Lauren Dixon writes about the waning of agile. As I have written a lot on agile, I completely agree with this. How do you know something has hit the late majority?
The big consulting firms have it as an offering.
Microsoft package it up and sell it.
Look at the Google Trend data, it seems that agile plateaued out in 2018.
Similarly in the Bain Management Fads Tools & Trends survey, “agile management” adoption has flatlined at 25% with mediocre satisfaction ratings.
The two comparisons are with Lean Six Sigma (going down) on the one hand and Digital Transformation (going up) on the other. As I have written about previously, LSS and Agile have a common ancestry although their adherents often find themselves in conflict.
Meanwhile Gartner’s latest hype cycle for emerging technologies is all about the AI baby.
I suspect that the next organizational fad tool will likely be something that draws on the current glamour of AI/ChatGPT in much the same way that agile drew on the glamour of software startups and Six Sigma was promoted via the glamour of Jack Welch.
It would be nice to think that we could finally put down organizational structuring fads but I doubt that will happen.
What do you think will be next?
Methinks we are in the world of #silverbullets here. Agile, as you rightly say, became the 'thing', and as the lustre wains, so a new hope is needed. I think you are right re AI, the only difference being, maybe, it is the first fad that MIGHT be able to reinvent itself on its own terms in time.