Devs were building features. We were on track. Then month 2 hit and management started hiring. A bunch of managers showed up. Then they brought in a Scrum Master. First week this guy wants to implement full Agile ceremonies.
Daily standups, sprint planning, retrospectives, backlog refinement. The whole package. His reasoning: "You need process to scale." We had 8 weeks left.
We weren't trying to scale. We were trying to finish. I've seen this same pattern play out multiple times now. Small team shipping. Management gets uncomfortable with lack of visibility, they hire process people. Process people need to justify their existence, ceremonies get implemented and everything slows down.
The thing that kills me is the timing. We were working. Why fix what isn't broken when you're 8 weeks from deadline? I'm genuinely curious, why can't management just leave working teams alone? Is it actual concern about sustainability or is it just discomfort with not having control mechanisms in place?
What's your experience with this?
PaulHoule•1w ago
ghostinit•1w ago
That's when it stops being team member helping out and becomes process person from outside.
PaulHoule•1w ago
If there is something positive about agile in low-trust situations it is, without agile, people can kick the can down the road a long way (six months!) before there is a confrontation that reveals the low trust problem. With agile it leads to meeting after nerve-wracking meeting... which of course can wear you out.