[extremeprogramming] The all-too-common "Rename Existing Process" 'refactoring'

I thought a new thread would work better here.

On Sun, Nov 3, 2019 at 4:40 PM russgold <[email protected]> wrote:

Now this gives me some hope. A few years ago, one of our VPs announced that
> the organization was going Agile. I’d been pushing TDD for years with mixed
> success; the PMs had noticed that our group, which used it, was much more
> productive than the other groups, which didn’t, but as we were
> geographically separated, it was very hard for me to mentor the others -
> and now, we were getting executive support!
>
> But as John notes, what was imposed was a far cry from what most of us
> thought of as agile. Upper management declared that we were no longer
> organized in management teams, but rather in *scrum teams*, and the
> managers were renamed as *scrum masters*. The PMs were henceforth to be
> called *product owners*, and would attend our weekly status meetings,
> which would now be held every day and called *scrum stand-ups*. All of
> our work was to be listed as taks in JIRA. Oh, and one hard rule was that
> all members of a scrum team had to be within five time zones of another.
>
> I pointed out to my manager (now the new VP) that what were were doing
> wasn’t even scrum, much less agile, but he assured me that we would somehow
> get better at it. Spoiler: we haven’t. I have managed to persuade my new
> team that unit tests are important, and now most developers make it a point
> to write them… once they have the code working.
>
> I work remotely these days, and have found it much harder to teach TDD
> that way; I used to be able to wander to a colleague’s desk or invite him
> to mine to say, look at this. That problem you’re having? Have you tried
> this kind of approach? Or even, come sit with me and tell me what you
> think. That’s a lot harder to do over Slack or Zoom.
>
> I hope to hear what you guys have figured out.
>

I do not work on a project full time, but rather spend 1/4 of the year
working on-site with clients and 3/4 of the year working remotely (and
sparingly) with clients while doing other things. I mention this only to
clarify my context for whatever follows.

I, too, find it harder to teach remotely in that stealthy style. On the
other hand, I have found it surprisingly good to work over Zoom (primarily)
with clients who have already bought in to trying to work with me. I have a
small number of individual clients whom I coach a few times per year. I
also have a few companies as clients whose people I coach several times per
year. They seem engaged and we do good work together, but I consider their
progress still quite slow, possibly because my consistent physical presence
doesn't serve as a reminder to them to practise. I don't quite know. I only
know that they like what we do while we do it, but they don't do it on
their own. I support them and encourage them, but it mostly doesn't "stick".

I suppose that I could try some psychological tricks to nudge them, but
instead I try to spend time understanding their situation better and
helping them come around to either buying in (and doing the work) or not
(and letting other priorities rise to the top). I have also spent
significant time making peace with them not taking my advice. Ultimately,
they pay for me for my advice, patience, understanding, and support, but
not for their subsequent results.

As for your now-VP, I see the usual and ominous "We'll get better at
(Scrum)." When I hear messages like this, I probe for details on the
results they expect and their reasons for even wanting to improve at Scrum
(or Agile or TDD or whatever they think they're buying at the moment). If
they don't know what they're buying nor why, then I can help them with that
problem. If they believe that they know but have strange-sounding
expectations, then I can help them address that risk. I can also let them
"be wrong" because I typically don't have to live day-to-day with their
"wrongness".

And when I did have to live day-to-day with their "wrongness", I spent time
redesigning my life to weaken my dependency on that particular job. Not
everyone has that option, but those that do often underestimate its value.

I don't know whether any of this helps, but there it is.
-- 
J. B. (Joe) Rainsberger :: https://tdd.training :: http://www.jbrains.ca ::
http://www.thecodewhisperer.com

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