Comments on: Achieving Agility: Means to an End, or End in Itself

By: Hass Chapman

Hass Chapman — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 12:34:38 +0000

Whilst I agree with what I understand the intent of this article is (that agility is not an end but a means to that end) I would say that in my experience you really only have to do one thing as a manager – keep your employees happy and tell them your top three priorities.

Keeping customers happy follows naturally from the culture of seeing everyone as individuals and trying to fulfill their needs – which you need to do to keep your employees happy. One thing I dislike that I see in two many organisations is a separation of engineering (or an agile team) from the stakeholders. We should all have a common sense of identity and common goals. Losing this is I think one of the main causes of loss of efficiency when growing from start-up to large company. So I would again simply focus on keeping the employees happy and making sure they understand the top three priorities. Employees are smart, they’ll figure the rest out for themselves.

By: Agile Maturity Model – 3 Different Approaches « Technology Trend Analysis

Agile Maturity Model – 3 Different Approaches « Technology Trend Analysis — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 04:46:58 +0000

[...] Esther Derby maintains that how agile you are doesn’t matter. What does matter is that your company is satisfying its customers, stakeholders, and employees. Therefore, an agile maturity model cannot be an end in itself; it has to be means for achieving an end – Achieving Agility: Means to an End, Or End in Itself [...]

By: Still No Silver Bullets « OlafLewitz

Still No Silver Bullets « OlafLewitz — Wed, 11 May 2011 07:49:26 +0000

[...] the first main conference day of XP2011, Esther Derby is speaking in the first keynote about the downsides of Agile transitions. She has these amazing [...]

By: What is the Purpose of an Agile Maturity Model? | The Agile CEO

What is the Purpose of an Agile Maturity Model? | The Agile CEO — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 17:09:56 +0000

[...] Lets pause here for a moment and consider an article posted by Esther Derby entitled “Achieving Agility: Means to an end. Or end in itself”. [...]

By: Chris Chan

Chris Chan — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 09:54:57 +0000

Agility is not a goal or something that is to be maximized. Agility is a continuum. There will be a point where there is sufficient agility to achieve your goals. So I agree with you that it doesn’t matter how Agile you are.

By: Gillian Clark

Gillian Clark — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 23:37:48 +0000

Great article and clearly articulates agile being a means to an end an end and having this goal in sight before you start your agile journey is crucial.
Agile assessments can be useful to gain insights into specific areas e.g. a coaching focus, but if you don’t have the long term goal in sight then you are simply trying to get ‘an agile tick in the box’

By: Linkopedia July 2010 | From the Editor of Methods & Tools

Linkopedia July 2010 | From the Editor of Methods & Tools — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 17:01:08 +0000

[...] Blog: Achieving Agility: Means to an End, or End in Itself [...]

By: Yet Another Agile Maturity Model (AMM) – The 5 Levels of Maturity | Analytical-Mind

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 13:57:20 +0000

[...] Agile Maturity Model (see the Other Useful Links at the end of this post). I actually agree with Esther Derby’s recent post … How agile you are doesn’t matter. Whether you are 50 per cent agile, 90 per cent agile or [...]

By: Esther

Esther — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 12:27:32 +0000

Hi, Sameh -

Scrum can highlight issues in each of these areas. In many cases, they are big, systemic problems–much bigger than one individual can shift. System problems are management problems, and it takes a coalition of managers to change them.

By: Sameh

Sameh — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 21:44:34 +0000

Great post!

These caveats can be recognized using the multiple inspection and feedback points of the Scrum process. For me this post reiterates the importance of the Scrum Master role. An experienced Scrum Master can facilitate the projects towards surfacing and acting on the above issues.

Being process focused gives the Scrum Master the opportunity to detect those issues. Reduce the Scrum Master to merely a coordinator would create a vacuum to be filled by a person who is knowledgeable and can influence change. IMHO:)

Thanks,