are programmers "failures"?

[pier4r]

I think that Agile, and many other frameworks, is not intrinsically bad. It has two big flaws though.

(a) it is not really based on hard data. Rather on observations. Observations can produce apparently reasonable solutions, but that at the end of the day they are superficial and help no one.
(b) Even in the case the solution suggested is sound, it is poorly applied. For example, let's be honest, Agile as it core coincides with the "Plan do check act" framework and ultimately with the scientific method. You have an idea, you plan for it (do your hypothesis), you code and test it (do/testing), you collect the result and you do a review to improve the idea/implementation if needed. Then the next cycle happens.

The reality is that, at least for what I read all over the internet and I experience at work, Agile (or the like) is never implemented. It is more waterfall with standups.
There is never a review. And if there is, it is once 5 months after the project ended.
In the standups there is no really "hey I am stuck with this, does anyone have an idea?". People barely listen.
It is never "ok we are going to implement only those X features in the next cycle". Rather it is "do as much as you can, if possible tonight".
There is poor testing and collecting whether things works.
There is poor reuse of code across projects.
Etc....
It is a poorly implemented chaotic mess.

So my 2 cents are. Agile is not bad, although it may be a superficial framework. Rather I have never seen it implemented properly.