Cows, Men, Paddocks
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References

These chapter notes cite public research and published readings used in the text. I restart the numbering for each chapter. Each number links to a reference; “Back to text” returns to the passage. I retain the worked-example and reconstruction disclosures in the chapters.

Three Circles and Three Arrows

  1. Henrik Kniberg, “Making sense of MVP (Minimum Viable Product), and why I prefer Earliest Testable/Usable/Lovable,” Crisp, 25 January 2016. Article. The top and middle rows adapt this illustration; the Sculpting row presents the book’s argument. Back to text.

  2. METR, Measuring the Impact of Early-2025 AI on Experienced Open-Source Developer Productivity, July 2025, arXiv:2507.09089. Study and results. Sixteen developers completed 246 tasks; the trial tested early-2025 tools on familiar repositories. Back to text.

  3. M. Borg, N. Hagatulah, A. Tornhill and E. Söderberg, “Code for Machines, Not Just Humans: Quantifying AI-Friendliness with Code Health Metrics,” proceedings of FORGE 2026 (2026). DOI. The benchmark compares model refactoring on code of differing health; it does not compare AI-authored and human-authored code or test subtraction. Back to text.

  4. Andrej Karpathy, “Software Is Changing (Again),” Y Combinator AI Startup School, June 2025. Talk. Back to text.

  5. Andrej Karpathy, post on the changing work of programmers, 26 December 2025. Post. Back to text.

Waterfall and Agile, Honestly

  1. Winston W. Royce, “Managing the Development of Large Software Systems,” proceedings of IEEE WESCON, 1970. Paper. Back to text.

  2. Barry W. Boehm, Software Engineering Economics (Prentice Hall, 1981); Barry W. Boehm and Philip N. Papaccio, “Understanding and Controlling Software Costs,” IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 14, no. 10 (1988), pp. 1462–1477. The 1988 paper supplies the fifty-to-two-hundred cost multiplier. Back to text.

  3. Frederick P. Brooks Jr., The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering (Addison-Wesley, 1975; anniversary edition, 1995). Back to text.

  4. Kent Beck and the other sixteen signatories, Manifesto for Agile Software Development, 2001. Manifesto and principles. Back to text.

  5. Dave Thomas, “Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility),” 4 March 2014. Article. Back to text.

The Hidden Axiom

  1. DORA, Accelerate State of DevOps Report 2024 (2024). Report. The adoption figures describe modelled associations across survey respondents, rather than measured effects on a particular team. Back to text.

  2. DORA, State of AI-Assisted Software Development (2025). Report. Back to text.

The IKEA Effect, Industrialised

  1. Michael I. Norton, Daniel Mochon and Dan Ariely, “The IKEA effect: When labor leads to love,” Journal of Consumer Psychology 22, no. 3 (2012), pp. 453–460. The experiments concern assembly and valuation; the software-founder application is the author’s interpretation. Back to text.

From Builders to Hardeners

  1. M. Alenezi, Rethinking Software Engineering for Agentic AI Systems, 12 April 2026, arXiv:2604.10599. Preprint. This is a review-based argument, not a field study of Sliday engagements. Back to text.

  2. A. E. Hassan, H. Li, D. Lin, B. Adams, T.-H. Chen, Y. Kashiwa and D. Qiu, Agentic Software Engineering: Foundational Pillars and a Research Roadmap, 2025, arXiv:2509.06216, version 3, June 2026. Preprint. Back to text.

Scoping Against an Artefact

  1. M. Alenezi, Rethinking Software Engineering for Agentic AI Systems, 12 April 2026, arXiv:2604.10599. Preprint. This is a review-based argument, not a field study of Sliday engagements. Back to text.

  2. M. Borg, N. Hagatulah, A. Tornhill and E. Söderberg, “Code for Machines, Not Just Humans: Quantifying AI-Friendliness with Code Health Metrics,” proceedings of FORGE 2026 (2026). DOI. The benchmark compares model refactoring on code of differing health; it does not compare AI-authored and human-authored code or test subtraction. Back to text.

  3. DORA, State of AI-Assisted Software Development (2025). Report. Back to text.

The Discipline of Subtraction

  1. M. Borg, N. Hagatulah, A. Tornhill and E. Söderberg, “Code for Machines, Not Just Humans: Quantifying AI-Friendliness with Code Health Metrics,” proceedings of FORGE 2026 (2026). DOI. The benchmark compares model refactoring on code of differing health; it does not compare AI-authored and human-authored code or test subtraction. Back to text.

  2. METR, Measuring the Impact of Early-2025 AI on Experienced Open-Source Developer Productivity, July 2025, arXiv:2507.09089. Study and results. Sixteen developers completed 246 tasks; the trial tested early-2025 tools on familiar repositories. Back to text.

Pricing the Cut

  1. Ryan Singer, Shape Up: Stop Running in Circles and Ship Work That Matters (Basecamp, 2019). Book. See the discussion of appetites and fixed time with variable scope. Back to text.

How It Fails

  1. M. Borg, N. Hagatulah, A. Tornhill and E. Söderberg, “Code for Machines, Not Just Humans: Quantifying AI-Friendliness with Code Health Metrics,” proceedings of FORGE 2026 (2026). DOI. The benchmark compares model refactoring on code of differing health; it does not compare AI-authored and human-authored code or test subtraction. Back to text.

  2. DORA, Accelerate State of DevOps Report 2024 (2024). Report. The adoption figures describe modelled associations across survey respondents, rather than measured effects on a particular team. Back to text.

The Founder’s View

  1. Michael I. Norton, Daniel Mochon and Dan Ariely, “The IKEA effect: When labor leads to love,” Journal of Consumer Psychology 22, no. 3 (2012), pp. 453–460. The experiments concern assembly and valuation; the software-founder application is the author’s interpretation. Back to text.

The Recalibration

  1. World Economic Forum, The Future of Jobs Report 2025, January 2025, pp. 6, 32–33 and 47. Report. The report projects skills change and training needs through 2030. Back to text.

  2. Andrej Karpathy, “Software Is Changing (Again),” Y Combinator AI Startup School, June 2025. Talk. Back to text.

  3. Stanford Digital Economy Lab, Canaries in the Coal Mine? Six Facts about the Recent Employment Effects of Artificial Intelligence, working paper, 13 November 2025 revision of the August 2025 paper. Paper. Back to text.

Rebuilt Every Two Years

  1. World Economic Forum, The Future of Jobs Report 2025, January 2025, pp. 6, 32–33 and 47. Report. The report projects skills change and training needs through 2030. Back to text.

  2. Ann LaPrade, Janet Mertens, Tanya Moore and Amy Wright, The enterprise guide to closing the skills gap (IBM Institute for Business Value, September 2019), p. 6. Report. For the 2.5–5-year range, see Nickle LaMoreaux’s discussion in IBM Think, “Embracing the future of HR in the AI-first enterprise”. The 2019 report gives five years and a shorter span for technical skills; it does not give the 2.5-year figure. Back to text.

  3. Sagar Goel and Orsolya Kovács-Ondrejkovic, “Reskilling for a Rapidly Changing World,” Boston Consulting Group, 22 September 2023. Article. Back to text.

  4. Peter M. Senge, The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization (Doubleday, 1990). Back to text.

Sculpting

  1. Thoughtworks, “The Future of Software Development” retreat, Deer Valley, Utah, February 2026. Announcement. See also Gergely Orosz, “The future of software engineering with AI”, The Pragmatic Engineer, 2026. Back to text.

  2. George J. Vettath, “After Agile, The Next Big Shift: Generative Software Delivery (GSD),” Stragiliti, 2 December 2025. Article. The author founded the low-code vendor Stragiliti / Kallos Solutions. Back to text.

  3. A. E. Hassan, H. Li, D. Lin, B. Adams, T.-H. Chen, Y. Kashiwa and D. Qiu, Agentic Software Engineering: Foundational Pillars and a Research Roadmap, 2025, arXiv:2509.06216, version 3, June 2026. Preprint. Back to text.

  4. Michael Sender, From Sprints to Swarms: Navigating the Post-Agile Future in the Age of AI (P3 Group, September 2025), whitepaper. Publication. Back to text.

What This Book Cannot Tell You

  1. Ryan Holiday, Perennial Seller: The Art of Making and Marketing Work that Lasts (Portfolio, 2017). Publisher. Back to text.

  2. Michael Lopp, Managing Humans: Biting and Humorous Tales of a Software Engineering Manager, 3rd ed. (Apress, 2016). DOI. Back to text.

  3. David Pye, The Nature and Art of Workmanship (Herbert Press, 2007 edition). Publisher. Back to text.

The Bottleneck Moves Again

  1. Winston W. Royce, “Managing the Development of Large Software Systems,” proceedings of IEEE WESCON, 1970. Paper. Back to text.

  2. Kent Beck and the other sixteen signatories, Manifesto for Agile Software Development, 2001. Manifesto and principles. Back to text.

  3. M. Alenezi, Rethinking Software Engineering for Agentic AI Systems, 12 April 2026, arXiv:2604.10599. Preprint. This is a review-based argument, not a field study of Sliday engagements. Back to text.

Distribution Will Eat Sculpting

  1. Bain & Company, Technology Report 2025, 23 September 2025: “State of the Art of Agentic AI Transformation,” p. 50, and “Building the Foundation for Agentic AI,” p. 72. Report. The three-to-five-year horizon concerns foundational spending; the 2028–29 interpretation belongs to the author. Back to text.

  2. Andrew Chen, “Every marketing channel sucks right now,” 9 April 2025. Essay. Back to text.

  3. Bryan Kim, “In Consumer AI, Momentum Is the Moat,” Andreessen Horowitz, 11 June 2025. Article. Back to text.

A Question for the Next Author

  1. Dave Thomas, “Agile Is Dead (Long Live Agility),” 4 March 2014. Article. Back to text.

  2. Winston W. Royce, “Managing the Development of Large Software Systems,” proceedings of IEEE WESCON, 1970. Paper. Back to text.