Over the last couple of decades, we have been pushing towards agility as a catalyst for a different way of working entirely. It’s interesting to reflect on where agility has ended up today.At the same time, traditional project management approaches talk about agile purely through a project management lens rather than a broader business and product context and as a result we aren’t always speaking the same language. To close that gap, you can use two different phrases:
“Agile within a project management operating model”
“Agility within a product management operating model”
Meeting organisations where they are matters more than ever. The agile industry took four values and twelve principles and somehow created hundreds of methods, wars between approaches, an alphabet soup of certifications, and a handful of enterprise frameworks each claiming to be the silver bullet. We’ve ended up with organisations at vastly different points on their journey and lots (and lots) of confusion in between.
Same word – agile – but very different contexts. Then it occurred to my long-time colleague Daniel Luschwitz, agile is just like politics. Both operate on a continuum left and right of centre. The further away from the centre to the right is a more conservative ideology, whereas to the left is a more progressive ideology.
In agile terms, the centre is the tipping point between:
Project-led agile (right-conservative)
Product-led agile (left-progressive)
Agile even has a constitution – the AgileManifesto. A set of 4 values and 12 principles that mostly any agile approach references and considers itself as following.
We also have a lot of ‘healthy’ debate in both politics and agile. Much like we hear in the halls of parliament “that is unconstitutional”; the agile community has been known to throw a few “that is not agile” phrases around too.
So, all this raises the question: if the various agile certifications were Australian political parties, what party would they be? Who would be our Australian Labor Party, Liberal Party of Australia and The Australian Greens parties? Do we have a contender for Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party, the Trumpet of Patriots or the Shooters Fishers and Farmers Party?
Where does the various incarnations of Scrum fit in the political landscape? Is SAFe progressive or conservative? Do any agile certifications have their ‘bee in a bonnet’ about paper bags?
To complete this exposé of the agile political world, Daniel Luschwitz brought me in to help write this series, ads, in his words, I am an authority on the agile landscape, “40 agile methods in 40 minutes” creator, and having served on the Agile Alliance Board I am technically a retired agile politician… and we all know what happens when retired politicians talk!
What’s next?
Over the coming posts, Daniel and I plan to map well-known certifications and frameworks across the Agile Political Spectrum.
Why?
It should be a bit of fun. Plus, Daniel has told too many people he plans to write this to back out now.
However, there is a serious side to this. The market is saturated with agile certifications and in many cases participants, managers of teams and recruiters haven’t fully understood what context the certification they have received serves. Our aim is to create awareness.
In the meantime, we welcome you to join in the debate! Who is your far-right conservative agile party?
The first article in the series is: PRINCE2 Agile and One Nation
Note: This article was amended slightly form the original published by Daniel Luchwitz to be written from my perspective.
Craig Smith 
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