I was going to write a quick note about “agile” today. Working title: “Why agile isn’t always flexible.” Then I realised probably nobody but me cares about that. Which isn’t a reason not to write it here — this might be the only digital space that’s mostly just about me. Raw and unfiltered.
But you’re in luck. I won’t bang on about why agilists should sometimes be more steadfast than the windsock everyone else expects them to be.
Because for all the talk of agility — and flexibility does resonate strongly in that word — it ultimately comes down to values. Every activity gets put on trial and judged whether it brings enough value to the customer or user of the product or service. That’s all that counts. When you run this respectfully through a team, everyone pulls in the same direction because no boss or other stakeholder (without skin in the game) has a personal political agenda they’re trying to push through.
So we come to value. One job of the Scrum Master is supporting the Product Owner on their journey to Super-Product-Owner status — not as a cleaner-upper, but as a trusted sparring partner. The Product Owner as “value optimiser” has to decide which things bring the most value. But by what criteria?
At the end of the day, it’s about making customers or users happy — so happy they keep using the product, expand it, recommend it. Meanwhile the product has to make money. So if you develop something that moves users forward and maybe even brings them joy, revenue goes up. That’s the theory anyway.
Too often though, teams just work through a long list whose order seems as fixed as beads on a string, and the whole project gets pushed through. Maybe this string of beads — or several of the beads — creates no additional value for the customer. Sometimes it makes more sense for the team and the company to do nothing.
Sounds counterintuitive at first. But developing stuff that’s worthless in the users’ eyes — and that’s what matters — sucks up time and life force from everyone involved. Double worthless.
This closes the circle: agilists who feel like circus performers in an arena full of slow, fat spectators shouldn’t show every trick. Better to practise and show fewer, more spectacular things. That gets the most applause from the audience and reduces the booing.
This post started in German on reinergaertner.de — yes, 1997, I’ve been doing this a while. The translation was AI-assisted. Any remaining awkwardness is authentically bilingual.