The posts A Social Contract for Agile and Additions to the Social Contract established the dire need to reconstitute the social contract at a time when software development and test jobs migrate off-shore in an unprecedented manner. As stated in the first of these two posts:
My sense in 2005 was that the social contract between employers and employees in the software industry was broken. Without a working social contract, the friction and antagonism can bring a system down. For example, in 1942 – the turning-point year of WWII – 833,000 days of coal mining were lost due to strikes in the British coal industry.
Colleague and friend Ryan Martens has just published an article on the subject in Dr. Dobb’s. Ryan examines the Agile Social Contact in the context of what it really takes to get Agile rolling. To quote him:
Can you see the simplicity of Agile Adoption when you apply appropriate commitment and structure? A truly effective Agile Social Contract that creates true trust and commitment requires clarity and discipline. With the transparency of a clearly communicated Agile Social Contract, you will establish a strong leadership mechanism that aligns all the stakeholders and teams within your Agile adoption. Of course Enterprise-scale agile adoptions take place in a larger context of the business and market. As Israel Gat stated in his personal Agile Social Contract, we cannot guarantee lifetime employment in this globally competitive world. But, by making a clear commitment to win-win agreements, we can change the conversation into a motivating one versus a de-motivating one. Don’t try to scale Agile without a real and personal commitment or without a clear rollout structure.
The fascinating thing to me is that Rally’s own social contract seems to have developed completely on its own. Best I know there had never been a conscious attempt to develop a social contract. Yet, the company is well-known for the strong affinity of its employees.
I will leave it Ryan to comment on this riddle…
