3 ms·

Way to put "agile coach" in sneer quotes, when the whole purpose of that whole career path is to help make sure devs aren't wasting their time on bullshit from

Way to put "agile coach" in sneer quotes, when the whole purpose of that whole career path is to help make sure devs aren't wasting their time on bullshit from incompetent business folks, or being burned out, or re-inventing the wheel AGAIN, which in turn earns the shareholders more money and decreases turnover via not burning people out. But then again, I guess we're back to "I'm an engineer, all these non-technical people are non-value-add because I can engineer everything." Even when some of them are, actually, technical themselves and just chose another path to use their skills.

morbicer 3y ago
Most agile coaches directly violate the agile manifesto like "people over processes" or "responding to change over following a plan" I've met some excellent ones that actually do what you claim as their purpose. But vast majority add zero value and many negative value. But I admit it's very coupled with companies' cultures.
hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
Your post is downvoted, perhaps for tone, but I think it's a fair criticism of what I wrote. FWIW, in many of those "technically adjacent" roles I mentioned, I've found that good ones can be worth their weight in gold, where "good" is usually defined as having a very strong attention to detail. Unfortunately, I've found a large number of folks in those roles are not good and that there are "more places to hide" in those roles than strictly technical ones. For example, I think that stellar product managers are invaluable, and I also think that since product manager can span so many functions it's probably the hardest role there is in tech. But I've been extremely frustrated, as an engineer, with many, many product managers who lack an attention to detail of how their own product works, and see themselves more as meeting-scheduler and jira-ticket-updater. So I don't mean to denigrate those professions, but I have found that, compared to software engineers, that bad ones seem to be able to stick around longer. With software engineers, if you can't code it becomes quickly apparent and these folks tend to be forced out or leave pretty fast on their own volition (of course, good coders can have a host of other problems...) But with non-technical/less-technical roles I've found that there is more "chaff per wheat", so to speak.

morbicer 3y ago

Most agile coaches directly violate the agile manifesto like "people over processes" or "responding to change over following a plan" I've met some excellent ones that actually do what you claim as their purpose. But vast majority add zero value and many negative value. But I admit it's very coupled with companies' cultures.

hn_throwaway_99 3y ago

Your post is downvoted, perhaps for tone, but I think it's a fair criticism of what I wrote. FWIW, in many of those "technically adjacent" roles I mentioned, I've found that good ones can be worth their weight in gold, where "good" is usually defined as having a very strong attention to detail. Unfortunately, I've found a large number of folks in those roles are not good and that there are "more places to hide" in those roles than strictly technical ones. For example, I think that stellar product managers are invaluable, and I also think that since product manager can span so many functions it's probably the hardest role there is in tech. But I've been extremely frustrated, as an engineer, with many, many product managers who lack an attention to detail of how their own product works, and see themselves more as meeting-scheduler and jira-ticket-updater. So I don't mean to denigrate those professions, but I have found that, compared to software engineers, that bad ones seem to be able to stick around longer. With software engineers, if you can't code it becomes quickly apparent and these folks tend to be forced out or leave pretty fast on their own volition (of course, good coders can have a host of other problems...) But with non-technical/less-technical roles I've found that there is more "chaff per wheat", so to speak.