Agile
6 Reasons Why Agile Fails For Hierarchical Organizations
A look at the conditions that enable successful agile organizations and the reasons why it fails
Recently, I was discussing why SAFe (which is not Agile) feels safe for corporate organization. As of 2021, SAFe growth has increased steadily:
And, make no mistake — I am a firm decrier of SAFe — it is possible to see reason why SAFe is comfortable for larger organizations: it has so many ceremonies and upward reporting that it is almost like Waterfall in Agile clothing:
To be fair, having read the fundamental considerations in SAFe, it’s not a bad framework — it’s just implemented, represented and understood wrongly.
Without diving too deep into SAFe, and making this yet-another-anti-SAFe article, I’m going to talk about why Agile fails in big orgs — where there are layers on layers of management — and how can an org leader reduce the chances of failure.
To do that, let’s first understand what makes Agile thrive in organizations.