“I said to the CIO at the time, we’re not going to hit this. In fact, we’ll be… I can actually tell you, we’re gonna be 3 weeks late… And he said: ‘Just make it work!'” – Renee Troughton
Renee shares a powerful story from her work on a mandatory legislative compliance project where reality clashed with executive expectations. Working with a team new to Agile, she carefully established velocity over two sprints and projected the delivery timeline. The challenge intensified when sales continued promising bespoke features to clients while the deadline remained fixed. Despite transparently communicating the team would miss the mandatory date by three weeks, leadership demanded she “just make it work” without providing solutions. Renee found herself creating a misleading burn-up chart to satisfy executive confidence, while the organization played a dangerous game of chicken—waiting for another implementer to admit delays first. This experience taught her the critical importance of courage in conversations with leaders and the need to clearly separate business decisions from development team responsibilities. Sometimes the best we can do is provide transparency and let leaders own the consequences of their choices.
In this episode, we refer to the seminal book on large projects: The Mythical Man Month, by Frederick Brooks.
Self-reflection Question: When faced with unrealistic demands from leadership, do you have the courage to maintain transparency about your team’s reality, even when it means refusing to create false artifacts of confidence?
Transform Your Agile Teams with Hard-Earned Lessons from Super-Experienced Scrum Masters
Do you wish you had decades of experience? Learn from the Best Scrum Masters In The World, Today! The Tips from the Trenches – Scrum Master edition audiobook includes hours of audio interviews with SM’s that have decades of experience: from Mike Cohn to Linda Rising, Christopher Avery, and many more. Super-experienced Scrum Masters share their hard-earned lessons with you. Learn those today, make your teams awesome!
About Renee Troughton
Renee is one of the most experienced Agile coaches in the Southern Hemisphere with over two decades of transformation experience across banking, insurance, pharma, and real estate. Since 2002, she’s helped organizations go digital, tackle systemic issues, and deliver value faster. Passionate about cutting bureaucracy, Renee champions a return to humanity at work.
Follow Renee’s work at AgileForest.com, her website as well as her work on the Agile Revolution podcast.
You can link with Renee Troughton on LinkedIn.
