Agile vs Fragile: Empower the “Right” Employees

Part 7 in a series of 17. To start at the beginning, first read Agile vs Fragile: A Disciplined Approach or an Excuse for Chaos.

Agile principle 5 is all about the people you chose to be a part of your team.  If focuses on the principle that if you get the “right” people, give them the right environment to be successful, and then get out of their way, they will deliver great things.  In an Agile world, the best and brightest are sought out to be a part of the team, and then they are enabled to make the right decisions as a team, without intrusion by leadership.  The teams identify the work that can be accomplished in a sprint.  After all, the people who do the work are in the best position to identify what needs to be done, and how much time it will take.  Management goes out of their way to remove barriers from the team, including themselves.In Fragile environments, management still maintains the power and control structures.  They overburden the team with status and update meetings, and they leverage their power to “drive” the team to meet project timelines.  In a Fragile world, this principle is manipulated to mean that “super” developers are all you need to have success, and other team members are either eliminated or their value marginalized.  One of the biggest indicators of a Fragile team is the level of burnout and turnover on the team as people grow weary of the death march mentality of the project.

In the next installment of the blog we will talk about the 7th Agile principle. In the meantime…Keep on testing!