
The Most Important Agile Practice Of All - askorkin
http://www.skorks.com/2009/08/the-most-important-agile-practice-of-all/
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windsurfer
It's very hard to respect people while trying to get them to work when they
aren't working as hard as you are and aren't as capable.

It gets a lot easier when your team mates are at least working as hard as you
are, or if they're on the same page knowledge- or skill-wise.

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yairharel
This is the exact opposite of Respect. If you only respect people who are like
you, you respect no one. We are all different and have different
circumstances. You can't accurately measure team member's output at any given
moment, as it fluctuates and depends on so many factors. Respecting someone
means (in the agile context) trusting their good intentions and willingness to
do everything they can for the success of the team/business. And guess what,
it's not hard at all. Oh, and it's contagious too.

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windsurfer
What do you do when they aren't willing to do a lot, and don't have great
intentions, but rather the intent to just slip by with "good enough"?

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diN0bot
I view "respect" less as a fluffy handy wavy answer, and more of a super
general meta answer. It's almost a cop-out, except that I completely agree
that The Most Important Collaboration Practice is respect.

I live in a coop with very little conflict because we strive to respect our
multiple perspectives. My husband is also my partner on multiple (serial)
startups. The heart of working with people, and thus multiple perspectives,
styles and experiences, is respect. How else could one properly listen, learn
and share?

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DanielBMarkham
Feel-good bullshit.

 _Feedback_ is the most important agile practice.

If you're not respectful, other team members will tell you and you're gone.

If you're not delivering, other team members will tell you and you're gone.

Agile is about conversations, and conversations are about feedback. Respect is
a big part of that, but you could have a team of high-performing assholes and
they'd do just fine. As long as everybody is providing feedback and acting on
it.

I wouldn't want to be on the team, but it'd all work out.

As a counter-example, I've seen extremely respectful teams get zero
performance. Everybody was so nice that nobody actually fixed things that were
broken -- nobody wanted the conflict. On the other hand, I've seen teams that
had low respect and high conflict that did very well.

Good agile teams are like families. That's both a good and bad thing.

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J_McQuade
The Most Important Agile Practice Of All?

"Remember to shut up about Agile for a minute and write some damned code!"

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askorkin
Most people I know are more than capable of discussing Agile
techniques/practices and writing plenty of code at the same time, the two are
not mutually exclusive :).

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J_McQuade
Oh, certainly - I was just (flippantly, I admit) pointing out that I'm fairly
sick of hearing about programming methodology X or Y. I have nothing against
the practices themselves, mind - just chalk it up as a friendly bout of HHOS.

