The End of Agile, or the Beginning of Something Else?

Sometimes, events can catch you completely off guard. For me, one such moment was the recent downturn in the Agile industry and community.

What wasn't a big surprise was that the job market for Agile folk dried up, leading to widespread layoffs. With rising interest rates, money stopped being cheap (or free), and when the budgeting process comes around, companies will start looking for "easy" cost-cuttings. With Scrum Masters/Agile Coaches being considered "admin" roles, it was quite obvious who would be the targets of headcount reductions.

It was also pretty clear that many organisations were disappointed by the results of their so-called agile transitions.

What was surprising, however, was how many companies and organisations believed that merely implementing Scrum (or your favourite flavour of Agile with a capital 'A') would make them agile. The even bigger surprise was that they thought they can confine agility to a certain department (ahem - engineering; ahem - product) and still get company-wide benefits. Without friction, without frustrations, without a thousand paper cuts.

The second surprise was that, apparently, there are many Scrum Masters/Agile Coaches who think they could apply the Scrum guide, tell their teams to use some additional techniques like Planning Poker and User Stories, and say: "Voilà: You now have an agile team".¹

That applying a concept or a framework was enough to spark meaningful change.

That this understanding of agility was so prevalent that it is now the mainstream.

I know many brilliant agile practitioners, and I am aware of the many obstacles they encounter and how they address these systemic issues, navigating many complex dynamics. But are those fundamental transformation processes the norm, or the exception?

We so often confuse output with outcome.

The expected outcome is the ability to create (more) customer value (faster). But for some reason, many were content just to apply a framework and focus on output alone. It's no wonder so many people ended up disillusioned.

So, is this the End Of Agile? I'm not sure – because I'm not sure there ever really was a Beginning of Agile.

If you think of Agile only as a framework, a bundle of processes, or a certain way to handle work, it will never work for you.

The way I think about Agile, it's a certain way to look at problems. Curious, open-minded, based on evidence. With the willingness to throw out everything you think you knew about a problem when new insights tell you that things aren't the way you think they are. Embracing the constructive force of complexity.

Changing the way we look at problems is changing the culture of an organisation. It touches leadership, structures, power, roles.

That's the outcome. But how do you get there? That depends on who and what you are, where you are right now, and how the outcomes should look for you.

There are many great tools in the "Agility" toolbox. Pick whatever looks like the right tool² for your context and apply it. See what happens. Adjust. Apply again. Adjust some more. Continue.

Take what works, forget the rest. Whatever helps move you toward your desired outcome is valuable.

Johanna Rothman would probably call that "agile with a lowercase 'a'". I call it pragmatic agility.

I hope that people will understand that being agile does not mean "doing Scrum". You can be agile without Scrum, and you can do Scrum without being agile. "Being agile" will look different for every organisation. Correspondingly, the path to becoming agile will be unique as well.

There are many tools out there that can help you find out how being agile will look like for you. Start looking for them.