When 'Why' meets 'How'

Since I embarked the Scrum/Agile journey half a decade ago, as a Scrum Master/Agile Coach, I was regularly battling between the traditional waterfall versus the agile way of gathering requirements. Let me take you through some of the challenges I had and see if it also makes sense in your context.

Waterfall & Agile Methodology

Waterfall - We focus a lot on writing the actual requirements into document like technical design document, configuration design document, functional specification document etc.

Agile - We focus more on Epic, Feature, User Story through customer collaboration; you can see here, user story means a story, like for example, as a web user, I want to visit the e-Commerce site so that I can purchase a bag that I love (nothing technical here: not the data field length, not the function of a button, not the Entity Relationship Diagram (ERD) etc).

The Difference

Up to this point of time, I think you should have already spotted the approach that both methodology used, are quite different in nature; one focuses on the left side of human brain, the other focuses more on the right side of the brain. This brings me to the real topic I want to discuss here today, "When 'Why' meets 'How'".

Inspired by the book, "Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action" and conversations with some of my fellow friends, I believe it is quite important for 'Why' and 'How' to understand each other, in order to create the magic of how greatness looks like.

The Dialogue

Why: Hi, I am 'Why', and you?

How: Hi, I am 'How'! What's up?

Why: I have a dream. I want to make my country a lovely place to stay.

How: Nice. But how?

Why: Er... I don't know, I am 'Why', how would I know, 'How'?

How: Ok, you have got a point. Let me figure out something.

A few moments later...

How: Sorry 'Why', what do you mean by a lovely place to stay. I kind of get you but at the same time, not. The definition is a bit vague can you break it down further so that I can figure out the how?

Why: Isn't it quite clear? A lovely place to stay? Ok let me try.

A few moments later...

WHY

Why: Now I know what I mean by a lovely place to stay. Ok, these are some of the definitions:

• As a person staying in this country, I want to have clean air so that we are always healthy
• As a person staying in this country, I want to have affordable living standard so that we can live a comfortable lifestyle
• As a person staying in this country, I want to have secure environment so that we don't need to constantly worry about safety

HOW

How: Ahhh... I think I know what you want now. This are the solutions I propose:

• Target to achieve Zero Carbon Emissions by 2030 - Encouraging the use of electric cars, implementing emission standard for automobile etc
• Target to achieve affordable living standard - affordable: house, car, public transport, food, entertainment etc
• Target to maintain crime rate at healthy threshold - Install CCTV at high crime rate area, educate people in every moral aspect, strengthen law enforcement etc

Why: This is exactly what I am talking about. Sounds good since these are all actionable items and we should be able to achieve them with some efforts. 'How', then how about my other dreams like... (the list goes on)

Conclusion

In conclusion, having 'Why' and 'How' to meet each other is probably just the first step. The next step would be understanding each other and be able to advance in the relationship, ultimately, be able to form a relationship that is akin to marital intimacy (mentally). How is by having a healthy level of communication and collaboration between 'Why' and 'How'. This is also aligned with one of the key values in agile manifesto: Individuals and interactions over processes and tools.