Succeeding with Agile

Reasons to Prefer Going All In

Just as there are reasons to prefer starting small, there are reasons to prefer an all-in transition:

• Going all in can reduce resistance. In anything less than an all-at-once transition, there will always be some skeptics who will hold out hope that the whole effort is a pilot that will soon be abandoned. Like Cortez burning his boats at Vera Cruz to prove his resolve to his soldiers, an organization that goes all in is demonstrating both its commitment to the new process and also that it will not turn back. This level of visible commitment to the change can be beneficial in helping the change succeed.

• It avoids problems created by having Scrum and traditional teams work together. If you transition anything ...