The longer I stay in this industry, the more anecdotes I accumulate that suggest that software development is not exclusively software development. Software de

The longer I stay in this industry, the more anecdotes I accumulate that suggest that software development is not exclusively software development. Software development is solutions development; but for a large subclass of problems, custom-built software that automates the tedious, predictable, and repetitive parts of the solution has been and always will be a competitive way to solve them. It's synecdoche, a metonymy for "software development [and other assorted disciplines of problem-solving]". Software is the hammer in the toolbox. Things that look like nails get hammered. The hammer is so useful to organizations that have many nail-like objects sticking up, that handypersons who only have a hammer in their toolbox can still work continuously, and may never need to do anything else but hammer things. This may become common enough that folks who also keep vice grips, screwdrivers, hand saws, duct tape, and penetrating oil in their toolboxes are forbidden from using those tools. They were hired for the hammer; they should use the hammer. And what's all this nonsense about non-hammer tools, anyway? We've never needed anything but hammers here, and that's the way we like it. Agile is about advising organizations with strict rules and style guides for nail-hammering to loosen up and let the hammerers determine how to wield their own hammers, and possibly also choose the length and width of the nails. Despite the amount I actually get paid, working upstream of the problem far enough to eliminate both the nail and the hammer--possibly using a more appropriate tool--is apparently above my pay grade. Agile never fixed that. It never even suggested that a non-hammer world exists. Even the CTO position might as well be chief hammering officer. The 'T' restricts the domain of authority. An organization that is agile instead of just Agile needs to have someone around that can meaningfully restructure the company itself, such that the assumptions already built in to its organizational hierarchy are not inevitably replicated in the processes of all of its subdivisions. That's why Agile never fixed anything. The CEOs still kept telling their CTOs to take charge of all the hammers and pound something out. Those companies founded to be Agile put different assumptions into their organization. When that changes, going through the motions of Agile won't help them any more.