I frequently read and hear about claims that "XP won't work for us" or "I can't see how we could do XP". XP isn't appropriate for every development context, but it works in suprisingly more settings than it may first seem.

There is a mathematicl technique known as reductions that I think provides a nice metaphor for this problem. Reductions are a theorem proving technique, in which you convert an existing problem to another problem. The other problem, which is hopefully simpler, is now the one you provide the proof for and therefore show that the given solution can be extended to the original problem.

There are many contexts where people assume you can't use XP. But if you try to find a reduction for the context, you frequently can filter out a lot of noise and complexity, such that you can see how the context can be simplified and XP can be used.

If nothing else, the process of thinking about your context from a different perspective will probably expose assumptions and areas for improvement.