Not "you" in particular, but "you" as in enough of a client base that it matters. This is basically the issue with methodologies, regardless of what the contents of a methodology are!
Being agile is applying those best practices as you suggest. This comes from years of experience on your team - either learned directly or through mentor-ship/apprenticeship, and will vary depending on the problem constraints and environment.
Employing Agile Methodology is applying a pre-defined "solution" to a "problem" that exists, usually because the best practices are not applied at best, but most likely because they are completely foreign to the problem scope.
It's the hammer/nail problem. There is a whole market of people looking for solutions to their half finished projects. There are many people selling hammers, screwdrivers, chisels, drills etc. etc. They all run into the same fundamental issue: not working with a complete toolbox.
The solution to the problem seekers is to hire competent, experienced and most often expensive programming teams and allow them to properly define the problem scope and solution. This is complicated by the fact that often "you" cannot judge the competency or the experience of the people you need to hire.
No amount of ignoring that very hard problem will make it go away. Not whatever process IBM was flaunting 20 years ago, not agile, and not whatever people come up with next.
Hackers are painters after all, and you need to have good painters on your team if you are looking for a good painting. It's very similar to hiring a trades-person to renovate your house. In the end, you find one with a good track record and you essentially get what you pay for.
Except that in many, many, cases, you do. :-)
Not "you" in particular, but "you" as in enough of a client base that it matters. This is basically the issue with methodologies, regardless of what the contents of a methodology are!
Being agile is applying those best practices as you suggest. This comes from years of experience on your team - either learned directly or through mentor-ship/apprenticeship, and will vary depending on the problem constraints and environment.
Employing Agile Methodology is applying a pre-defined "solution" to a "problem" that exists, usually because the best practices are not applied at best, but most likely because they are completely foreign to the problem scope.
It's the hammer/nail problem. There is a whole market of people looking for solutions to their half finished projects. There are many people selling hammers, screwdrivers, chisels, drills etc. etc. They all run into the same fundamental issue: not working with a complete toolbox.
The solution to the problem seekers is to hire competent, experienced and most often expensive programming teams and allow them to properly define the problem scope and solution. This is complicated by the fact that often "you" cannot judge the competency or the experience of the people you need to hire.
No amount of ignoring that very hard problem will make it go away. Not whatever process IBM was flaunting 20 years ago, not agile, and not whatever people come up with next.
Hackers are painters after all, and you need to have good painters on your team if you are looking for a good painting. It's very similar to hiring a trades-person to renovate your house. In the end, you find one with a good track record and you essentially get what you pay for.