It’s more recruiting and marketing tactic, the company is saying how fair they treat everyone by paying same salary.
It may work in short term, when everyone is part of product and tech team, and building product and valuation.
It will become a problem when junior people are paid same as senior level people that’s delivering more impact. And, when the company grows and have to hire support staff. Will they pay same salary to the receptionist?
But why then even write an article on it, if your experiment is only valid for a very specific set of people, and the minute you start hiring more people or different skillsets or age groups or experience or pretty much anything else, it fails?
Like literally anyone can start a team of few people that are all paid the same. It's not really that hard, nor does it require that much attention. You only need to write about it, if it successfully stays that way for a long period of time or if it scales when parameters change.
Compensation is simply what people ask for and accept as fair.
Too many developers do not negotiate and simply accept lower compensation.
If your are a software engineer with a job offer, ALWAYS negotiate for higher salary. Most likely, you will get increase from first offer. If not, go find a company that will offer the higher increase.
There are companies who will offer you $X - $10K and negotiate up to $X if you fight them for it. There are other companies who will offer you $X + $5K and never negotiate.
For multiple reasons, it’s nicer to work at the second, but your algorithm ensures you’ll always choose the first type.
Agile, as it’s practiced today is Jira driven disorganized waterfall, and has nothing to do with the OG agile principles.
Much like TDD, which works great when it’s dev driven, agile works great when it’s driven by dev team.
The problem happens when the PMs get involved and they have to schedule meetings to get basic status updates and have to implement their voodoo rituals to make it look like PMs are adding to project velocity. Planning Poker, lol.
It gets much worse on larger scope projects and many devs and PMs are inexperienced.
Oh, man, you haven't seen Jira driven disorganized waterfall until you've seen SAFe -- Scaled Agile Framework. Basically Agile with cement shoes, for organizations that are scared to do anything without getting it countersigned in triplicate.
I love how there is an ongoing war between "the old guards" of agile and SAFe. Look up some of the rants, it's a great read. Certificate peddlers flaming each other.
SAFe has a great, telling name though - it's designed to be safe for corporate control freaks. They might not know waterfall, they just live it in their guts.
Easy to identify, they believe in being a "visionary leader" and "inspiring the lower rank".
The dev team can absolutely never drive a business process. Developers don't work with customers, don't measure revenue, don't do marketing. Scrum exists to facilitate clear communication about requirements in the smallest deliverable increments. Devs should be fully bought in and involved in decision making but product mangers have to be there to do discovery and set priorities. PMs are there to facilitate and measure progress which can mostly be done just by keeping tickets up to date.
If you have an inexperienced team, any process you adopt is going to suck.
As a dev I have spoken directly with customers in multiple projects, but based on mentioning revenue/marketing it seems you're coming from a consumer focus and not b2b implementations? It seems to be a common perspective on this site but it's not the only one.
Talking with a customer was great when we could, usually it's been when I worked in a small team (1-3 developers), speaking with either internal or external customers. We talk through what is needed then the BA/PM documents it in the updated job brief, rather than the other way around which leads to so much back and forth. It gets to the root of any uncertainty about what they want much quicker.
This is not any official brand of Agile. It's just our natural inclination when left alone. Talk, iterate, deliver.
I agree with everything you say. Part of the problem is PMs and the scrum masters with certificates and no technical experience run the show and play presenter/jira manager. Most of the time they have no idea what's going on and are glorified backwatchers.
I'd rather have multiple Sr. Devs be half time management, and half time dev. Or increase Sr. Dev pay by 20-30% and have them pick up management on top of their duties.
I am certain your parents had same ideas. Until they decided to have babies. Having kids is powerful natural drive after finding suitable enough mates.
Statistically, you will have children in future, if you’re under 30 right now.
Linux would be cancelled in current atmosphere. Microsoft would just hire some social justice group to accuse Linus Torvalds about saying mean things.
Then, we could only use Windows Server 2021 Enterprise Platform Web Edition, and only be able to develop in Visual Basic C++ asp pages running in IIS 21.
Then again, how is that any different than current Apple Google monopoly in mobile space?
Unfortunately, your assessment is very correct. There will be no solution and only a slow decline as previous systems become obsolete and there no on to fix or upgrade to better systems.
This country is producing more Tik Tok stars than engineers that can sustain civilization.
Which country built the pocket computer/communicator? Which country built the electronics, circuit boards, cables, batteries, housing and fastening screws?
Which country built the components and systems and subsystems that go into manufacturing an electric car?
Which country has lithium, rare earth metal processing capabilities critical in manufacturing all modern electronic systems?
Which country built the components and subsystems in the vaccine manufacturing plants?
Decades ago, US had the education system to move millions of people through manufacturing and engineering pipeline to build all above things.
Now, that US education system does not exist. The manufacturing base does not exist. The engineering pipeline does not exist.
We produce more dropout Tik Tok stars than Professional Engineers that develop critical cooling cores, that can withstand heat and stress thresholds in modern military aircraft, and master welders with 20 years of experience that can weld specialty metal alloys in compact designs.
It’s not just aircraft. Do you know who works on water treatment plants that provide clean drinking water to millions of people in US? These guys will be retiring in few years. Who are going to replace them? Who are going to do the hard and difficult job of maintaining these critical systems?
This country simply does not have enough skilled engineers to design and produce original parts to requirements. Let alone reverse engineer a worn out part.
B2 is product of its time and the amount of engineering resources that went into design and development simply can not be replicated with current society.
Tik Tok stars make multi millions of dollars, so why would any smart person spend years in school and solve complex problems to build state of art Stealth Plane.
Boeing can’t even produce a simple jet without having it fall out of the sky few times, 737 Max.
I would disagree on this point. I work in aerospace with a a lot of smart folks. Boeing's 737 issues are a product of many years of poor management choices, but I don't think represent the talent of the industry as a whole.
737 Max is just the poster child for issues in aerospace. There are many other examples, F35, 787, F22, are just recent examples.
The flow of smart folks in the pipeline are dwindling. You may be working with smart folks, but how many are going to retire in few years? Who are going to replace them? Does the current education system produce the number and quality of candidates needed?
Project failures cannot be simply attributed to a workforce problem without a detailed analysis especially when the top example is a widely reported management failure.
It’s an industry failure, society failure, not just a single project failure.
This country can not build a new reliable airplane, like it did decades ago.
It’s failed project after project. Ask yourself why this is the case? What has changed in this country? What has changed in the industry. What has changed in society?
It’s not just aircraft. Where are US high speed rail systems, that other countries built 30, 40 years ago?
Where are modern infrastructure?
Who works in water treatment plants, providing clean drinking water for millions of people? What happens when all these guys retire in few years?
Tik Tok is all fun and games, and no one wants to do the hard messy work of treating water for consumption.
The F35 seems like a project management issue more than engineering. No one stopped the scope from creeping out of control as new tech and capabilities were added.
> No one stopped the scope from creeping out of control as new tech and capabilities were added.
The problem with F-35 wasn't scope creep, it was the initial premise which operated under a mistaken belief that getting a single “do everything” airframe to maximize commonality would drive down unit cost, rather than driving it up through the conflicting needs of distinct missions.
It may work in short term, when everyone is part of product and tech team, and building product and valuation.
It will become a problem when junior people are paid same as senior level people that’s delivering more impact. And, when the company grows and have to hire support staff. Will they pay same salary to the receptionist?