Agile Otter Blog

Why do we care if people call what they're doing TDD or BDD or why do we care if they actually do it? Saying It When people mislabel what they’re doing and refer to it as “BDD” or “TDD” or “Scrum” or “Agile” when it isn't, it screws up all the conversations that follow until we manage to unravel that they’re really just doing automated testing, or iterations, or what-have-you. Clarity in a conversation has the same value as clarity in code, and maybe more so. Someone told me that they were doing TDD, and we were well into the conversation before I realized that everything I had said for several minutes had been totally misconstrued. What they thought was TDD was “holding a testing sprint before release” So, the value in crisp terminology is improved communication. What is the value proposition for misusing terms? I guess some people — even in the agile world — don’t know that TDD and BDD are processes, not artifacts or tools; and that neither is just another ...

When I'm talking to Agile teams, we often talk about the role of management: whether it exists, and if so what it is. I always fall back to the principles of the agile manifesto : Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project. Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done. Of course, there is more to it than that in an organization. If we were, as some suggest, to get rid of the managers someone would have to assume the duties that managers actually fill in organizations. It's possible via holocracy and sociocracy to do such a thing, but what would it mean? I like managers.  I love leaders, I have some issue sometimes with bosses, but I like managers. I like having them. I have enjoyed being one. I even like administrators. In my mind, managers are people who are trusted to care for, spend, and attend to certain aspects of the work which I call t...