Agile Smells - Do you need agile deodorant?

"Agile Smells" is a catalog of warning signs that your agile project may (or may not) be about to go horribly wrong.

Let me contribute a few other smells I've come across:

"Can you change that estimate? / Can you revise the remaining estimates DOWN?"

This is a variation of Executive Pressure. After a few sprints the teams velocity stabilizes and it becomes clear the hoped for project deadline can not be met. Instead of adjusting the usual project management variables - time, scope, resources (and quality, although quality should be the last variable to be sacrificed) - the initial reaction is to apply pressure to the developers to work longer hours . In most cases it was not the developers who set the original project deadline. A more constructive approach is to and adjust the usual variables as the project progresses.

Sign-Off

"You can't change your mind. It's been signed off!" You're still thinking waterfall. Accept that the business owners will change their minds - for any number of reasons - even after the corresponding story has been completed. Any changes become a new story, which of course has to be prioritised.

"What is a chicken?"

Although people may say they have committed to using agile it is often not a priority for them to do some basic reading on the subject. For example, I've lent people the very thin and straight-to-the-point Agile Software Development with Scrum, but if a few days later they can't tell me the story of the Chicken and the Pig then I know they are not that interested in the subject.