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Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

pragdave.me

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Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#61

Post by keithly »

shadowmint wrote: post #38
bananas wrote: post #7

I found that no methodology works as well as getting the right people in and let them organise themselves. If you have the wrong people, it doesn't matter what methodology or process you bring in, you're screwed. On that basis, methodology isn't that relevant. I just watched a company apply SCRUM to apparently solve process problems and it just made things worse because the staff aren't disciplined or interested in w…

The point of that article is that you need to be self reflective and open to change. I'll post it here again, without any of the other distracting things he said about verbs and so on. Just take a moment to think about what these steps actually mean: - Find out where you are - Take a small step towards your goal - Adjust your understanding based on what you learned - Repeat If you want to work as effectively as you c…

This reminds me of the OODA loop: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop

I think this concept also describes the essence of "agile" well (along with the four points you quote).

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#62

Post by lucisferre »

burkestar wrote: post #36

Disagree. Language is not an immutable thing and is always evolving in its use to reflect the concepts of the people using it. I think capitalizing Agile as a noun makes it a "thing" that we can refer to collectively and ultimately helps us communicate about the concepts that it entails. The unfortunate down-side is when a popular term is misused due to ignorance and misunderstanding by a large group of people - whic…

The problem with Scrum is it is rarely about principles and more about a process. Not that there is anything intrinsically wrong with that, but generally speaking, there are no one size fits all processes that will work for (or "fix") every business and team out there.

If it's really working for you and your team, that's great though. But there really isn't anything magic about Scrum. It's not the silver bullet many of it's proponents sell it as.

And not that I think this is worth anything, but I have learned it from a coach, I'm even a "certified Scrum Master (tm)", which again isn't worth anything, and I worked on a team where everyone was trained in Scrum, using a coach. It was arguably one of the least "Agile" teams I've worked on. Additionally, I've attended and even organized "Agile" conferences, both before and after working with that team.

I agree 100% with Dave.

If you like Scrum I think that's ok, I don't actually think it's a bad process, but in the hands of a mediocre team it's next to useless. However, in a lot of ways things like Scrum are anti-agile. Call it "Scrum" if you want to, but, and you're right, words do have meanings and "Agile" has been co-opted by these consultants for all the wrong reasons.

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#63

Post by loceng »

bananas wrote: post #7

I found that no methodology works as well as getting the right people in and let them organise themselves. If you have the wrong people, it doesn't matter what methodology or process you bring in, you're screwed. On that basis, methodology isn't that relevant. I just watched a company apply SCRUM to apparently solve process problems and it just made things worse because the staff aren't disciplined or interested in w…

The most important factor for allowing this to happen is having as long of a runway as possible. Good vision is important too of course.

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#64

Post by sanderjd »

Nursie wrote: post #53
bowlofpetunias wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Scrum is applied well, all issues with the staff and the rest of the organisation will surface as blocking issues. That's pretty much the #1 reason I find Scrum useful. It makes shit hurt . When introduced in a disfunctional organisation, it's basically a role-playing version of root cause analysis. Of course, when implemented internally in a disfunctional organisation by people who are part of the problem, those…

>> Of course, when implemented internally in a disfunctional organisation by people who are part of the problem, those issues will be swept under the rug and the problem will only get worse. I think that's the point. Agile/Scrum is often just window dressing. If you have a good team then it will give you some nice things like frequent interim releases and a better idea of progress. But if you don't have staff who are…

Which firms are those, in your opinion?

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#65

Post by benjaminwootton »

The author is quite defensive about the commercialisation around agile. I don't think this is warranted.

I'm a developer, but I have described myself as an agile consultant in the past.

This isn't out of cynically spotting an opportunity to make a buck. Its because I've spent a lot of time working in agile environments, learning the pitfalls and how to do it well, and want to share what I really and genuinely think is a better way to deliver software.

When vendors and consultants start to coallesce around an idea, it usually means that the idea is a good one that is gaining traction, coming down from the ivory tower. It's a positive thing and not something to leave the community that you founded over.

I've heard this argument many times over the years, and it always sticks in the throat a little. I'm evangelising an idea that I passionately believe in but am seen to be selling out the community ideals somehow. I walk the same line on my current venture in the DevOps space.

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#66

Post by NAFV_P »

mcv wrote: post #21

I understand what he says, but from a grammar perspective, he's wrong. He complains that Agile, which started out as an adjective, has been turned into a noun. He wants it to be an adverb instead, so he introduces agility, which already is a noun. And then he says it's not a noun. (I'm sorry, but I just couldn't not point that out.) But other than that, I agree. What should be making our work easier has been turned i…

> I understand what he says, but from a grammar perspective, he's wrong. He complains that Agile, which started out as an adjective, has been turned into a noun. He wants it to be an adverb instead, so he introduces agility, which already is a noun. And then he says it's not a noun. (I'm sorry, but I just couldn't not point that out.)

Your knowledge of English programming is excellent, it is a rare and underrated skill. I can only recall one article on English coding posted on HN [0]. BTW love the double negative at the end.

[0] http://antirez.com/news/61

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#67

Post by lucisferre »

projectileboy wrote: post #56

Dave didn't seem to mind cashing the checks he got for all the "agile" books his company published. This piece would have been interesting in, say, 2008, but now he's just riding the wave.

From what I can see none of his own books are actually about "Agile". In fact "Agile development with Rails" is probably the only one that used that word in the title, and I can't really fault him for taking advantage.

Also he wrote some quite good books, 'Pragmatic Thinking and Learning' come to mind. I don't think your comment is particularly fair, nor does it diminish the point he is making in any way even if you're right.

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#68

Post by Nursie »

sanderjd wrote: post #64
Nursie wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Of course, when implemented internally in a disfunctional organisation by people who are part of the problem, those issues will be swept under the rug and the problem will only get worse. I think that's the point. Agile/Scrum is often just window dressing. If you have a good team then it will give you some nice things like frequent interim releases and a better idea of progress. But if you don't have staff who are…

Which firms are those, in your opinion?

I spent a few years inside Big Blue. It moves very slowly but (IMHO) has world class people putting out well written, quality stuff.

It has its dark corners like anywhere else, I'm willing to concede it may just have been the teams I worked with that were awesome, it's certainly not cool, I wouldn't want to spend my whole career working for them and (frankly) god help you if you let one of their salesman in the building... But I learned a lot about doing things right. And now I'm a freelancer without the massive organisational overhead so I get to do things fast and right.

I dunno, maybe a large traditional corp isn't the only answer, but some way of enforcing good practice on people for a while, like a boot camp, so that they can take some of it with them to environments where it's not enforced as rigidly.

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#69

Post by projectileboy »

lucisferre wrote: post #67
projectileboy wrote: post #56

Dave didn't seem to mind cashing the checks he got for all the "agile" books his company published. This piece would have been interesting in, say, 2008, but now he's just riding the wave.

From what I can see none of his own books are actually about "Agile". In fact "Agile development with Rails" is probably the only one that used that word in the title, and I can't really fault him for taking advantage. Also he wrote some quite good books, 'Pragmatic Thinking and Learning' come to mind. I don't think your comment is particularly fair, nor does it diminish the point he is making in any way even if you'…

His words:

"Once the Manifesto became popular, the word agile became a magnet for anyone with points to espouse, hours to bill, or products to sell. It became a marketing term, co-opted to improve sales in the same way that words such as eco and natural are. A word that is abused in this way becomes useless—it stops having meaning as it transitions into a brand."

From his company's website:

http://pragprog.com/categories/practices

I think the callout is appropriate.

Re: Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility)

#70

Post by vpeters25 »

Ingon wrote: post #42
hox wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was it about your standups that were hurting your team? I'm on the fence with daily standup meetings. they definitely can help a team communicate when there are a large number of external forces at play in a larger organization and if there are no underlying asynchronous communication channels available. on the other hand, in a team that communicates regularly with historical communications available to new team…

Among the negatives of standups are: - Rarely the right information. Every person in the team have different needs for information. It is even harder to deliver the right amount and on the right level if your team includes designers, quality engineers, project/product managers. - Rarely at the right time. If your company culture includes flexible hours, no matter at what time you put the standup somebody will suffer.…

I find it really hard to understand how a quick, 5 minute meeting every day can hurt a team.

> - Rarely the right information.

You were doing it wrong: standups are not to give or receive information, just to inform the team what did you do yesterday, what are you doing to day and any blockers.

> - Rarely at the right time.

We schedule them 15 minutes before the first team member goes out for lunch (10:45 am), this forces a hard deadline.

> - Failure to communicate.

You should communicate blockers to your SCRUMMASTER immediately, the daily meeting is to remind him/her the blocker is still there.

> - Finally the "what I did yesterday" part.... If you don't know what somebody is working on, then go and ask him.

This is so wrong in so many ways. The SCRUMMASTER's job is to keep management off developers back and play interference so they can focus on getting the job done.

A stakeholder should NEVER be invited to talk directly to developers about what they are working on. If they want a daily status, they can attend the daily standup where they cannot talk, just listen. If they have questions, ask the scrummaster after the meeting.

The daily standup is a tradeoff, as SCRUMMASTER you promise the team they will not get dragged to any other meeting during the iteration.

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