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> why is this "Scrum" specific?

Scrum's pre-committed units of work across the team promotes this; its one of the reasons that many groups prefer flow-based methods (which can support regularly-timed releases simply by shipping the features that are ready at the time of the release cutoff) rather than Scrum's cycle-based method.

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I don't see how this is true. If you're building slack into your cycle there should be regular investment time available that a pure flow-based system wouldn't have.

If there's no slack in your sprint schedule, well there's your problem.

In my experience, Scrum's work-unit factorization encourages thinking of developers as spherical cows that need no personal development, with slack as a concession to reality that patches the damage Scrum itself causes. And Slack is generally considered to be for technical investment, though, not personal investment.

A good manager could think past that, for sure, but I've never encountered a good manager that felt Scrum was good or necessary for their teams.

"If you're building slack into your cycle"

Then management comes over and asks why you're slacking off.

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