The Agile Manifesto consists of four values and twelve principles intended to guide teams in delivering high-quality software quickly and efficiently.
Download Manifesto for Agile Software Development
The four values of the Agile Manifesto are:
- Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
- Working software over comprehensive documentation
- Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
- Responding to change over following a plan
These values emphasize the importance of people, collaboration, and adaptability in the software development process. They also suggest that Agile teams should prioritize working software and customer engagement over bureaucratic processes and documentation.
The twelve principles of the Agile Manifesto are:
- Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software.
- Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.
- Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale.
- Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.
- Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done.
- The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation.
- Working software is the primary measure of progress.
- Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.
- Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.
- Simplicity–the art of maximizing the amount of work not done–is essential.
- The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.
- At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behaviour accordingly.
In summary, the Agile Manifesto is a set of values and principles for Agile software development that emphasizes people, collaboration, adaptability, and working software. It is intended to guide teams in delivering high-quality software quickly and efficiently. Agile development methodologies like Scrum, Kanban, and Lean, are based on the Agile Manifesto principles.