Agile organizations are working daily to improve.
There is no substitute for doing hard work.
They try to figure out solutions to challenging problems as they go along, using Scrum as a canvas to illuminate the way.
Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forward.
— Kierkegaard
Non-agile organizations are only talking [5].
The illusion of agility is often established in such companies.
Internal working groups are drafting transformation plans, updated processes, and guidelines.
Where is the doing?
It was one of the findings of the SwissQ agility report 2020.
It is not a transformation if it does not change how you work.
It is not an agile transformation if it does not simplify how you work.
It is not an agile transformation of Scrum if it does not increase the actual collaboration between customers, teams, and stakeholders.
— Gunther Verheyen
Look at all these companies trying to copycat Spotify ways of working.
Their dreadful hope is that the copycat will solve all their flaws.
Agile is not magic nor a silver bullet!
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Agile does not fix poor leadership, poor management, or command-and-control culture.
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Agile does not fix lack of engagement or company political games.
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Agile does not fix people’s ego or lack of motivation.
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Agile does not fix poor behaviors, culture, and mindset.
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Agile does not fix over-allocation of people or lack of focus.
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Agile does not fix poor customer focus.
Agile does not fix poor process workflow or poor collaboration.
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Agile does not fix poor HR compensation processes that do not set the right people’s behavior.
Agile makes it all visible and transparent.
Beware being transparent can be excruciating and induce distress.
Agile is the framework to detect flaws and to measure improvements through an empirical process.
A huge intentional effort needs to be taken by those in the process, willing to fix or improve such things.