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It's not explained, but I know exactly what he means. We mandate that development teams and integrated product teams have to use agile methods, but the procurem

by _bnmd 5y ago

It's not explained, but I know exactly what he means. We mandate that development teams and integrated product teams have to use agile methods, but the procurement process itself is inherently not agile. Contracts come with fixed dollar amounts, milestone delivery dates, and requirements that need at least signoff from senior agency officials to change and possibly acts of Congress. Further, the way your "customer" is always an acquisition office rather than actual users of your system, developers can't receive, solicit, or respond to direct feedback from users, which is a pretty basic core tenet of agile development, without which it's hard to see how it can ever work.

ethbr0 5y ago
This. If you want to read more into the precise ordering of the neologism, it's agile sandwiched in the middle of waterfall. Which is to say, the upstream and downstream didn't change how they do things at all, and somehow developers acting differently is supposed to convert everything to agile. Or to put it another way, this is what you get when you tell everyone they need to "do agile" without actually retraining people on what that means and update processes to enable it. Source: experience with healthcare "agile" and "sprints"
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  Stronger: Somehow developers acting differently without the inputs that agile processes require is supposed to convert everything to agile. And somehow it never does...
  - panzagl 5y ago
    In practice most contractors end up hiring a bunch of former users to act as stand-ins for the real operators. These former users then get to engage in continual pissing matches with the acquisition office over how things really get done. Hilarity ensues.
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > Which is to say, the upstream and downstream didn't change how they do things at all, and somehow developers acting differently is supposed to convert everything to agile. Sounds like my corner of the private sector.
- Pokepokalypse 5y ago
  I know the solution! Hire a scrum-master! that will fix it.

by _bnmd 5y ago

ethbr0 5y ago

This. If you want to read more into the precise ordering of the neologism, it's agile sandwiched in the middle of waterfall. Which is to say, the upstream and downstream didn't change how they do things at all, and somehow developers acting differently is supposed to convert everything to agile. Or to put it another way, this is what you get when you tell everyone they need to "do agile" without actually retraining people on what that means and update processes to enable it. Source: experience with healthcare "agile" and "sprints"

AnimalMuppet 5y ago
Stronger: Somehow developers acting differently without the inputs that agile processes require is supposed to convert everything to agile. And somehow it never does...
- panzagl 5y ago
  In practice most contractors end up hiring a bunch of former users to act as stand-ins for the real operators. These former users then get to engage in continual pissing matches with the acquisition office over how things really get done. Hilarity ensues.
tablespoon 5y ago
> Which is to say, the upstream and downstream didn't change how they do things at all, and somehow developers acting differently is supposed to convert everything to agile. Sounds like my corner of the private sector.
Pokepokalypse 5y ago
I know the solution! Hire a scrum-master! that will fix it.