We admit it, Cloudspace made a mistake. We got pair programming wrong. We did it with the best of intentions, but our plan completely backfired. Let me explain…

We have been using versions of Agile Development at Cloudspace for most of our 13 year history — even before it had a formal name. However, we didn’t implement pair programming, or extreme programming (XP) as it is sometimes called, at the company until more recently. One of the driving factors for moving to pair programming was the rapid growth of our business working with tech startups. In order to serve these clients, we needed to grow the team rapidly. As we started discussing options, implementing pair programming came up. Pairing junior developers with more senior developer on the team to mentor them through on the job training sounded like a good idea. In fact, we thought this was so much of a good move that we carved out specific team roles for Jr. Developers and Pair Leads.