In one of the comments, for When is a Scrum Master (or a PM) Not?, Craig Brown said
Process, process, process.
What about people? At the end of the day the process is just one of several enabers (alongside culture, technology and tools, etc.)
Won't an experienced and talented team just deliver regardless of the process? ANd doesn't that indicate that the process is relatively unimportant?
Well, yes, if you have “experienced and talented” people, they will manage to deliver just about regardless of the process. My experiences over the last couple of months lead me to believe these folks don't have the experience. They may well have the talent, but not the experience, or the self esteem to do what they know they need to do.
One of the reasons the XP folks are so adamant about their practices is because the practices create a system (a process, if you will) that helps people accomplish the work. We Tried Baseball and It Didn't Work is a humorous take on what happens if you say you're playing baseball, but don't follow the process. Same thing with XP, Scrum, or cleanroom or anything else you choose to do. If you don't follow the process, it doesn't help. You can call it anything you want, but calling it Scrum (or something else) doesn't make it so.
So what do you do with an inexperienced team? (Let's assume they are talented.) I still think someone needs to help with the process, so the team gains experience and succeeds. Without the willingness of someone to stand up and say, “No, that's not the way this is supposed to work. And, here's why…” the team cannot be successful.
I've met process police, and no, I don't want to work with them. But a little process does go a long way when organizing or managing a project. If I want to use timeboxes because otherwise people fall prey to Student Syndrome, I should have that option. It's quite reasonable to want an iteration backlog before an iteration starts, so the team can estimate it and commit to it. It's not reasonable for a person who's not developing or estimating to lengthen the timeboxes and reject retrospectives because he doesn't think it will help the team. The people who reject the agreed-upon process are not helping the team, even though they think they are.
Leaders, no matter what they are called, are the people who guide the team through it's designated process. They are especially necessary when the team is inexperienced, whether that's general inexperience or inexperience with a particular project organization.
I would agree with your synopsis of process. The problem that I see in organizations is that they don’t get the balance. I either see NO PROCESS proponents that don’t think we should have any process or it isn’t agile, or I see people who follow the process blindly thinking that it will deliver a quality product. Some agile consultants seem to push agile techniques and sell it as part of the Agile process (using buzzwords like Scrum) when in reality, the agile processes are often frameworks to use your own processes. The only issue with using experienced people to create these processes is that usually, they are experienced, but they aren’t knowledgeable. They do things the way they learned, but don’t know about the latest industry best practices, etc.
The thing that’s hard to the point of impossibility is to hit the mythical “sweet spot” of process that is situated somewhere between ad-hocracy and bureaucracy.
Perhaps the reason that the sweet spot is so hard to locate is because it varies based on situation and individual perception. Or maybe it’s simply because it doesn’t exist.
Right on !
Alistair Cockburn touches on a similar topic in his blog this week (see link below). Yes, Process, the evil P-word scorned by many before they even ask, “What process are you advocating?”
I tend to use the same process in all situations:
1. Think about what you are trying to do
2. Pick a process that fits this situation (there are many alternatives)
3. Adjust as necessary
http://alistair.cockburn.us/index.php/Why_can%27t_people_deliver%3F
Being a Certified Process Master, I loved seeing this posting and the numerous responses. Now I must deal with the dilemma of adding something meaningful, without getting on my soap box. I will start by saying most organizations are not very good at process. We have managed over the years thanks to the creativity, ingenuity and heroics of the capable people in our charge. If enterprises could conquer the discipline and excel at process design, succeed at process implementation, master managing the process lifecycle, then people would embrace processes. Good process is liberating, enabling and empowering. Good process makes work possible and practical.
The reason that experienced and talented people succeed is that they understand process and how to apply it. Ad hoc never works.
Inexperienced people need process to guide them, and benefit from marching in lock step until they gain the experience and understanding.
Untalented people are doomed to suffer until they find something that matches their talents, although process may keep them out of trouble to a degree (or maybe it’s the customers of untalented people who suffer).