Scrum is Dumb

Myopia is not only an eyesight condition, it also sometimes refers to the kind of tunnel vision and nearsightedness plaguing the software engineering field.  Such a condition has been festering since 1995, when Scrum arrived on the scene and effectively became the centroid of the Agile movement.  With the advent of Generative AI and its combination with older forms of AI to yield Agency, Scrums usefulness is now severely challenged, and its continued existence will prove to be detrimental in the era of AI generated/assisted software development.  The extremely biased assumptions waged by non-engineering/developer process people has almost no relevance with the new paradigm emerging.  How can any reasonable individual not compromised by their own selfish profit center deem a 30 year old approach to be state of the art?  Who says a single individual can't run circles around a team of status gatherers, demand interpreters, customer proxies or mere queuing agents?  While it would be unreasonable to assert that Scrum offered no value to the industry during the turn of the millennium, it now represents a closed or fixed mindset, an echo chamber and obsolescence.  Scrums contribution and anything like it was tantamount to training-wheels intended to "hunt" for critical WIP through timeboxing.  Instilling iteration and overcoming hyper-specialization in roles was difficult to say the least but that time has now passed.

This is not conjecture or biased opinion - it is fact based on the work and products we have now realized.  As is typical with disruptive paradigm shifts, what is about to take place is an extreme compression of the software delivery value stream - what I have identified and articulated back over 10 years ago with HyperAgility™.  Such a compression will yield not mere 10x or 100x productivity gains, but rather 1000x or more improvements in productivity.  How you might ask?  Well, with HyperAgility™ a single Solution Architect working in concert with our AI agent can realize enterprise domain software (think SAP, Oracle, IBM and the like) with a labor footprint of 1/10th to 1/100th of the cost structure, and do it 10 to 100 times faster and with quality actively and automatically injected into the resultant software product.  More importantly, no longer is "off-the-shelf" software rigid and opaque.  Most of us who have been in the industry long enough have seen the total shit-shows that ensue when trying to upgrade an ERP package version, increasingly mandated by vendors on a rigid cycle.  Let alone no one would ever claim that "vanilla" COTS is ever realized, meaning that huge amounts of brittle customizations are required due to the often times rigid and outdated view of business processes and competitive domains.  That is if the project even gets across the finish line. 

Such a strategy is supported by the outlook by industry analysts and notable publications.  In fact, recent surveys of CIO priorities for 2025 highlight emphasis on repatriating software development in-house.  According to Forrester’s Priorities Survey, 2024, 64% of business and technology professionals said that bringing more development in-house would be a high or critical priority for their IT organization over the next 12 months.   According to recent surveys by CIO Magazine, “‘How can I and my organization enable expanded development and use of technology outside of IT in an optimal way? How do we help build the technology talent and support business technologist across the enterprise to enable their success?’”  

What is now upon us, and can be proven with actual product, is the era of AI-OTS software - an extremely high-order reuse paradigm different than anything that has existed before.  What is available to consultants who are about to be displaced by this trend is the ability to perform the role of Solution Architect for their customers, still potentially leaning of "developer coaches" and customer SME's, but orchestrating the interface between the organization and the AI, and elevating their value proposition centered around their relationship with the stakeholders, the understanding of their customers business and appreciation of the competitive landscape.

Reach out if you would like to understand more on how you can disrupt the charlatans and big consultants out there who are unethically milking the cow of their customers.  Differentiate yourself as the inevitable labor footprint of the industry is drastically reduced.  Don't believe what most are too afraid to admit or say - pure specialist developers will be disrupted; and process overhead roles will be severely disrupted.  Yet the opportunity is for ALL to perform this new Solution Architect role, thereby democratizing software development. 

If I were a big system's integrator or consultancy, I would be scared shitless.