SPACE Framework Assessment
Assess your team across all 5 SPACE dimensions: Satisfaction, Performance, Activity, Communication, and Efficiency. Get a visual radar chart and recommendations.
Our Take
SPACE succeeds where DORA falls short—it acknowledges that developer experience matters as much as throughput. You can't optimize delivery while burning out your team.
Most engineering leaders obsess over deployment frequency and lead time, missing the human factors that actually drive sustainable performance. SPACE forces you to measure what matters: is your team thriving, or just surviving? The best-performing teams we've seen score high across all five dimensions, not just the easy-to-measure ones.
"Teams scoring high on Satisfaction in SPACE have 40% lower attrition and 25% higher productivity."
— Microsoft SPACE Framework Research, 2021
Rate Your Team (1-5)
1 = Poor, 2 = Below Average, 3 = Average, 4 = Good, 5 = Excellent
SPACE Assessment Results
3.0 / 5.0
Average across 5 SPACE dimensions
SPACE Radar
Recommended Focus: Satisfaction
Team happiness, engagement, and wellbeing
- • Run regular developer satisfaction surveys
- • Address top complaints from team feedback
- • Invest in developer experience improvements
SPACE vs DORA
SPACE complements DORA by adding human factors. While DORA focuses on delivery metrics (deployment frequency, lead time, MTTR, change failure rate), SPACE includes satisfaction, communication, and broader efficiency measures.
Try our DORA Calculator for delivery metrics →About the SPACE Framework
The SPACE framework was introduced in "The SPACE of Developer Productivity" (2021) by Nicole Forsgren, Margaret-Anne Storey, Chandra Maddila, Thomas Zimmermann, Brian Houck, and Jenna Butler.
The framework argues that productivity is multidimensional and warns against using any single metric. It's designed to capture both outcomes (performance, activity) and perceptions (satisfaction, efficiency).
Key insight: Activity metrics alone (commits, PRs) can be gamed and don't capture actual value delivered. SPACE encourages measuring satisfaction and communication alongside output.
Frequently Asked Questions
The SPACE framework is a multidimensional model for measuring developer productivity created by researchers at GitHub, Microsoft, and the University of Victoria. It stands for Satisfaction, Performance, Activity, Communication, and Efficiency. Unlike single-metric approaches, SPACE acknowledges that productivity is complex and must be measured across multiple dimensions to get an accurate picture of team health and output.
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Learn More
Why Microsoft Abandoned DORA for SPACE (And You Should Too)
Learn how to implement the SPACE framework from Microsoft and GitHub research to measure developer productivity across Satisfaction, Performance, Activity, Communication, and Efficiency.
Lines of Code Is Embarrassing. Measure This Instead
Stop treating engineers like factory workers. Learn why LOC tracking is embarrassing, which metrics destroy trust, and how to measure productivity without surveillance. 83% of developers suffer burnout—bad metrics make it worse.
What is Developer Productivity? (It's Not What You Think)
Developer productivity means sustainable delivery with team health—not lines of code. Learn the frameworks, dimensions, and what NOT to measure.
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