cumulativehypotheses

If there is a common theme to this “Agile” journey that you’re almost certainly on if you’re reading this—and there might not be—then a good candidate for that could be a certain series of unpleasant, ego–challenging realisations.

It began with programmers, back in the late 90s, as eXtreme Programming took hold and the unpleasant, ego–challenging realisations dawned that: the common old–school programmers’ preferred mode of engagement with users—pretending that they don’t exist—and their preferred mode of engagement with their employers—surly passive–aggression leavened with withering cynicism—and their preferred mode of engagement with each other—isolation interspersed with bouts of one–up–manship—and their preferred mode of engagement with the subject matter at hand—wrestling it into submission via the effortful application of sheer individual intellectual brilliance—weren’t going to cut it any more.

Over time, the various other specialisms that go into most industrial–scale software development—and IT systems work more generally—have had also to come to terms with the idea that they aren’t that special. With the idea that locking themselves into their caves with a sign outside saying “Do Not Disturb, Genius at Work” and each finding a way to make their particular specialism into the one true bastion of intelligence—and the true single point of failure, and that not seen as a bad thing—is not going to cut it any more.

A cross–functional, self–organising team will of course contain, must contain, various individuals who have, though education, experience or inclination, a comparative advantage over their colleagues in some particular skill, domain, tool, or whatever. It would be perverse indeed for a cross–functional, self–organising team not have the person who knows the most about databases look first at a data storage problem. And it would be foolish indeed to let that person do so by themselves—at least pair, maybe mob—so that the knowledge and experience is spread around. And it would be perverse indeed for a cross–functional, self–organising team to make a run preventing any one member of the team having a go at any particular problem merely because they aren’t the one with the strongest comparative advantage in that topic. And it would be foolish indeed for such a team to not create a physical, technical and psychological environment where that could be done safely. And so on.

Different disciplines have embraced their not–special–ism at different times and with different levels of enthusiasm. “Lean UX” represents the current batch, as designers get to grips with the idea that they—in common with ever other discipline—turn out not to be the special and unique snowflakes uniquely crucial to the success of any development endeavours. Where is your discipline on this journey?