In almost all cases, I’m opposed to setting aside time for refactoring. In my view refactoring is not an activity you set aside time to do. Refactoring is something you do all the time in little bursts.

If you're afraid to change something it is clearly poorly designed.

Never in the annals of software engineering was so much owed by so many to so few lines of code

Why is composing symphonies tough? I don't know. It's just very few people in the world can do it well. And I think that's the case with upfront design. It is very hard to do well.

A pattern is an idea that has been useful in one practical context and will probably be useful in others.

The biggest issue on software teams is making sure everyone understands what everyone else is doing.

So I hope I’ve made clear that imposing agile methods is a very red flag.