medium.com/bbc-product-technology/refactor-organisation-80e4e171d922?source=rss----ccd524e1760a---4>)

Author: Graeme Lindsay

Published: 2022-03-07T11:18:47Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [BBC](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/bbc.md>)

Topics: [Website](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/website.md>), [Cloud](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/cloud.md>), [Serverless](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/serverless.md>), [Development](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/development.md>), [User Experience](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/user-experience.md>)

Tags: [cloud](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/cloud.md>), [conways-law](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/conways-law.md>), [engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/engineering.md>), [platform-engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/platform-engineering.md>), [refactor](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/refactor.md>), [reorganization](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/reorganization.md>), [serverless](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/serverless.md>), [team-topologies](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/team-topologies.md>), [user-experience](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/user-experience.md>)

## AI overview

The BBC describes how its WebCore initiative to reimagine BBC Online required organizational changes alongside technical work. The article discusses the history of separate digital-service teams, duplicated capabilities and maintenance costs, and the role of shared platforms and team interactions in creating a single website strategy.

## Source excerpt

Changing the organisation -- to build the technology right.In earlier blog posts, we explored how we moved BBC online to the cloud. This was part of a wider initiative called WebCore, which used a range of serverless technologies to reimagine the BBC website. There were technical challenges we faced integrating WebCore with our architecture, but this initiative has been as much a refactor of our organisation, with profound implications on the people within it. In this blog post, rather than focus just on the technical challenges, I want to share: Some of the organisational history that led to WebCore How we went about re-organising for success How we viewed the team topologies and interaction modes between teams How we view the role of the platform (and the Core teams who build it) in enabling many teams to interact with one another First -- some history... The BBC website is made up of several digital services, including iPlayer, Sounds, News and Sport. Each is a major service in its own right -- with millions of visits every week -- and they have grown independently of one another over several years. This was reflected in the way the organisation was shaped -- with separate departments owning each digital service. This shape meant each individual product achieved its own aims well, but it also meant the user experience across multiple services wasn't as seamless and consistent as it could have been. There were mismatched technologies and duplication between the services. Lots of features, despite being conceptually similar, were implemented multiple times -- with the total cost of maintenance also paid multiple times. Cross-cutting capabilities -- e.g., personalisation and analytics -- were major tasks that each product development team had to tackle themselves. WebCore is part of a strategy to re-imagine BBC Online and create a single website for all the digital services. Standardising onto a single technology set, building shared 'horizontal' capabilities, and sharing com