Dee Teal · Delivery leadership
Good delivery should be the normal result, not the heroic one.
I lead delivery for enterprise web platforms across arts, health, law and government. Eleven years in, six of them running the delivery function rather than a single project: the people, the practice and the standards around them.
Open source
WordPress 5.6
Release coordinator on the first all-women and non-binary release squad
Team growth
10 to 20
Grew a distributed delivery team in twelve months, across a 6.5 hour time zone spread
Regional revenue
43%
Share of company revenue delivered by the region I led, FY2021/22
Recognition
8 awards
For a national performing arts website I led delivery on
How I run a delivery function
Make it safe to be wrong.
Problems that arrive early are cheap. I build teams where people can raise them without paying for it.
Light touch, properly defined.
Light touch is about how much justification I ask for, not how often we talk. One-to-ones belong to the person, not to me.
Values you can assess.
You cannot assess whether someone is collaborative. You can assess whether they work in the open. I write standards down so they can be measured, not argued about.
Selected work
Human Made · 2018 to 2022
Building a delivery practice in a fully remote agency
Doubled a regional team across three continents and built the practice that is still producing delivery directors.
WordPress open source · 2020
Coordinating WordPress 5.6
Shipping a major release of software that runs over 40% of the web, with no line authority over anyone.
A national law firm · 2026
Taking over a platform nobody could support
Stabilising a headless platform inherited from another agency, inside four months.
What colleagues say
“…embedding agile best practice and directly managing people across multiple timezones and regions.”
Tom Willmot, CEO and co-founder, Human Made
Speaking
Speaking since 2011 on the human side of delivery: client relationships, remote and cross-cultural teams, women in leadership and, now, what AI changes about the brief. Includes keynotes at WordCamp Sunshine Coast and WordCamp Auckland, WordCamp Europe in 2016, 2019 and 2024, and a featured slot at WordCamp Canada in 2025.
Next talk
You’re All Project Managers Now: Why your agent is only as good as your brief
Enqueue, Sydney · 9 December 2026
Writing and conversation
Managing Remotely is where I write about distributed teams, project management and managing yourself. Future of Team is the podcast I co-hosted with James Giroux on performance, feedback, engagement and inclusive leadership.
-
I’m co-hosting the Future of Team Podcast
One of my favourite ‘I slid into their DMs’ stories comes from Rob McElhenny and Ryan Reynolds recounting the beginning days of a friendship that has matured into a(n ad)venture with the North Welsh soccer team, Wrexham AFC. If you…
-
10 things I wish I knew on entering the workforce
Around a food laden table recently, a group of women at various stages in our careers had the chance to share our journeys with our friend, a new university graduate embarking on making the first steps in her career. We…
-
Seasonal Change
Here in the south east of Australia we’re in the early weeks of spring. It really crept up on me this year. I was so absorbed in the routine of my everyday wintery life that for a minute I might…
Get in touch
A talk, a podcast, or a delivery problem worth a conversation. Email me at hello@deeteal.com.