“When the Great Tao prevails, the world is shared by all.
The worthy and capable are chosen as leaders, trust is fostered and goodwill is cultivated. Thus, people do not only regard their own parents as parents, nor do they only regard their own children as children. The old are cared for until death, the adults are gainfully employed, and the children are nurtured. Widowers, widows, orphans, childless seniors, the disabled and diseased are all taken care of. Men have their proper roles, and women have their families. While people hate to see a resource thrown away, they do not necessarily keep it for their own use.
Not contributing one’s efforts is abhorred, the same as devoting them purely for one’s own self-interests. Therefore, conspiracies do not thrive; robberies, thefts and criminal activities do not occur. And so, there is no need for doors to be shut.
This is called the Great Unity.”
– Book of Rites(Liji), Great Unity
I was holding the role of General Manager in Titansoft when I first encountered Agile in 2014 – and I felt as though Agile (Agile development, Agile management) depicted an ideal world. Just take as an example, the most popular Scrum framework in agile methodology: there is no Team Leader in Scrum teams and projects are completed through the division of labour. Members have the option to choose the task they want to work on rather than having a supervisor assigning work. Team members are motivated and strive to perform, with results shared by the entire team. (Note: Product Backlog is decided by the Product Owner but the team determines the best way to perform the job)
In other words, it is similar to the presentation of an ideal society in communism which reads “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
