Agile development addresses this problem [the spiral of distrust] by iterative delivery of system functionality to meet requirements that people know they need today.
via Agile Builds Trust with Fast Feedback | CIO – Blogs and Discussion.
I think this (iteratively meeting user’s expectation) is one of the best options that we have to gain trust, deliver real value, have great products and have fun but … I don’t think it’s enough. I see for example two effects coming when the loop gets going:
- the customer buys in: he is so fascinated by this “new” model that he jumps on board and stop challenging the team toward a better performance
- the customer gets used and start kicking because it wants even more … and this lead to less quality (= distrust) or get pushed back.
I don’t necessarily have a solution, if you have one please feel free to share in the comments 🙂
PierG
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PierG (aka Piergiorgio Grossi) 
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March 6, 2011 at 7:20 pm
MktgMeetsIT
You’re right about it not being enough. “Meets user’s expectations”…there’s an emotional component here – it’s not the same thing as meeting requirements.
The nascent functionality delivered in a sprint release may be a real achievement for the dev team. They understandably celebrate their win. Yet the business team doesn’t celebrate – they’re underwhelmed because the delivered iteration is not “baked” enough to impress their boss or delight a user. Technically, requirements for the release have been met. Yet, cue the distrust spiral.
The business wonders how the dev team can be so insular and self-delusional that they think this delivery is even close to empowering the business. The dev team wonders how the business can be so clueless and short-sighted that they can’t appreciate this delivery for the major milestone that it is.
The solution is emotional intelligence. The dev team can make it their business to understand that “done” is a subjective term, and not get their knickers in a knot when the business’s definition doesn’t match theirs. And the business can make it their business to learn the development cycle’s rhythms, understand how iterative deliveries get them closer to their goals, and express appreciation for the dev team’s efforts throughout.
March 7, 2011 at 10:17 am
PierG
@MktgMeetsIt I’m not sure I agree completely on the fact that DONE is a subjective term: I’d more say that no matter how precisely you define DONE, as for ever form of communication it is perceived differently by different people. This means that what can be a technical perfect DONE, is not giving the right emotions or trust or feelings to someone (the users, for ex) … and this is a very interesting topic!
Thank you for sharing,
PierG
March 8, 2011 at 6:05 pm
The definition of DONE … is not DONE « PierG (aka Piergiorgio Grossi)
[…] sometimes this is not enough: as MktgMeetsIt writes in a comment to my post The Spiral of Distrust: “there is an emotional component […]
March 10, 2011 at 3:28 am
MktgMeetsIT
Fair enough, PierG. “Differently perceived” may indeed be a more accurate term than “subjective”. I think we can both agree that trust between the business and dev teams gets better when we bring those differences out into the light and talk through them. Many thanks for exploring this topic!