The shift, the expert says, looks like a logical stage in the industry’s maturation.
One of the most noticeable trends among Russian IT companies is a gradual move away from dogmatic Agile practices, according to IT expert and partner at 5D Consulting, Alexey Karpunin.
“For a long time, Agile was treated almost as a universal cure for all management problems. It was implemented everywhere, often without regard for business scale, system criticality, or the real complexity of processes. In practice, this frequently produced the opposite effect – longer timelines, higher development costs, fragmented architectures, and a sense that project control had dissolved somewhere between sprints and backlogs. The market is now beginning to honestly acknowledge this experience and rethink it, and that is, without exaggeration, a positive sign,” Karpunin said.
As a reminder, the Agile approach to project management focuses on iterative development, constant customer interaction, and rapid adaptation to change.
According to the expert, in an effort to restore accountability, predictability, and coherent decision-making, companies are returning to classical project management.
“The project-based approach is once again becoming relevant where deadlines, budgets, and outcomes matter more than an endless process of ‘improvement for improvement’s sake.’ This is especially evident in large and complex IT systems, where the cost of error is too high and architectural chaos quickly turns into a systemic business risk. This shift looks like a logical stage in the industry’s maturation,” he stressed.
IT Is Like Outer Space Exploration
Karpunin compared the development of digital technologies to a space program, noting that in the long run, sober engineering logic may become a key competitive advantage for Russian IT. As a result, many teams are already gradually returning to a project-based approach, combining it with tools that actually work.
“Outer space is always about strict engineering discipline, calculation, responsibility, and an understanding that improvisation has its limits. Russian IT is gradually arriving at the same realization: the scale of tasks has reached a point where working ‘by feel’ and hoping flexibility will save everything no longer works. Clear project boundaries, strong engineering logic, and control at all levels are needed,” the IT expert added.
