Emil is a computer scientist with a keen interest in agile methodologies, operational research and the information technology industry.
My journey as a student of agile started about 17 years ago, just after those visionaries signed the Agile Manifesto at the Snowbird Ski Resort in Utah’s Wasatch Mountain Range (Beck et al., 2001). Through the years as I became proficient in various agile principles, practices and methodologies, the answer to one question kept alluding me: Why is it that some companies struggle so much in adopting agile, whereas others seem to take it in stride?
Of course, I was always ready with answers: management resisting change, a company’s culture at odds with agile values, lack of agile training, previous bad experiences, co-location issues, etc. (Dikert, Paasivaara & Lassenius, 2016). But these challenges, even though important to understand, are typically not the true root causes of the issue…and understanding the true root cause will help us understand the “secret sauce” that makes agile work.
While I was attending a backlog grooming session at a very large payments firm, the software development manager became very emotional when a senior leader kept on pushing the teams to deliver more. One of the things she blurted out affected me profoundly: “You just do not understand the heart of agile!” This woman became arguably one of the most successful agile coaches South Africa has ever seen. During a lean coffee event at Scrum Gathering…
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Published at Mon, 21 May 2018 04:00:00 +0000
