3 ms·

I think I know who Dave is making fun of, and yes, there are plenty of stakeholders who are hopelessly lost and willing to "buy agile" to make it look like they

by oldpond 12y ago

I think I know who Dave is making fun of, and yes, there are plenty of stakeholders who are hopelessly lost and willing to "buy agile" to make it look like they are doing something. Just get all the useless project managers to call themselves scrum masters and hold daily stand-ups (which in the old days we called micro managing) and hope and prey that something works... I've been in this business since the 80's and a consultant since '98, and I can say that although I love the agile approach, busted organizations and "enterprise" consultants are killing the ideas. Agile is a software development approach, not an organization development methodology. The last gig I was on the customer tried to "go agile". All the departments started holding daily stand-ups which quickly became silly repetitions and micro management kill-zones. Picture this, the daily help desk standup: "Yesterday I answered phones, and today I plan to answer phones again." Everyone was doing 'agile' except the software development teams. Maybe Dave is right, all you can do is laugh about it. And then put it all on the cloud.

InclinedPlane 12y ago
At one of my past jobs we did "agile" or "scrums" or whatever they called their bastardized version of an agile process. At one point this involved standups which included over a dozen people and typically lasted between 45 minutes and an hour and a half. Everyday.
- deleted 12y ago
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- EdwardDiego 12y ago
  Gah. So let me guess, the "stand-up" ended up with a bunch of people sitting down, because after all, you can't stand up for that long...? ...the number of people who miss the reason for standing up (to force brevity) is astounding.
  - InclinedPlane 12y ago
    Nope. Everyone stayed standing the whole time. This was at a multi-billion dollar online retailer who shall remain nameless (though it's pretty easy to figure out).
enraged_camel 12y ago
Unbelievable. You just described my previous employer. I was there for over six years and witnessed the transition to Agile. Literally every department, including the sales team, started doing daily stand-ups. I was in a technical consulting role, and our stand-ups were exactly like you describe: "Yesterday I answered seven emails from customers, which took me five hours, and today I'm going to spend the rest of the hours for that task on..." The incredible thing was how much upper management treated Agile as a panacea. It made me realize that they had no idea how to actually run a company, which is why I ultimately quit. I can't work for people I don't respect.
- wpietri 12y ago
  I was involved in the Agile movement early on, and it killed me to see this happen to friend after friend after friend. What began as a bottom-up, respectful approach to finding better ways to work was co-opted by management (and the consultants they hired) and turned into just another stick to beat people with.

by oldpond 12y ago

InclinedPlane 12y ago

At one of my past jobs we did "agile" or "scrums" or whatever they called their bastardized version of an agile process. At one point this involved standups which included over a dozen people and typically lasted between 45 minutes and an hour and a half. Everyday.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
EdwardDiego 12y ago
Gah. So let me guess, the "stand-up" ended up with a bunch of people sitting down, because after all, you can't stand up for that long...? ...the number of people who miss the reason for standing up (to force brevity) is astounding.
- InclinedPlane 12y ago
  Nope. Everyone stayed standing the whole time. This was at a multi-billion dollar online retailer who shall remain nameless (though it's pretty easy to figure out).

enraged_camel 12y ago

Unbelievable. You just described my previous employer. I was there for over six years and witnessed the transition to Agile. Literally every department, including the sales team, started doing daily stand-ups. I was in a technical consulting role, and our stand-ups were exactly like you describe: "Yesterday I answered seven emails from customers, which took me five hours, and today I'm going to spend the rest of the hours for that task on..." The incredible thing was how much upper management treated Agile as a panacea. It made me realize that they had no idea how to actually run a company, which is why I ultimately quit. I can't work for people I don't respect.

wpietri 12y ago
I was involved in the Agile movement early on, and it killed me to see this happen to friend after friend after friend. What began as a bottom-up, respectful approach to finding better ways to work was co-opted by management (and the consultants they hired) and turned into just another stick to beat people with.