Agile: A Tool or an Art?
A few days ago, when I was browsing YouTube, I stumbled upon a talk by Marianna Pascal that discusses how we should approach a foreign language when we try to learn it. It was a talk about language, the English language, to be exact. I have watched it a few years back, but the magic of YouTube made it show up again.
Anyway, based on her years of experience teaching English in Malaysia, she came to the conclusion that the confidence to speak English for non-native speakers is about attitude, not ability. She shared quite a lot about how she came to that conclusion, but I won’t be sharing them here. It is better that you watch and absorb her wisdom yourself. A little spoiler: She asked viewers to choose between treating a language as a tool to be used effectively or as an art to master.
Next up is another video about the English language, specifically grammar. In one TEDed video, Andreea S. Calude asked the question, “Does grammar matter?” You can view the video here: https://youtu.be/Wn_eBrIDUuc. The video talks about 2 point of views regarding this matter: prescriptivists and descriptivists. One sees grammar as highly important as in you should always use it. Another one sees grammar as important, but not necessarily needed in every occassion. Guess which one is which.
In any case, both video are somewhat related. If you see a language as an art to master, grammar is not something you want to miss. On the other hand, if you see language as a tool that should be used effectively, you should also see grammar as something that should be used when needed (depends on the situation). Right? No. There is one more alternative, i.e. approach a language as an art to be used effectively. With this one, we should always strive to master a language, but at the end of the day, it is still a tool. If you can’t use it effectively, there is no point in mastering it.
… an art to be used effectively.
Now for Agile. Finally!
As an Agile practitioner, I think I saw similar situation to the ones I described above. One sees Agile, specifically its methods or frameworks, as something that must to be mastered so that it can function as a whole. The opposite sees Agile methods and frameworks as tools to be used effectively. It works even if you only use them partially or as a combination as long as it is effective. Of course there is also the third view that sees Agile as an art to be used effectively. Striving to master any Agile methods or frameworks is important. However, understanding how to use them according to our needs instead of using them for the sake of using is much more important, right? Isn’t that the whole point of mastering something?
As for me, I choose the third point of view. Take Scrum as an example. I am a certified Scrum Master from Scrum.org. I am still at level 1, but that proves that I take Scrum mastery as something important. If I don’t, I would probably take other Scrum Master certification that is less risky, i.e. with more chance to try and lower passing grade. I even took the liberty of passing the Product Owner and Agile Leadership certification test from Scrum.org. If mastery was not important, why bother?
However, in doing Scrum, I never constrain myself to the Scrum Guide. Not because I don’t want to, but because the places where I need to do Scrum can’t fully use Scrum as prescribed by the Scrum Guide. I always start Scrum (and teach about Scrum) per that guide, but there are times when the framework simply doesn’t work as recommended so I have to adapt. Honestly, all of my work that uses Scrum to date is more of an adaptation of Scrum instead of a (full) adoption.
Other that Scrum, my work also include me doing Kanban, ScrumBan, and elements of Extreme Programming. DevOps? Sure, why not. SAFe? Maybe later when I’m convinced that using SAFe is being Agile. Mastering them is still something I’m trying to achieve, but on a daily basis, effectiveness is what really matters.
