Three phases of agility: past, present and future

By Jim Highsmith

May 31, 2011 — (Page 1 of 3)

At Agile 2011, we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Agile Manifesto, a milestone worth celebrating. From my perspective on this occasion, there are three major phases of the Agile movement: Rogue Team, Courageous Executive, and Enlightened Enterprise. What excites me about this anniversary are the accomplishments of the last decade and what we can imagine for the future.

The first major phase of Agile, from about 2001 to 2005, is what I call the “Rouge Team” period. Individual teams received dispensation to try this “Agile” stuff and sometimes several successful Agile projects were completed. But resistance to further implementation was high as organizational antibodies attacked (though there were exceptions in a few software companies).

In this period, teams focused on iterative development (iterations, stories, stand-ups, pair-programming, backlogs, iteration planning, collocating teams), but the core technical practices (automated testing, continuous integration, test-driven development) were often bypassed. Teams tended to focus more on iteration management practices than technical practices.

This first phase of Agile led to mixed results. Many managers were pleased with project performance, better ROI, faster results and improved customer relationships. However, focusing on the iteration management aspects of Agile rather than the technical practices didn’t lead to improved quality. Those organizations that utilized both iteration management and technical practices (particularly those in the Extreme Programming community) had a better record of improving both quality and overall results.

The second, “Courageous Executive” phase of Agile, roughly from 2004 to today (the phases overlap of course), saw us moving from rogue teams to larger initiatives. Larger projects were commissioned, and courageous CIOs and VPs of engineering decided to transform their entire development organizations to Agile methods.

In this process, iteration management was extended into project management, and the emphasis on technical practices improved. Courageous organizations began to emphasize practices such as automated testing, test-driven development and continuous integration.

Some of these transformations worked well, but many dragged out too long for all the reasons large changes often fail to achieve their objectives. Many of these efforts focused on Agile practices—“doing” Agile—and failed to achieve their objectives because they ignored Agile principles—“being” Agile.

Related Search Term(s): agile

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