Practice
Description
Practices are appropriate when:
- The work requires creativity, innovation, or continuous adaptation to the context.
- The quality of the outcome depends on people's specific knowledge and experience.
- Requirements or the environment change frequently and require constant adaptation.
Agile methodologies (Scrum, Kanban, XP) are practices: the Retrospective, the Daily Scrum, and TDD are procedures that help the team work better, but the value of the results they produce depends on the team's knowledge and collaboration, not on the mechanical execution of the procedure.
Difference from process
The distinction between practice and process is central to the value proposition of agility compared with process engineering models:
- In a process: the person serves the procedure. The knowledge resides in the process.
- In a practice: the procedure serves the person. The knowledge resides in the person.
Practice and Expert Management
The expert management advocated by Scrum Manager is precisely the ability to adapt practices to the context rather than applying them mechanically. A technical manager applies practices because they are in the manual; an expert manager adapts practices because they understand the value each one brings in their specific context.
Common mistake
Turning practices into processes. When a team applies Scrum ritualistically—holding the events because "it's time" and filling in the artifacts because "it has to be done"—it turns practices into processes and loses the benefit of both. It gets neither the efficiency and predictability of a good process nor the creativity and adaptability of a good practice.
See also
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