Take It or Leave It

by Pawel Brodzinski on July 11, 2007

Robert McIlree has commented my recent post about agile methods. I believe one thing from the comment is worth mentioning. Robert says:

“I will take issue that Agile methods are no different from a take-it-or-leave-it standpoint as opposed to traditional process-oriented methods.”

There are two general approaches to implementation of any methodology in software development. One says you should treat the chosen method as a bible and adjust your organization to work exactly like it’s written in the books. Another says: here’s the thing, you can take whatever you want and leave whatever you don’t want but remember every decision brings its consequences.

While almost no one would admit to choose the former approach it’s quite often. Ask people why they don’t like Prince-2.

“- It is sooo heavy and formal.

- Why don’t you cut unneeded things off then?

- Can I??? They haven’t told me that.“

Personally I’m on the other end of spectrum. I believe you can use take-it-or-leave-it approach with virtually every software development methodology. Unlike Robert I believe that process-oriented methods are no different here. Even there you can decide to change only several areas and leave the rest unchanged if it works well for you. You just need to know what you resign from and why.

{ 2 comments… add one }

Mike Ramm July 12, 2007 at 2:53 am

Hi Pawel!

I completely agree with you on your last paragraph. I am a software project manager with a long experience and I also came to believe that you can fine-tune each methodology you use in order to fit better your needs but you must know why you use, omit, or change each part of the methodology you adopt.

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Pawel Brodzinski July 12, 2007 at 2:21 pm

And, when you dig dip enough, you find most of methodologies actually encourage you to use that approach.

Btw: I find agile methods quite formal – they just formalize agility in a specific way. It’s not impossible to end with some deeply structured process which isn’t really agile any more. With agile methods you won’t find many incentives to use “take-it-or-leave-it” approach, which could be considered as a quite natural here.

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