A(nother) Response to SAFe Criticisms: Part 1

Full Disclosure: I am a certified Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) Program Consultant (SPC).

Before you continue reading this somewhat lengthy, multi-part blog post, let me lay out the prerequisites. Well, really just the one. If you are not already at least somewhat familiar with Dean Leffingwell’s Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) then this post is not going to be as meaningful to you. The official website for SAFe is http://scaledagileframework.com, although there are others out there (Andrew Blain, for example) who have done a good job of explaining what SAFe is.

Last year Dean Leffingwell (and SAFe in general) had a significant presence at Agile2013. In response, Ken Schwaber wrote a provocative blog post entitled “unSAFe at any speed”. What Ken failed to accomplish was to produce criticism that was any more founded than your run-of-the-mill angsty hearsay. He did, however, manage to set off a civil war within the Agile community over whether or not SAFe should be allowed in the Agile club or beaten until silenced or killed. I have been rather surprised at how many “Agilists” have chosen the latter.

Agile has always appealed to my inclusive nature. The goal is outlined in the Agile Manifesto and its 12 Principles. Anything that strives to deliver within the paradigm of the Manifesto and its Principles can be considered Agile. All approaches have strengths and weaknesses, and all approaches focus more on some aspects than others. In the end, though, all approaches are well-intentioned efforts to elevate teams to their potential. I think that’s beautiful, I really do.

A roadblock that has existed for years is that of large organizations who are not already Agile. Getting these behemoths to shift the way they work, much less the way they think, is no easy task. Many have taken the “All or Nothing” approach – either adopt an existing Agile approach in its purest form, wholesale, with no alterations, or surrender yourself to your competition, wither away, and die. Neither of these options is particularly appealing to most of these organizations, so they ignore Agile and continue their status quo.

Along comes Dean Leffingwell and SAFe and, all of the sudden, you have an Agile approach that the organization can use to become Agile. Of course it looks different from the other options currently available, but that’s kind of the point. It aims to establish Agile Principles and Lean Thinking in larger enterprises in increments that are actually realistic. Just as every Scrum team is different, every organization that adopts SAFe does so in its own way. And, just like Scrum, a lot of the implementation details cannot be neatly outlined in a guide or abstract for anyone to pick up and repeat without putting in any of the effort.

The reality of the situation makes the Purists out there really uncomfortable. A lot of criticism has been published. I am going to attempt to address some of this criticism. My intent here is not to get everyone out there to use SAFe. Heck, I don’t even intend for everyone to like it. My intent is to clarify a few misconceptions, first and foremost the one that SAFe is not Agile.

I’ll be publishing my response in multiple parts in order to accomplish this intent. The number of parts depends, at least partially, on you. I want to know what criticisms or misunderstandings of SAFe you would like me to respond to. I would further ask that you communicate with me as a respectful professional (and I’ll do the same). I’ve seen this topic get out of control without ever getting to root cause. Not that I have delusions of grandeur or anything, but I’d like to think that I can help find and address the root cause of these criticisms without it turning into a shouting match. I guess we’ll find out.

Series Posts:
Part 2: 25% Scrum Master
Part 3: HIP Sprints

Caution: Spikes

                Several misconceptions exist around the concept of a spike in Agile Development.  Spikes are an essential part of the development cycle but are inevitably either over- or under-used due to a failure to understand why we create spikes.  Hopefully I can help shed some light on how to use spikes to best drive business value and when to eschew them in favor of directly driving business value through stories.

                Taken from the Scaled Agile Framework website (www.scaledagileframwork.com): “the purpose of a spike is to gain the knowledge necessary to reduce the risk of a technical approach, better understand a requirement, or increase the reliability of a story estimate”.  So that seems fairly straightforward, right?  Unfortunately, due to the nature of human language, different people draw very different conclusions from the same source, taking a fairly simple, direct statement and completely misrepresenting it in ways the author never dreamed of.

                Let’s take the last two parts of that statement first: “better understand a requirement” and “increase the reliability of a story estimate”.  This means that if a team comes across a story that has so many unknowns they can’t accurately provide an estimate for the story, then a spike is in order to perform some research to determine how to best tackle the story.  This research may mean meeting with the end users to get more in-depth knowledge of the business process involved, meeting with other developers to determine the best way to implement a solution, working through external dependencies with other teams or many other activities too numerous to list here.  Performing this research will provide a better understanding of the given acceptance criteria, thereby raising the comfort level of the scrum team.  So how is this one botched?  Developers get spike-happy.   It is not uncommon for developers to become uncomfortable even with small levels of uncertainty and create spikes unnecessarily clogging up the backlog.  As a general rule of thumb, if you are creating a spike for an hour or two worth of research, it is probably not necessary to create that spike.

                Climbing further down this particular rabbit-hole, one must ask the question, “Why does it matter how many spikes I create if it helps make the story more accurate?”  The answer to this question is alluded to in the title of this article.  Customers do not care about spikes.  A spike by its nature delivers no business value and is generally throwaway if anything is actually developed during it.  As a result, it is important to minimize the spikes created unless necessary. 

When faced with uncertainty, the team must assess the level of unknowns in the story and make a determination.  Create a spike?  Perhaps increase the story points a little to account for some possible research needed?  Locate an SME on the story in order to provide feedback on the complexity of the story while pointing it?  The last option is preferable as it eliminates the unknowns immediately and gives the team a reasonable comfort level while actually pointing the story.  In this instance, it is important to be proactive and make sure that SME is invited to the discussion of the story or consulted with beforehand.  The second option of buffering the story points is not the optimal solution but is still preferable to creating a spike since most likely both the spike and story will not be completed in the same sprint.  This delays business value delivery to the customer.  On the downside, it still increases the size of the story, potentially making it too large to be taken in the preferred sprint.

Moving on to the first part of the definition of a spike (in case you’ve forgotten already, “gain the knowledge necessary to reduce the risk of a technical approach”), a spike may be created if a new technology has been decided on and some research or a proof of concept (POC) may be needed in order to proceed forward with development on the stories in question.  I have observed a couple of key pitfalls when dealing with this particular kind of spike that should be avoided if the spike is to be effective in the long-term. 

The first pitfall when dealing with POCs is the failure to time-box it properly.  A POC is throwaway by nature.  Please do not spend more time on it than necessary before completing the story.  Specify a time-box beforehand when planning the spike and ensure that once that time-box is met, the story that initiated the spike is revisited (Many sources recommend specifying the time-box in days or even hours to ensure that the developers involved are actively keeping track of the spike’s time).  If at that point, too many unknowns still remain in order to point the story, then another spike may be needed.  It is critical that the spike is kept as short as possible since again, no business value is being delivered.  That time-box is important because developers typically like to develop (go figure…) and may want to get that POC completely working.  Guess what?  That POC is junk.  Throw it away once you’ve gotten what you need from it and work on something the business cares about.

This leads me to the second pitfall.  Don’t turn the POC into the story.  If the developer starts actually coding the story, then why are we doing a spike?  This is risky for a couple of reasons.  For one, typically POCs are very short-lived and ad-hoc, leading to coding them with looser standards than we might have for our flagship applications.  If the POC starts to turn into the actual application, there are likely some bad habits that do not need to be carried forth.  Another concern with mutating a POC into story is hidden in intrinsic idea that we are in agile development and as such, things change.  The developer runs the risk of working on an actual story, integrating into the environment, and then ultimately undoing it when priorities shift or the technology being used doesn’t pan out.  And I haven’t met a developer yet that loves rework.  If you are still trying to decide what color to paint your house, you are probably not going to just start painting the front of your house with the first color you find that you sort of like the look of, right?   The important thing to remember with POCs is to keep them simple and keep them focused on the key unknowns that are being solved for.  Your POC does not need to adhere to all coding standards.  It does not need to have a full suite of J-Units.  It does not need to look pretty.  Heck, it really doesn’t even have to completely work, as long as you’ve gotten what you need out of it. 

In summary, spikes are absolutely important when used properly but are easily abused.  A good rule of thumb is not to spend more than a day or two on a spike unless you are dealing with a large number of complex unknowns in which you may have a few spikes to deal with.  Use your best judgment and remember than your customer does not care about these spikes.  Treat them like the begrudging necessity that they are and not as your top tool in the tackle box.

I Madge I'll - Agile Posers

When I meet someone who wants to talk about Agile I start by asking, "What do you know about Agile?" Most of the time I begin to hear those key buzzwords the newly indoctrinated are so proud to spout off: "It's where, instead of Waterfall," said with a grin and a wink, "your scrum has sprints and they stand up and there's no requirements and you demo and it's amazing!" I often think to myself, "Seriously? Why do these people think this?" So recently I decided to apply Occam's Razor and ask what the simplest answer is. My conclusion? Somebody told them this.

Consultant Speak*

Okay, so I don't think anyone told them something quite so incoherent as what I put, but they definitely started out with 1) a specific methodology in mind, almost certainly Scrum, and 2) an unholy amount of buzzwords and Agile vocabulary to accentuate just how different Agile is from the dreaded Waterfall. I get it - you're probably (relatively) new to Scrum and you're super excited about it and want the whole world to know how it changed your life. Unless, of course, you're a consultant who's trying to confuse a potential client into throwing money at you to turn their IT shop around. Tsk, tsk.

"...It's Not What You SAY, It's What You HEAR!"

The problem is these people don't know what Agile is. They don't fully understand what it is they're saying. All they know is that if they keep saying certain words with enough conviction then people will think they know what they're talking about. It reminds me of the game "Mad Gab". In case you're not familiar, players in the game read words on a card that don't really make any sense. They're not supposed to. The words on the cards, said with the correct inflection and pacing, are supposed to sound just like a commonplace phrase that your team is trying to guess. For example, these new, hopeful, and largely ignorant future Agilists are saying "I Madge I'll" in hopes that you'll hear "I'm Agile"! The problem is they aren't.

Agile Posers

I was recently working with a fellow Agile Coach (I know, I don't care for the term, either, but I'm not sure what else to call him) and we were collaboratively taking notes via Google Docs. On occasion we would have an impromptu discussion in the document due to a tangent that our notes took us on. One such tangential conversation was about Agile Posers. It went a little something like this:

"‘how to spot an agile poser’ (consultant-speak?)

1.one who pretends to be someone who's not. 2. who tries to fit in but with exaggeration
urban dictionaryl33t speakpwned you, you poser

'5. Someone whos acts like someone they’re not,but not realizing that there being fake, basically a loser trying to fit in.' - UrbanDictionary.com

'6. A poser is someone who tries hard to be something they arent. Usually, posers call other people posers because they are jealous that the person they called a poser is more skater/stoner/goth/punk/rocker/grunge/Agile/etc. than they will ever be.' - UrbanDictionary.com

posers often fool themselves first.  they aren't always (deliberately) not

ask probing questions.  why do you like it, what was good, test their belief."

On the off-chance any of my readers are Trekkies...

Our conversation went on to include things such as mining for conflict and Open Space sessions as means to help draw out and coach Agile posers. Take another look at definition #5. These are the people I'm talking about here. Those who want to be Agile, who hear about it and crave to belong. They'll ask anyone who claims to be Agile what that means and they'll cling to whatever they're told. So what's the take-away here? Tell them the right thing!

Being Agile vs. Doing Scrum

When people ask me what Agile is, I always go to the Manifesto and backing Principles first. I emphasize over and again that Agile is a way of thinking, a paradigm, a perspective, an approach. Yes, there are implementations and yes, Scrum is the most popular by far and yes, there are those who will tell you that the definition of Agile is Scrum. I'm here to tell you that it's not.

So what's the harm in people thinking Agile is just Scrum? Scrum's not all that bad. Of course it's not. I love Scrum, it's helped my organization tremendously. The problem with believing that Agile is just Scrum is it sends you on a quest to be the best implementer of a set of practices. Your Retros will eventually dry up because you can't get any more Scrum-like. But you'll keep doing them because "that's Scrum." You have to understand why Scrum is set up the way it is. Why you're asked to perform certain ceremonies. You have to know in what direction to Adapt when you Inspect in your Retros. And, most importantly, you have to be willing to break the rules like an artist once you've mastered them. You have to be willing to try things that are not in the Scrum Guide. You need Kaizen!

I'm Right!.. Am I Right?

As per usual, I don't have much to go on here other than my experiences and the stories I hear from others. So I want to know: What does being an "Agile Poser" mean to you? Have you experienced those "Mad Gab" Agile enthusiasts? Have I hit the mark on being Agile versus doing Scrum, or am I way off base? I want to know what you think, and I want to use your ideas to make myself better (being completely transparent here). Please leave a comment or shoot me a message on LinkedIn. I'd love to hear from you.



* I received some feedback that this post was offensive to consultants. I would like to clarify that I am not trying to group all consultants together and say that they are all this way. I am basing this on conversations I've had with people who were introduced to Agile by these types of consultants; observations from a friend who is a former consultant; and my first-hand experience with sub-par consultants. I know there are amazing consultants out there - I've met them, too, and admire the work they do - but there are an alarming number of consultants out there who do fit this bill.

Descriptive versus Prescriptive

“Imposing an agile process from the outside strips the team of the self-determination which is at the heart of agile thinking.” -Martin Fowler, Agile Manifesto signatory, from his October 2006 blog post, “Agile Imposition”

As a member of the SAFe community, I've heard and experienced a lot of concern and displeasure with what is perceived as a highly prescriptive Agile framework. However, having actually met and worked with Dean, Colin, and Alex, I have never felt they were trying to shove a framework down my throat. To me it felt more like "your organization is new to Agile and we come with decades of experience; try this framework on, including all of these recommended practices, see how it fits, then tailor it accordingly." Granted, that vibe came from face-to-face conversations, not websites and white papers.

This problem is not unique to SAFe. Pure Agilists have always pushed for a more "hands-off" approach. It's interesting to me how married some of agilists become to a certain methodology - conversations with these people usually boil down to "you should let people do whatever they want, but if you're a good coach and they really get the principles then they're most likely going to go with my favorite methodology." This is often coupled with, "I also offer Agile Coaching services..." The problem is, they've got a point about the coaching. You can't leave teams all to themselves; you have to support them somehow. I'm not saying all Agile teams need a dedicated Agile Coach, but they need the resources necessary to ensure the direction in which they adapt is in accordance with Agile principles and the environment that will support them when (not if) they fail.

Many of my thoughts on this subject have recently been affected by the information I was recently exposed to at OpenAgileAdoption.com. One of the references cited is Martin Fowler's "Agile Imposition" - an article written nearly seven years ago and more relevant now than ever before. Of course, Fowler and Open Agile Adoption are both focused more on organizational transformation than prescriptive frameworks, but I think the principles still apply. It all boils down to enacting change through influence but without mandate. It's a principle that every good Scrum Master is already familiar with - Servant Leadership. You've got to not only lead the horse to water but get them to realize just how parched they are!

So how do you do this within the context of a framework? My opinion: change the way you say what you're trying to say. More specifically, make it clear why you recommend certain practices, when they're relevant and highly likely to improve results, and when it might make sense to try something else. You're still going to lay out the recommended practices, but you'll be taking a descriptive approach to explaining them rather than a prescriptive approach.

The Scrum Alliance uses the term "Common Practices" instead of "Best Practices" to describe what would traditionally be considered "Best Practices". By changing the term they change the reader's perception. They're not saying "you need to do this or you can't be considered among the 'best'"; they're saying "this is something that a lot of people do in this situation, and here's why." That's the approach the entire industry needs to be taking. I would bet that many framework authors already think that way. The problem is that way of thinking is not reflected in their writings.

What do you think? Does this resonate, or am I way off base? How would you expect websites and other communication regarding what are typically seen as "prescriptive frameworks" to change to be more in line with a descriptive approach?

Taming the Wild West: the Differences between Agile and Cowboy Coding

One of the strongest arguments for Agile is that it’s not Waterfall. However, not everything that isn't Waterfall is Agile, a fact that’s not always understood. This misunderstanding hurts the Agile brand when people familiar with only Waterfall begin associating all other methodologies, including a lack thereof, as Agile. I want to be very clear about this: Agile is not Cowboy Coding, and Cowboy Coding is not unique to Agile teams. It is important both to understand how Agile and Cowboy Coding are different and what Cowboy Coding looks like so that you can identify it on your teams (yes, even Waterfall teams).

The Loner

One of the easiest signs of a Cowboy Coder is that he’s a loner. He may be working under the name of Agile, but there are no Agile methodologies or frameworks I’m aware of that support such behavior. In fact, the backing principles of the Agile Manifesto state, “Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project”; “Build projects around motivated individuals”; “The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation”; “The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams”; and “At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.” The manifesto, its principles, and all Agile methodologies and frameworks I know of are very human-centered with an emphasis on collaboration.

If you have a loner on your team that insists on working in a silo, there’s a possibility that you have a cowboy in your midst. Try to rein them in using mandatory meeting/ceremonies that promote meaningful conversations and practices like Pair Programming. If they absolutely refuse then you will likely end up spending considerable time managing the work around them – holding ad hoc conversations, formal code reviews, knowledge transfer workshops, etc. – with diminishing returns.

Straight to Production

Working directly with Production code or with a source code repository that isn't versioned is a bad idea. Don’t get me wrong, I love Continuous Delivery and working off the trunk, but a software development team must be very mature and disciplined to make this work. They use feature toggles and branching by abstraction to protect code that isn’t ready for Production. They build test suites around the code so that each commit is verified against regression. They do their due diligence to make sure that a change isn't going to blow up if it’s pushed to Production. Cowboys, simply put, don’t.

If you find yourself consistently in a situation where the same person or people are making changes directly to Production without due diligence then you might just be working with Cowboys. Have them read up on DevOps and Continuous Delivery so they can learn the right way to get changes to Production quickly. Emergency situations that require quick, non-vetted changes to Production should be avoided at all costs.

Wastes of Time

The Cowboy will often refer to Testing and Documentation as a waste of time. They may even commit the cardinal sin of Agile, reciting the Manifesto blasphemously: “‘Working software is the primary measure of progress’; anything else is just a waste of time!” To those people, I would ask them to define “working”. Does it pass the Acceptance Criteria associated to the work (or did you even bother to ensure you had Acceptance Criteria)? Can anybody actually use it, or is it too buggy or complex? Is anyone other than yourself aware of the assumptions made around input, output, workflow, etc.?

Without proper testing and documentation, you can’t prove your software works nor can anybody understand how it works. With that being said, if your tests and documentation don’t contribute to the value and usability of the software then they are, in fact, a waste of time. Focus your testing efforts on tests that actually stand a chance of failing and finding vulnerabilities. Don’t spin your wheels creating “write-only” documentation. This is the approach that Agile espouses; anyone who says tests and documentation are altogether useless is operating with a Cowboy mindset, not an Agile one.

“Emergent Architecture”

One of the backing principles to the Agile Manifesto states “The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams”. There are those who believe this means “just make it up as you go.” That’s not entirely accurate. There still needs to be intelligent design, and that design needs to make the software as easy to comprehend and maintain as possible. As another principle clarifies, “Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.” This means having a thorough understanding of the latest design patterns and practices. It means taking the time to refactor working code into something better. It means taking a little bit of time up-front to design what you think will work and adjusting as you go.

Agile developers do not shoot from the hip. They take pride in their applications; they have a sense of ownership. They will throw research spikes, read books, build proofs-of-concept, attend conferences – do what it takes to build the right thing in the right way. You’ll spot a Cowboy by their purposeful lack of direction, sticking code wherever they please with the sole purpose of “getting something to work” so they can move on to the next thing. If they do it in the name of “emergent architecture” then call shenanigans. That’s not architecture, it’s just reckless.

Somewhere to Hang their Hat

The good news is that cowboys can be tamed if they can come to appreciate the practices, tools, and frameworks that Agile provides. Cowboys won’t jump on the bandwagon just for the heck of it. There will always be some that refuse to be tamed, but many will see the benefits and forsake their wandering ways once you give them a safe place to hang their hat.

One of the great things about reformed Cowboys is they are used to developing quickly and cross-functionally. If you arm them with XP practices, Agile tools, a Kaizen mindset, and continued training and development, they can become model developers that contribute quality software time after time.

Just don’t make the mistake of trying to get them to do something for which there is no tangible benefit. They don’t take too kindly to that.

Knowledge vs. Wisdom

Technology deteriorates wisdom. As text messaging and email become more popular, communication suffers. As the knowledge of civilizations becomes accessible with the click of a mouse, individual thought vanishes. I have a wealth of knowledge attained from movies and T.V. shows, and it is not uncommon for me to say something funny and my wife respond with “What is that from?” Granted, I often have the answer ready, but it is something of a reality check when something funny is actually an original thought. People are smart and capable of learning vast amounts of information, but when people spend all of their time taking in data – Googling, checking YouTube, crawling Wikipedia for hours on end – one must wonder how much time they actually spend thinking.