The IT Skeptic - agile

SAFe ain't all bad

skeptic — Thu, 12 Dec 2019 06:33:39 +0000

There's as much heat as light generated by conversations about SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework). I want to share my views, for whatever they're worth. They can be summed up in one sentence: the best day using SAFe is the day you agree you don't need it any more.

The secret to easy organisational change: hacking the org.

skeptic — Wed, 23 Oct 2019 02:41:41 +0000

Our secret is out.

Agile hasn't jumped the shark, it has just escaped the pond.

skeptic — Fri, 11 Oct 2019 22:11:52 +0000

Boy, Agile Enterprise didn't take long to leap over the hype curve into the trough of disillusionment. Agile software has been hammered for some time, and now it's organisational Agile's turn.

The dysfunctions of transformation

skeptic — Fri, 13 Sep 2019 09:19:17 +0000

There are classic mistakes being made over and over as large organisations try to "do Agile", "implement Agile", or *shudder* "transform". I'm getting passionate about preventing the harm.

Fractured Agile

skeptic — Mon, 02 Sep 2019 10:48:32 +0000

Agile seems to go off in many directions. There are multiple flavours of Agile, often driven by one strong personality. Will there ever be a unified vision of Agile quite like there was when the Agile Manifesto was written?
Actually I'm sure there wasn't. I can guess how the conversations went that day. Agile has always been thus, and always will be?

Now we have [last updated 3/9/19]

how much nice is too much?

skeptic — Sun, 14 Jul 2019 09:58:46 +0000

How much nice is too much?

Agile continual improvement

skeptic — Sun, 05 May 2019 21:01:01 +0000

Pursuit of improvement can hurt innovation. Agility is not how fast you can go, it is how fast you can change. So endless optimisation through continual Improvement can misdirect you

Doug Tedder is one of a group of ITSM writers who write good sense. He writes:

Firing people is always a last resort.

skeptic — Thu, 07 Feb 2019 21:24:47 +0000

Firing people should always be a last resort, not an instrument of culture change.

My changing mind

skeptic — Sun, 27 Jan 2019 07:58:47 +0000

It's lucky for me that I don't get the kind of attention which would lead to people comparing my current posts to my old ones. There is nothing worse than having your own words quoted back to you a decade later. And this blog has been going 12 years, so my views have certainly changed over that time - not drifted slightly, but shifted majorly. Here are some examples:

Agile Procurement

skeptic — Fri, 02 Nov 2018 23:28:43 +0000

Agility of procurement is a major issue for many organisations. Especially as we try to increase our agility in working, it is often the procurement department that we run into like a brick wall. E.g. from personal experience it can take months to hire a consultant or contractor, which makes it impossible to work.

New Ways Of Managing

skeptic — Tue, 09 Oct 2018 06:44:35 +0000

I'm now convinced that transformation to Agile isn't about new ways of working, it's about New Ways Of Managing™.
Change the governance, policy, KPIs, system, products, services, and people development. The culture and work will change.
This is the IT Skeptic's Big idea for 2018.

Just enough documentation of practices

skeptic — Sat, 18 Aug 2018 03:02:40 +0000

Let the people doing the work design the work. Stop patronising knowledge work professionals.

Velocity through quality

skeptic — Sat, 28 Jul 2018 23:16:24 +0000

The fundamental axiom of New Ways Of Working And Managing (NWOWAM, pronounced "wow, man!")is "Velocity Through Quality".

Overcoming the dysfunctions of IT project management

skeptic — Wed, 04 Jul 2018 19:44:04 +0000

I've had fun on twitter since I tweeted The 20 dysfunctions of IT Project Management and said that it comes from my presentation "Project Management is the worst thing ever to happen to IT".

The oxymoron of agile project management

skeptic — Mon, 18 Jun 2018 12:36:09 +0000

Talk of "agile project management" is just lipstick on a pig. Project management is the worst thing thatever happened to IT. It's time for it to back out quietly.

CIO magazine - who ought to know better - came up with this bizarre statement:

Mincing money: the boundary between Agile and project funding

skeptic — Wed, 06 Jun 2018 22:34:51 +0000

There is a boundary problem where the "Product not Project" structure of standing teams and streams of work meets the Project/business-case structure of programme/portfolio management and financial governance.

At that boundary, management needs to create white space to stop the two models clashing, and to mince up the money, turning big project gobs into steady team streams.

Ten agile principles that screw up conventional project management

skeptic — Mon, 28 May 2018 21:54:36 +0000

I've been blogging about how we need to shed traditional project management ways of working.

Here are ten Agile principles that sit badly with conventional project management methodology:
1. no known defects, prioritise defects over new
2. product not project
3. bring the work to the teams, stop disbanding and reforming teams

What does going fast mean?

skeptic — Sat, 12 May 2018 21:44:26 +0000

What does it mean to go fast?

Tim Ottinger has a great discussion on this Twitter thread: beware of fast meaning hasty.

People say that "agile" isn't about speed. @JoshuaKerievsky calls out that "moving with easy grace" isn't slow. Maybe ppl can say "agile isn't about doing hurried work" instead?

New Ways of Working: Agile, Devops; do you get it?

skeptic — Tue, 10 Apr 2018 02:33:05 +0000

Nothing is new and everything is new.
There is a change sweeping through our industry the like of which we have never seen before. Do you get it?

If you're treating your colleagues and clients as empowered adults who know more than you do about how to do the work...

Lessons the world took from ITIL

skeptic — Sun, 18 Mar 2018 19:06:12 +0000

ITIL aspires to be customer-centric. If only the reality matched the aspiration. If only the main lesson people took away from ITIL was customer value. In practice I think the world takes away quite different lessons.

Here is a bunch of awful fallacies that the world actually took from ITIL: