CulturalValues

A report from XP2003 by EmilyBache

Last year at Xp2002, in his closing speech Kent Beck encouraged us to look more closely at the values of XP. At that time he felt there had been a lot of research into things like testing, pair programming etc, which was good, but XP is about more than just doing practices. I don’t know if what Kent said had anything to do with it, but I did feel that values and priciples were more talked about this year. There was even a panel entitled “XP Practices versus Values?”, which I unfortunately missed.

Anyway, I noticed that as soon as you start talking about agile values, you very quickly start talking about the culture of your organization. Here are a few other things people said that caught my attention.

In his keynote speech, Steve Fraser told us about an informal survey he had done of 70 leading software practitioners. He asked them what the three biggest software problems were. The response can be summarized as 1/3 is to do with schedule, budget and tools, 1/3 is to do with building the right product and testing it properly, and the remaining 1/3 is about people. As an example, he showed a short video of John Vlissides answering the question by saying “People, people and people!”

So one of the biggest issues with software is the people who write it. The organizational culture these software practitioners work in must be relevant.

David Putman (When he presented his paper “Trailing-Edge management”) - Few managers make use of their teams capabilities. They often (unconciously) subscribe to Theory X – that people don’t like to work and have to be coerced, induced and directed. This creates an enforced management culture that stifles creativity and learning. In contrast, enlightened managers follow Theory Y - work is as natural and fun as playing. People can manage themselves, motivated by self esteem, achievement and learning. What results is an emergent culture and organizational learning.

Jim Highsmith (during his keynote speech) – the social architecture of an organization is as important to success as the product it sells. Prefer LeadershipCollaborationManagement. You need to get the right people on your bus (team), which should be a meritocracy. If you have some wrong people on your bus you will instead need beaurocracy in order to control them, which can cause the right people to get off the bus, increasing the proportion of wrong people and the need for beaurocracy…

In a way, this sounds logical. But in other ways, doesn’t it just reflect a working culture where it is possible and acceptable to fire people more or less at will?

Michele Marchesi (during his keynote speech) – Some organizations need a certain level of CMM approval in order to win government contracts, but instead of actually improving their processes, managers and developers cheat and deceive the CMM inspectors. The CMM is changing to try to stop this, by introducing more emphasis on values and principles that organizations should follow.

Mary Popendieck (during the Coaching panel) – teams need leadership, and a motivating environment – that is often what the coach provides. The management role is different.

I don’t think she really explained what a manager does. I’d like to ask her.

Mike Hill (In his presentation at the Agile Transition workshop) – The One Team of XP consists of three groupings – customers, managers and developers. The dividing lines between the groups should be fluid, and people can wear different hats. However, managers generally make poor customers for an XP team, because a customer must be able to negotiate with developers. Managers are used to having the developers just do what they’re told.

After listening to all this I began to notice that I didn’t really identify with a lot of what was being said. I’m fairly puzzled by the idea of a manager who is unable to negotiate, motivate, coach and lead. The environment I work in is not like that. My managers encourage continuous learning, a healthy work/personal life balance, and are receptive to new ideas like XP. So I guess you’re wondering where I work - an enlightened XP shop perhaps? A one-person consultancy firm? No, actually. I work in the IS department of a multinational corporation with over 50 000 employees.

I think the difference is that I live in Sweden, a country with a very different working culture than that of the US or the UK. I am a little concerned that almost all the viewpoints above, and indeed at the conference as a whole, come straight from American working culture. If I could be Kent Beck for a moment, (wahey!) and make a request to the conference for next year, I would like to ask for more cultural diversity and understanding from the speakers at the front.