Death of #Agile #PMOT

OK, so maybe Agile isn’t dead yet. But I think it is certainly starting to suffer from the same disease that ultimately claimed Waterfall and other methodologies. As usual, Steve Jobs saw the issues years ago:

Content over process

Process over Content

Once the focus is on process over content, the patient starts to decline. Process is supposed to improve content by providing guidance and predictability. But if the process is followed blindly and no autonomy is given to team members to customize process, we have placed Process over Content. This happened late in the Waterfall days with additional focus on CMMI ranking and achieving other process certifications.

Most troubling is a lot of the discussion is the Agile world lately is about process and not content. We are talking about who is more Agile than whom. We are talking about absolutes as to how estimating is bad and that estimates should NEVER be done. We are talking about absolutes rather than compromises. You are ignoring Content when discussions gravitate toward absolutes. Is it a key indicator that you are no longer evaluating what needs to be accomplished or what value is. The discussion now is darn it, come hell of high water, we will be doing User Stories, with relative estimating, or not estimating at all. And it doesn’t matter what the clients think or what success is.

I know this because people are writing books about absolutes and not about how to compromise.

But Terry, we do listen to our clients you’ll say. We wouldn’t be doing our professional duty if we didn’t promote our preferred approach. We then customize after.

Fair enough. But your preferred approach is all about process and not content. Process enables content, but process is not content. Your focus is on the process….

I’ll let that sink in…