Thanks for your comment. After this incident I have refrained from commenting on Cedrics writings. Not all gems in the Google mine I presume.

Yeah, obviously I learned after this debacle. However, it was the same preso I had given to gobs of other developers, and never had any problems before. In prior talks, the dissenters actually voiced their concerns, etc., in the room, and we had honest discussions, as opposed to this case, where I was attacked after I left the building. I did express limitations of TDD, and so on. The talk was solicited as a very introductory overview of TDD, and that’s what it was. Certain people came in with other agendas, and they heard what they wanted to hear.

I am currently seeing Agile being used for this purpose. I cannot unfortunately indicate where that is being done for obvious reasons.

However, this warning is not new, Tom DeMarco and Alistair Cockburn have both issued the caution previously. And there are a LOT of anecodotes of programmers bailing out of these jails, a quick surf on google shows them. However, it’s not “cool” to point it out and go counter-current, here’s an example of the complaint and how it’s brushed off: http://www.embedded.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=16700086

Cedric used a presentation on TDD talk fall out against “Agilism”, while at the same time distorting the words of the presenter. That is my main beef with his post.

And I agree that people in the XP community most certainly can be dogmatic, especially a few years back. But I am surprised by the rest of your post, I have no experiences of agile enforcing sweat shops. Any examples?

Many push XP as dogma/rhetoric and claim it is Agile. Well, yes that is true - but it’s only one flavour and arguably a poor one as a general one-size-fits-all choice. Agile is meant to avoid such statements, yet here we have a flip side.

Dogmatism has taken hold with many converts to the Agile religion who insist others follow their version of Agile…this is hypocrisy at its purests. No wonder he was confused!

It does not however negate the basis of what I believe his point was and THAT is why it is resonating across the industry, unfortunately he did not communicate it well just as it seems Jeff failed to fully communicate what he was after…

In fact, it may be that the rapid iteration and tighter interaction is the biggest value to an Agile method. Communication is often poor. This is a prime example

However the “big stir” is only part of that. The unspoken issue is that Agile is being used to enforce sweat shops and INCREASE micromangement, not free professionals from it.

Creative, smart people work well when there is respect for their professionalism, their input and knowledge. Agile can go a long way towards encouraging this - but in many places XP is rammed down people’s throats with all privacy and ability to concentrate removed. No amount of Hawaiin Shirt Days or “rah team, have a free Coke” will address the fundamental lack of control over working environment.

But again - this isn’t communicated well by those driving the backlash.

Communication is key.

I like your analogy with karate. It’s good that Cedric missed the target; you know what happens to a person’s leg when they do the kick incorrectly, but connect with the target with great force.