Facebook Agile: Is your Enterprise living a lie?

#1

Originally published at: http://www.agileuprising.com/facebook-agile-enterprise-living-lie/

**This post is Rated: PG-13+. I heard the best phrase today. As I was wrapping up our Coach’s CoP, I was sharing banter with a colleague about some of the factors inhibiting growth and preventing teams from making progress. A recurring pattern I’ve seen is lack of leadership. Not leadership buy-in. Not leadership support. Not…

#2

I love this. If it weren’t so true I’d actually laugh at it :wink:

#3

It bothers me how accurate this is. Nice work @cusack

#4

This post is so spot-on it’s unnerving; sadly in Enterprise IT (and by extension corporate living) it’s more about what you said you did, and what you can tell people you did, than what you actually did. I’m hoping I stick around long enough in the corporate world to see people like us folks (who understand that putting perfume on a pig doesn’t change the fact that it’s a pig) rise to levels of prominence in the enterprise and start changing the culture.

#5

Ron also hates that he introduced story points. :slight_smile:

#6

The overstepping the peers thing is part of the culture here - I’m not sure how peer groups got pitted against each other, but sometimes it seems like lord of the flies to get that next director/VP position - its toxic to the core, and I have friends that have worked here in the past, and it was the same 10 years ago. But sometimes you can make that work for you to move things forward. But, every status report deck I’ve ever seen here in the past 18 months might as well be a powerpoint printout of a facebook wall. Everything’s good/green/no problems - while directors that I plead with in their office to fix the thing that is going to derail the train do nothing ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Perhaps its part of our human nature to not expose our faults and failures - humility and vulnerability is such a rare trait to be on display at work - or, at least the IT business as its all I know.

Maybe there’s a market for a new type of social media to scratch away at the thin veneer of happy instagram stories and get down to real life… a social media version of MTV’s real world.

Dont worry, #noestimates makes it all better, Jason.

#7

Yes. I started to write an actual case I am facing but it made me so depressed I’m not going to not share it :frowning: I guess we just have to plug away and hope to live long enough to see our preferred culture percolate upward :slight_smile:

#9

IMO, the key is “leadership” versus “management.” Leadership has become part of organizational titles just as management is. Leadership and management are skills.

I once told an Agile Coach, Scrum Master (really a S_Fe consultant), Sr. Technology Manager, and CTO that there was a lack of leadership. They did not understand what I meant. “We are all managers to some degree. Managing out finances, time, responsibilities, meals, etc. As professionals there needs to be a level of trust that a team can manage itself internally and ask for assistance when needed. What the team needs from you is leadership. Present the problem, support a vision, provide the resources, assist with issues, coordinate at a high level, trust the team, and enable them to perform.” The 1000 yard stare continued. That was about a year into an 18 month struggle before I finally left.

#10

Starts at home…weekend warrior starts building a deck, but doesn’t get to the railings…then claims it was by design. Takes that mess of a mindstate to work.

#11

Nice post. I identify strongly with “Facebook Agile”.
In fact it’s not just agile, it’s a symptom of meritocracy. Whenever one is compared against one’s peers, or when measures metastasize into targets, Facebook X is the result.

Facebook metrics
Facebook engagement survey results
Facebook test coverage
Facebook feedback