Adversarial work does seem like it's largely a sign of communication breakdown. I think 'gaming' isn't always as adversarial as it seems, though. I was considering it in terms of Goodhart's Law, where even with good intentions, representative metrics become less representative as you organize around them. The "active days" entry in your link seems like an example; if everyone pushes most days for the sake of pushing, then active days isn't feedback on programmer skill.
Of course, your link touches on that. "Everyone pushes every day" is a great outcome, even if the metric is no longer clear. The common trend is to pick good metrics, then struggle to keep them relevant. I really like the alternative of just setting metrics that will be good after people optimize.
Adversarial work does seem like it's largely a sign of communication breakdown. I think 'gaming' isn't always as adversarial as it seems, though. I was considering it in terms of Goodhart's Law, where even with good intentions, representative metrics become less representative as you organize around them. The "active days" entry in your link seems like an example; if everyone pushes most days for the sake of pushing, then active days isn't feedback on programmer skill.
Of course, your link touches on that. "Everyone pushes every day" is a great outcome, even if the metric is no longer clear. The common trend is to pick good metrics, then struggle to keep them relevant. I really like the alternative of just setting metrics that will be good after people optimize.