4 ms·

This sounds soul-crushing and I hope never to work in such an environment.

porker 5y ago
> This sounds soul-crushing and I hope never to work in such an environment. It isn't. Soul-crushing is doing "Agile" where the "scrum master" tells you how long each ticket will take, where the client is invisible and never involved, and where retro is 1 hour at the end of the sprint and focused on blame.
- chris11 5y ago
  That example does sound really bad. But I would feel disengaged if everything was broken down to 1 point stories at the beginning of the sprint.
  - antihipocrat 5y ago
    I thought the idea was to focus on what is achievable in the sprint. Breaking tasks into separate steps or points exposes the complexity of a task and a task that is listed as 1 point should be fairly quick to implement. For me I'd feel more engaged by seeing that I've contributed to completing distinct points on the board at the end of the sprint. I'm a team of one and only recently started coding a large project. Sometimes I can work entire days only having achieved intangible progress. I'd love to be able to quantify this work as progress toward distinct tasks. Maybe I need to implement an Agile-like system for myself.
- forgotmypw17 5y ago
  The "scrum master" is not telling you how long a ticket will take. They're asking you, can you break this ticket down any further? I see that you have a task to implement validation in the phone number field, can we break that down into three tasks? Determining the format which needs to be applied and edge cases, adding validation to the field on the client side, and also on the server side? Right away, thinking about it this way may reveal certain unknowns which you had not previously thought about. And all of it took an extra minute or two. While your team-mates are also engaged and "THERE" to help. Later you can see which of the tasks took longer or less than expected, and use this to improve your future estimates (during the retro.) This is only skimming the top of the types of benefits you can gain from a good Agile process.
  - porker 5y ago
    No, in this case the "scrum master" did tell us how long the tickets would take, because the cost had already been agreed with the client before we were involved. It was a special place to work.
forgotmypw17 5y ago
Was one of the least soul-crushing and nicest experiences in professional software development.
underdeserver 5y ago
It's not. The time spent in those retrospectives and planning sessions are about the technical aspects - how talks should be broken down, how overall design of interacting components should look like. It's 100% actual work. I'd take these over another bs "status sync" any day.
- username90 5y ago
  Some developers might love just mindlessly doing trivial tickets week after week, since it means they don't have to worry about anything since the job is so easy. But others will view that as soul crushing, you can't say it isn't soul crushing for them.
  - Robin_Message 5y ago
    Being able to break down a complex technical problem into mostly one point tickets doesn't mean it is easy or mindless, just that you're good at planning and executing.
    - username90 5y ago
      It means that the day to day job is easy and mindless, even if it is some ok work being done during those meetings. Doing all the real work in a meeting every other week does seem soul crushing.
    - tkiolp4 5y ago
      There’s a difference between breaking down a complex technical problem in a few days (my approach) and doing it on the fly while doing a sprint planning. Most of Agile people want you to give estimates and simple dumb tasks that break down a complex one; this is fine... but hey, it will take me a week to do so! This is not OK for them (they want the estimate while doing the sprint planning).
draw_down 5y ago
I dunno if it’s quite soul crushing, but entire days of planning and retro certainly are not fun. Pass.
g051051 5y ago
> At the end of the sprint, we spent AN ENTIRE DAY on retro. Before the next sprint started, we spent AN ENTIRE DAY on planning. I'm getting ill just thinking about this. Two whole days wasted every sprint!
- Jtsummers 5y ago
  Two whole days! Oh the humanity! If those two days out of every two weeks are critical to a team hitting their deadlines, then the team is already fucked. If you can't stop, think, talk, and relax for a moment, then you're already behind or will be behind and you'll probably never catch up without risking burnout of the team and mass quitting.
  - g051051 5y ago
    If your team is so dysfunctional that you need two days to stop, think, talk, and relax, then no amount of meetings are ever going to get you on track.
    - Jtsummers 5y ago
      It’s not about dysfunction. It’s about deliberateness. Only idiots press forward without taking time to think and consider how everything is going. By making it part of the routine you help to ensure the absence of that kind of moronic behavior. Press forward and burn out your team with a lack of slack and forethought if you want. No one is forcing you to be intelligent.
      - g051051 5y ago
        It's not about deliberateness, it's about mindless ritual for rituals' sake. Only idiots would perform cargo-cult practices over a set time regardless of need or utility. By using your brain to take time only when necessary you help to ensure the absence of that kind of moronic behavior. Force time wasting meetings and burn out your team with a lack of respect. No one is forcing you to be intelligent.

> This sounds soul-crushing and I hope never to work in such an environment. It isn't. Soul-crushing is doing "Agile" where the "scrum master" tells you how long each ticket will take, where the client is invisible and never involved, and where retro is 1 hour at the end of the sprint and focused on blame.

chris11 5y ago
That example does sound really bad. But I would feel disengaged if everything was broken down to 1 point stories at the beginning of the sprint.
- antihipocrat 5y ago
  I thought the idea was to focus on what is achievable in the sprint. Breaking tasks into separate steps or points exposes the complexity of a task and a task that is listed as 1 point should be fairly quick to implement. For me I'd feel more engaged by seeing that I've contributed to completing distinct points on the board at the end of the sprint. I'm a team of one and only recently started coding a large project. Sometimes I can work entire days only having achieved intangible progress. I'd love to be able to quantify this work as progress toward distinct tasks. Maybe I need to implement an Agile-like system for myself.
forgotmypw17 5y ago
The "scrum master" is not telling you how long a ticket will take. They're asking you, can you break this ticket down any further? I see that you have a task to implement validation in the phone number field, can we break that down into three tasks? Determining the format which needs to be applied and edge cases, adding validation to the field on the client side, and also on the server side? Right away, thinking about it this way may reveal certain unknowns which you had not previously thought about. And all of it took an extra minute or two. While your team-mates are also engaged and "THERE" to help. Later you can see which of the tasks took longer or less than expected, and use this to improve your future estimates (during the retro.) This is only skimming the top of the types of benefits you can gain from a good Agile process.
- porker 5y ago
  No, in this case the "scrum master" did tell us how long the tickets would take, because the cost had already been agreed with the client before we were involved. It was a special place to work.

forgotmypw17 5y ago

Was one of the least soul-crushing and nicest experiences in professional software development.

underdeserver 5y ago

It's not. The time spent in those retrospectives and planning sessions are about the technical aspects - how talks should be broken down, how overall design of interacting components should look like. It's 100% actual work. I'd take these over another bs "status sync" any day.

username90 5y ago
Some developers might love just mindlessly doing trivial tickets week after week, since it means they don't have to worry about anything since the job is so easy. But others will view that as soul crushing, you can't say it isn't soul crushing for them.
- Robin_Message 5y ago
  Being able to break down a complex technical problem into mostly one point tickets doesn't mean it is easy or mindless, just that you're good at planning and executing.
  - username90 5y ago
    It means that the day to day job is easy and mindless, even if it is some ok work being done during those meetings. Doing all the real work in a meeting every other week does seem soul crushing.
  - tkiolp4 5y ago
    There’s a difference between breaking down a complex technical problem in a few days (my approach) and doing it on the fly while doing a sprint planning. Most of Agile people want you to give estimates and simple dumb tasks that break down a complex one; this is fine... but hey, it will take me a week to do so! This is not OK for them (they want the estimate while doing the sprint planning).

draw_down 5y ago

I dunno if it’s quite soul crushing, but entire days of planning and retro certainly are not fun. Pass.

g051051 5y ago

> At the end of the sprint, we spent AN ENTIRE DAY on retro. Before the next sprint started, we spent AN ENTIRE DAY on planning. I'm getting ill just thinking about this. Two whole days wasted every sprint!

Jtsummers 5y ago
Two whole days! Oh the humanity! If those two days out of every two weeks are critical to a team hitting their deadlines, then the team is already fucked. If you can't stop, think, talk, and relax for a moment, then you're already behind or will be behind and you'll probably never catch up without risking burnout of the team and mass quitting.
- g051051 5y ago
  If your team is so dysfunctional that you need two days to stop, think, talk, and relax, then no amount of meetings are ever going to get you on track.
  - Jtsummers 5y ago
    It’s not about dysfunction. It’s about deliberateness. Only idiots press forward without taking time to think and consider how everything is going. By making it part of the routine you help to ensure the absence of that kind of moronic behavior. Press forward and burn out your team with a lack of slack and forethought if you want. No one is forcing you to be intelligent.
    - g051051 5y ago
      It's not about deliberateness, it's about mindless ritual for rituals' sake. Only idiots would perform cargo-cult practices over a set time regardless of need or utility. By using your brain to take time only when necessary you help to ensure the absence of that kind of moronic behavior. Force time wasting meetings and burn out your team with a lack of respect. No one is forcing you to be intelligent.