The Stack Overflow podcast is a weekly conversation about working in software development, learning to code, and the art and culture of computer programming. Hosted by Paul Ford and Ben Popper, the series features questions from our community, interviews with fascinating guests, and hot takes on what’s happening in tech. Founded in 2008, Stack Overflow is empowering the world to develop technology through collective knowledge. It’s best known for being the largest, most trusted online community for developers and technologists. More than 100 million people come to Stack Overflow every month to ask questions, help solve coding problems, and develop new skills.

We hate Scrum and Agile too

September 23, 2022 00:22:35 21.68 MB Downloads: 0

About three years ago, when our public platform engineering team at Stack started growing, we realized that we needed a more robust formal project management system that could scale with all the creativity coming on board. That’s when we started looking at formal, by-the-book frameworks to empower and coach our teams to their fullest potential. We landed on Agile and Scrum. 

Admittedly, our development team was nervous about implementing Scrum and Agile at first. So we focused on the goals of introspection and accountability rather than the rigidness of enforcement.

Agile and Scrum get a lot of hate. But is that their fault or are you doing it wrong?

We talked about this on the podcast a few years ago, when Ben, Paul, and Sara wondered, “Is Scrum making you a worse engineer?” 

It’s about providing support—not punishing people. Done right, Agile and Scrum can be a force of freedom and autonomy when they start with trust.

Connect with Shanda and Jon on LinkedIn.

We conclude with a big high five to Lifeboat badge winner jminkler for their answer to how to create an Instagram share link in PHP (thank you).

‘Til next time.