Agilistas are often accused of saying, whenever anyone says that Agile failed, of saying "You weren't doing it right." I think we usually start with questions, and the Q and A goes something like this:
Joe Tryer
We tried Agile and it failed.
Sam Agilista
Tell us about your dedicated Product Owner.
Joe
Well, we didn't have a real PO, but we had an Analyst.
Sam
Did the Analyst have the authority to modify the requirements,
and to control scope to bring the project in on time.
Joe
No, we all knew what we had to do and when we had to get it done.
Sam
OK ... tell us how you worked together.
Joe
Well, we figured out our technical tasks and everyone worked on
their tasks.
Sam
What happened then?
Joe Tryer
Well, at the end of the month, when we would integrate the system,
it wouldn't integrate and a large percentage of the stories weren't
really done.
Sam Agilista
I see. Did you try working on fewer or smaller stories?
Did you try working on stories instead of tasks?
Joe
Well, we couldn't, really, because the Analyst wouldn't make them
smaller, said they would be useless if they were smaller. And
anyway, only two of us could do Java, and the DBA and the testers
couldn't really do coding.
Sam
OK. What else?
Joe
Well, the Architecture Team kept saying our design was wrong,
and they wouldn't let us release the code ever, no matter what,
until we changed over.
Sam
So what happened?
Joe
Well, we had a three-month refactoring to put in the new design.
Sam
I see. How did that turn out?
Joe
We had a lot of trouble debugging the app on the new architecture.
Sam
Did your tests help get that going?
Joe
Well, we didn't have many tests so our testers got overloaded.
Sam
So what happened then?
Joe
Well, after almost the whole 90 days, they canceled funding for the
project. So that's why Agile failed.
So by the time the conversation is over, we generally know that Agile failed because it wasn't done. We don't know why it wasn't done, which could be important. But we do know they weren't doing it right.
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