Modern Agile — an introduction to an awesome concept

Today’s Agile

Let’s start with some context — The Agile Manifesto for Software Development

I have always seen the Agile Manifesto for Software Development (established in 2001, see http://agilemanifesto.org/) as something great. It was a departure from how we used to develop software (think about large projects with different phases and all of that) and it enabled many of us to be more effective in delivering value to our customers. But the past few years I felt that it had it’s limitations. While some of the principles are as to the point now as they were in 2001, other principles are more out of date.

Examples of the first are:

‘Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.’ — This touches three very important topics:

• Satisfy the customer
• Early and continuous delivery
• Valuable software

There is so much good in this principle. Everything starts and ends here I’d say.

‘Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.’ — Think about how projects often start relaxed but end up with people making long hours to make the target. This remains something you see a lot as a dysfunction in many companies. The principle…