How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum • Hacker News Board

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#161

Post by pempem » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:31 PM UTC

mk89 wrote: post #145

nickd2001 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" I realized that it all comes down to "metrics" - end of every sprint, my manager has to present it to his bosses". I wonder how widespread this is.. Certainly that's exactly what I experienced at a previous workplace, and worse than that, people's performance was judged on whether they'd done exactly the "right" stories in a 2 week sprint. Rather than thinking about developing software, people were working out how…

Interesting, I had a very similar experience in the past. I think we just were part of a software factory that is not necessarily bad, it's just a different approach to work. It's much more convenient for a manager to just apply "standard" principles (scrum, 2 weeks, story points, velocity, etc. like a mantra) rather than innovating at this risk of being wrong, difficult, etc. Too much bureaucracy is not good, maybe…

Agreed on the kind of religious adherence which can make the process feels a bit like..a staged show? Stifling instead of open discussion?

"Metrics" though drive when something might be delivered which triggers marketing spend, hiring requirements and so on. It says "we're working on this now and that next" which drives all kinds of internal storytelling about priorities and cascades down (or up?) into quarterly calls.

How do you do it otherwise without having ipod summers?

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#162

Post by jeffbee » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:31 PM UTC

sparsely wrote: post #55

whynotmaybe wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe have a look at this https://trunkbaseddevelopment.com/

This seems to be advocating the second workflow, i.e. pushing on a short lived branch then merging back in (their intermediate setup seems impractical technically for most setups - how do you run standard tests without committing your code, unless you do everything locally?)

This is a very git-centric view. There are other source code management systems.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#163

Post by hallway_monitor » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

bennysomething wrote: post #107

lordnacho wrote: post #17

The thing about Scrum is the observations and principles make sense, but then to sell it as a course they've turned it into very specific prescriptions. I went on a scrum course and the takeaway was basically that feedback is a big deal, and you should try to get some repeatedly and quickly. It's also common sense that you should have tasks written down somewhere, and that some of them are more important than others.…

It also fits very well with feature factory shops: a story fits nicely into a single feature. God help you when you are trying to build a system from scratch with scrum overhead. Not everything is a story or a ticket. It's painful.

This one hurt, it's exactly what I spent the past 18 months doing - building a new system. Luckily my director was sympathetic but the Company loves Scrum and Metrics. Tried to change process unsuccessfully, so I quit to work somewhere saner.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#164

Post by mbeex » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:40 PM UTC

I was there when Agile was invented. In my opinion, Scrum has always been the worst embodiment of a good idea.

In terms of content, teams of experienced developers have always worked in the spirit of Agile (of course there are exceptions). This informal understanding was and is superior to a formal horizontal Scrum implementation. For example, it preserves seniority and true accountability - two things that Scrum pretty systematically destroys in my experience. Initially, I was hoping for additional solutions to problems in the vertical direction - management, customer relations, etc.... But that never materialized, at least in my environment. And since I've been in the industry for more than 20 years, that's not too little.

These days, mandatory Scrum is a contra-indicator for any project that crosses my path as a freelancer.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#165

Post by numbsafari » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:41 PM UTC

jermeh wrote: post #125

hatchnyc wrote: post #22

> Engineers are encouraged to interact with the rest of the business and build relationships with non-engineers. In contrast, traditional companies often make it impossible for developers to interact with the rest of the business. In my experience “traditional companies” will often have a bunch of people in cushy “gatekeeping“ jobs whose main function is basically forwarding emails back and forth between devs and the…

I work in a "traditional company" and the gatekeepers were installed to keep developers from going insane. When we have too much information back and forth between business and engineering, the loudest complaints from the business side (where the $$$ comes from today and tomorrow) drowns out the team's and department's internal goals, which are usually much longer term (meaning the $$$ is in months or years, not next…

This is because businesses chronically underinvest in developer/engineering resources.

Developers tend to be viewed as something that is not "core" to the business, and generally only necessary on a project-by-project basis. So, projects are initiated, resource needs identified, and, since nobody wants to hire a bunch of full-time staff, most likely a consulting firm or off-the-shelf product is selected and configured.

The downside is now you have a thing that needs to be maintained, and probably it will be maintained by a limited pool of "in house experts", who are also responsible for just about everything else.

The net result is that you've got this centralized resource that is under provisioned and, well dear reader, what does your training as a systems engineer tells you will happen with a centralized resource that is under provisioned? Contention? Rising latencies and queue lengths? Disastrous to recover from failures?

You betcha.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#166

Post by hiptobecubic » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:41 PM UTC

williamdclt wrote: post #74

lordnacho wrote: post #17

The thing about Scrum is the observations and principles make sense, but then to sell it as a course they've turned it into very specific prescriptions. I went on a scrum course and the takeaway was basically that feedback is a big deal, and you should try to get some repeatedly and quickly. It's also common sense that you should have tasks written down somewhere, and that some of them are more important than others.…

The whole debating around agile, scrum, kanban etc etc, with seniors hating Scrum yet it being pushed ever and ever again made much more sense when I heard some guy talk about Shu-Ha-Ri ( https://martinfowler.com/bliki/ShuHaRi.html ). Having a strict framework à la Scrum is very helpful for new developpers or new teams, where they don't yet have their marks and need to get a feel of what agility feels like. Being exp…

Maybe if you don't fill a team with nine juniors that have no mentors, you don't get this problem?

It's not like FAANG isn't hiring boatloads of new grads every year. Why don't those people need scrum to get on the right track, but half the rest of the industry seems to?

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#167

Post by g051051 » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:42 PM UTC

> The success of companies and project management approaches is not always correlated

Glad to see the author admit this... unfortunately most scrum cultists can't believe this can be the case.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#168

Post by faizshah » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:42 PM UTC

There’s this image that big tech teams build software where everything is automated and has 100% test coverage and all the infrastructure heals itself and all teams are hyper efficient. It’s not really true, the biggest shared practice between big tech is letting the team’s manager pick whatever methodology works best for them.

The big tech version of scrum is just sprints, stand ups and shipping often. There’s still a waterfall process, mounting technical debt, huge backlogs where everything is high priority, and over committing to slipping deadlines.

I think people should think twice before looking at big tech as the place to learn good management practices from.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#169

Post by gregmac » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:43 PM UTC

erikwiffin wrote: post #128

troupe wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> debating whether it is worth 5 points are 8 I'm baffled by this behavior. If you know it is the next most important thing, why do you care? What would it change in your behavior if it is a 5 vs and 8? If you are looking at a task that you would choose not to do if it were an 8 but choose to do if it were a 5, then you probably look for something that is more important to work on. I think you are right that much of…

I think there's value in that debate (within reason) even as a developer. If Alice thinks a task is worth 5, and Bob thinks it's worth 8, then there's a good chance one of them knows something the other does not. Is Bob aware of some hidden complexity that bumps it up 3 points? Or is Alice familiar with a convenient library that solves exactly that complexity? Planning poker is a convenient time to get that knowledge…

My team doesn't really argue about points next to each other (on the Fibonacci scale) anymore, we just pick by majority and move on.

The conversation is meaningful when it's about 3 vs 8 because exactly as you say, there probably is some hidden complexity not everyone knows about, or sometimes some work has already been done or there's a framework feature that makes it easier than it seems.

But 2 vs 3 or 5 vs 8... this is explicitly designed to be an imprecise number, so let's not waste our time debating which one to choose.

Re: How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum

#170

Post by hnuser847 » Mon, Sep 27, 2021, 2:43 PM UTC

CraneWorm wrote: post #120

jshmrsn wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have sprint retros and generally find them valuable. I’m curious how one would even go about incorporating music and movies into a sprint retro? That does sound painful.

I think they mean when your retro board has a theme; I've seen various themes applied successfully i.e. sailboat: https://metroretro.io/templates/the-sailboat-retrospective

It's amazing how infantilized this industry has become during my short 10 year career. I'm so thankful I switched to product and don't have to deal with this BS anymore.