A New Muscle Memory: Training Systems Engineers in the Agile Culture of Trust
Sharon Torres Fairbairn · Insight · 2018
ABSTRACT The transition to an agile team often causes culture shock for systems engineers who spent their early careers following a waterfall development process. Even agile mindset enthusiasts can experience friction while retraining their “muscle memory” from a waterfall upbringing. One disadvantage is that the prevailing training model for systems engineers still consists more of systematic control than of systemic trust, where trust relates to the quality of the relationships within and among the disciplines involved in an agile engineering effort. The engineering of complex systems involves capricious, uncertain, risky, variable, and evolving (CURVE) problems, so are we adding to the burden by not transforming the way we cultivate systems thinkers? This paper explores agile systems engineering training, behaviors, and a culture of trust as critical enablers to thriving in the CURVE domain.