Do not open the box - Agile and the Schrödinger's dilemma

As soon as...

  • You define what 'Agile' is,
  • You show people what 'Agile' is in your company,
  • You list what you do to implement 'Agile'...

...everyone has an opinion.

And most of the time, that opinion would be... "that's not real Agile''.

Making the analogy with the Schrödinger's experiment, every time you open the box that contains your organisation, you reduce the possibilities of what Agile means and the degrees of freedom associated with this wide concept. As soon as you describe what concretely embodies Agile in your very own context, you prevent people to imagine the options available to extend or to improve the existing situation.

So, what should you do?
Stay in an undecided state of 'Agile' and keep a whole and rich 'Agile' concept, or make 'Agile' specific to your context and lose some of the flawlessness of the 'Agile' concept?

Based on a short story, I'll demonstrate that Agile is both dead and alive in your organisations.


Outline/Structure of the Lightning Talk

I'll use the analogy with the Schrodinger's Cat experiment to show that some Agile practices are as important as a strong Agile vision in organisations.

Learning Outcome

-> Defining 'Agile' makes you lose the flawlessness of 'Agile'
-> How to overcome this tradeoff?

Target Audience

Agile Practitioners

Prerequisites for Attendees


schedule Submitted 2 years ago