People desire a structure that allows them to abdicate responsibility.
s/People/Managers/
In many of the cases I have experienced, agile breaks down into an excuse to not plan ("Requirements just slow things down!"), and the elements of it that would drive success are ignored.
So often business leaders just want shit done, and when the technical types warn about reliability or technical debt, there is a lot handwaving. Thus short attention spans see agile as a way to justify shortcuts. When this happens the result can be worse than a poorly executed waterfall model.
Agile works when all the proper elements are used, just like any other endeavor, and it fails for the same contrary reasons. Developers become frustrated when yet another path to accomplishment is blocked.
Disclaimer - Am technical manager. Have watched business peers shortcut to failure. Have fought the battles and lost. Frustration apparent.
This exactly. Agile allows managers to push all responsibility onto the developers (design, testing, deployment, ops, customer service, spec writing, documentation, training, etc), while simultaneously enabling them to demand milestones every two weeks.
I have seen this taken to the extreme-- the management at one company I worked for would not specify ANYTHING in writing. Nothing. Not even bullet points on what a feature would do. They would then micro manage intensely (I had a non-technical VP doing code reviews on a Senior Architect).
Estimates, however, only included development time, never any other tasks, and were always challenged. Deadlines were always hard. In short, we had all the responsibility of Agile but none of the empowerment. Engineering was to blame for everything.
If you think this was some small crazy startup... This companies revenues are about 500m a year. Almost every American has our products in their homes.
"So often business leaders just want shit done, and when the technical types warn about reliability or technical debt, there is a lot handwaving. Thus short attention spans see agile as a way to justify shortcuts."
This is the crux of the problem with agile. The reason it's embraced so readily by business types is the reason that it fails. With the 'justifying shortcuts' description you hit the nail on the head.
Comments
s/People/Managers/
In many of the cases I have experienced, agile breaks down into an excuse to not plan ("Requirements just slow things down!"), and the elements of it that would drive success are ignored.
So often business leaders just want shit done, and when the technical types warn about reliability or technical debt, there is a lot handwaving. Thus short attention spans see agile as a way to justify shortcuts. When this happens the result can be worse than a poorly executed waterfall model.
Agile works when all the proper elements are used, just like any other endeavor, and it fails for the same contrary reasons. Developers become frustrated when yet another path to accomplishment is blocked.
Disclaimer - Am technical manager. Have watched business peers shortcut to failure. Have fought the battles and lost. Frustration apparent.
This exactly. Agile allows managers to push all responsibility onto the developers (design, testing, deployment, ops, customer service, spec writing, documentation, training, etc), while simultaneously enabling them to demand milestones every two weeks.
I have seen this taken to the extreme-- the management at one company I worked for would not specify ANYTHING in writing. Nothing. Not even bullet points on what a feature would do. They would then micro manage intensely (I had a non-technical VP doing code reviews on a Senior Architect).
Estimates, however, only included development time, never any other tasks, and were always challenged. Deadlines were always hard. In short, we had all the responsibility of Agile but none of the empowerment. Engineering was to blame for everything.
If you think this was some small crazy startup... This companies revenues are about 500m a year. Almost every American has our products in their homes.
This is the crux of the problem with agile. The reason it's embraced so readily by business types is the reason that it fails. With the 'justifying shortcuts' description you hit the nail on the head.