Jason Voorhees
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I'll let you in on another secret in the silicon valley.In tech the real make or break factor isn't genius IQ engineers or fancy computers it's how the work gets divided. That single decision dictates the speed, quality, sanity and whether people actually love building software and the company or just hate it
In tech we have different software development models that get used. It's basically how all the work will get divided into tasks. There's waterfall model, V model, agile model etc.
The most common of this is the agile model. In standard Agile, a massive project like build an online checkout system is chopped into tiny bite sized tasks. Teams work in strict 2 week blocks called Sprints. Every single morning, they hold a 15 minute Daily Standup to answer. What did I do yesterday? What am I doing today. What's are the problems I am facing.Ritual performed. Box checked.
In a lot of engineering teams this turns into whats called zombie scrum or dark agile
www.eficode.com
The same useless standups. The same shitty meetings, Same bloated backlogs and boring agendas. It turns the entire development cycle into a dreaded experience so people resort to sloppy performance because software engineering believe it or not is a very creative job.
It's not the same as say being accountant sitting in the same place crunching the same ledger. You would be solving ambiguous problems, inventing solutions. Rigid rituals + micromanagement turn it into factory work. Creativity dies and as result people start hating this line of work.
Now AI also in the picture. Many tech companies are slowly moving away from this model. Example Apple They don't iterate in 2 week cycles because their hardware launch dates are set in stone. iPhone will be launched in September come what may, wwdc 2026 will happen in June at any cost so they operate on massive, highly coordinated, top down milestones.
Basecamp literally wrote the book on rejecting Agile. They use a framework called Shape Up.
agilefirst.io
Instead of 2 week scrambles, teams get fixed 6 week cycles to build a single, well defined feature, followed by 2 weeks of absolute quiet. No one does anything. Just pass time breathe and explore. Zero daily status updates.
I am in Devops so I don't have daily standups besides incidents and also plenty of free time. But tbh 2026 is feeling like a tipping point. Perhaps I'm reaching but the Agile zombie factory is losing its grip because the sheer speed enabled by AI tooling which makes two week scrum cycles look like bottlenecks. I am glad to be witnessing this change myself and I'm hopeful about the future. Tech is going to back to what it always was.
In tech we have different software development models that get used. It's basically how all the work will get divided into tasks. There's waterfall model, V model, agile model etc.
The most common of this is the agile model. In standard Agile, a massive project like build an online checkout system is chopped into tiny bite sized tasks. Teams work in strict 2 week blocks called Sprints. Every single morning, they hold a 15 minute Daily Standup to answer. What did I do yesterday? What am I doing today. What's are the problems I am facing.Ritual performed. Box checked.
In a lot of engineering teams this turns into whats called zombie scrum or dark agile
Dark Agile: How the mistakes of others can help you in your agile transformation journey
Learn from common agile adoption mistakes to improve your transformation, and discover why training in Dark Agile is gaining traction.
www.eficode.com
The same useless standups. The same shitty meetings, Same bloated backlogs and boring agendas. It turns the entire development cycle into a dreaded experience so people resort to sloppy performance because software engineering believe it or not is a very creative job.
It's not the same as say being accountant sitting in the same place crunching the same ledger. You would be solving ambiguous problems, inventing solutions. Rigid rituals + micromanagement turn it into factory work. Creativity dies and as result people start hating this line of work.
Now AI also in the picture. Many tech companies are slowly moving away from this model. Example Apple They don't iterate in 2 week cycles because their hardware launch dates are set in stone. iPhone will be launched in September come what may, wwdc 2026 will happen in June at any cost so they operate on massive, highly coordinated, top down milestones.
Basecamp literally wrote the book on rejecting Agile. They use a framework called Shape Up.
Shape Up: a complete guide to this new development methodology (2026)
The Shape Up method enables engineering teams to optimize their workflow, improve output, and bring sanity into the development process.
agilefirst.io
Instead of 2 week scrambles, teams get fixed 6 week cycles to build a single, well defined feature, followed by 2 weeks of absolute quiet. No one does anything. Just pass time breathe and explore. Zero daily status updates.
I am in Devops so I don't have daily standups besides incidents and also plenty of free time. But tbh 2026 is feeling like a tipping point. Perhaps I'm reaching but the Agile zombie factory is losing its grip because the sheer speed enabled by AI tooling which makes two week scrum cycles look like bottlenecks. I am glad to be witnessing this change myself and I'm hopeful about the future. Tech is going to back to what it always was.
