A wise man once concluded that there is no such thing as a free lunch. He was right, of course. Agile methodologies have promised programmers that they can build big software without big planning-up-front.

If Agile isn’t promising success without planning then what is it promising? If you can’t answer that then welcome to Earth.

Why is this a problem? Because Agile is selling a promise to developers that must be fulfilled by architects and designers.

Yes, the Agile practices of 2-week timeframe’s, daily stand-up meetings, pair programming, etc, depend on the simple fact that SOMEONE is keeping a clear vision of the end product in mind.

That sounds like BDUF (big design up front). Someone has to do it. It’s not the developer’s responsibility, it’s the architect’s.

So successful Agile development requires an architect to succeed.

A techtalk video of Hubert Smits, the Agile Guy, inspired this post.