Summary of the agile manifesto principles

Regardless of the processes and tools you put in place to become more agile, you should take time to learn and instill the principles of agile to help you understand what you are aiming for.  Reading and understanding the implications of the agile manifesto is therefore a very valuable start, although it is just a start of a very important change.

Here is a quick summary of the agile manifesto to get you started:

• Highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
• Welcome changing requirements, empowers business to adapt at its own pace.
• Deliver working solutions frequently, continuous feedback - working software is the primary measure of progress.
• Business and developers work in concert throughout the project (breaking down that divide)
• Build projects around motivated individuals, trust them to get the job done.
• Conveying information with face-to-face conversation.
• Maintain a constant pace indefinitely - sponsors, developers, and users.
• Continuous attention to technical excellence - good design enhances agility.
• Simplicity - the art of maximizing the amount of work not done
• The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
• Team focused on continuous improvement.

See the Manifesto for Agile Software for more details