After years of writing about agile transformations, frameworks, and methodologies, I’m ready to share something that’s been building in my mind for months: Agile Ways is evolving into Adaptive Ways.
This isn’t just a rebrand. It’s a recognition of where our industry—and my own thinking—has arrived.
The Wave We’ve All Ridden
Look at this logo that’s served Agile Ways well:
Clean. Contained. Structured. It represented everything I believed about agile: clear frameworks, defined boundaries, systematic approaches.
But here’s what I’ve learned from years of watching agile implementations: the real world doesn’t fit in circles.
The teams I’ve worked with, the organizations I’ve advised, the practitioners I’ve spoken with—they’ve all described the same journey. Initial excitement about agile. Struggles with implementation. Frustration with rigid adherence to frameworks. Disillusionment with the “agile industrial complex.” And then, for the lucky ones, a breakthrough into something more fluid, more intelligent, more… adaptive.
It looks like this:
From Agile to Adaptive Intelligence
This wave-to-arrow isn’t just a pretty design. It’s the story of everyone who’s lived through real agile transformations:
• The wave represents the turbulence we’ve all experienced—the ups and downs of sprint planning, the chaos of retrospectives that change nothing, the endless debates about story points, the consultants who promised transformation and delivered ceremony.
• The arrow represents the breakthrough—when teams stop following frameworks and start responding intelligently to their actual context.
I call this adaptive intelligence: the ability to sense what’s actually happening, learn from real feedback, and adjust approach based on evidence rather than ideology.
Why “Beyond Agile”?
Don’t get me wrong. Agile taught us crucial lessons:
• Working software over comprehensive documentation
• Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
• Responding to change over following a plan
But somewhere along the way, agile became what it originally opposed: a rigid set of prescribed practices, sold by an industry of consultants who’ve never written code or shipped products.
Adaptive Ways is for those of us who’ve graduated from agile school and are ready to apply intelligence rather than methodology.
What’s Coming
Starting next week, I’m launching Adaptive Ways on Substack. It’s designed for:
• Practitioners burned by bad agile implementations who are ready for something more nuanced
• Leaders frustrated with agile transformation promises that never delivered real results
• Teams wanting to move beyond ceremony toward actual effectiveness
• Anyone curious about what comes after agile
We’ll explore adaptive intelligence in software development, product management, organizational design, and leadership. We’ll look at real case studies of teams that found their way through the agile turbulence to something better.
Thank You, Agile Ways Readers
To everyone who’s followed this journey, shared posts, and engaged in conversations: you’ve shaped my thinking more than you know. Many of your questions, challenges, and stories are what led me toward adaptive intelligence.
I hope you’ll join me at Adaptive Ways. The subscription is free, and I promise the content will be worth your time.
The wave taught us to navigate turbulence.The arrow shows us where we’re heading.
See you on the other side.
Subscribe to Adaptive Ways on SubStack → https://adaptiveways.substack.com/p/adaptive-ways-substack
This is the final post on Agile Ways. All future content will be published at Adaptive Ways, where we explore what comes after agile.
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