Have the Agile Principles Endured? An Empirical Investigation Post 20th Anniversary of the Agile Manifesto (2001)

Abstract

This study investigates whether the Agile principles introduced in the Agile Manifesto (2001) have endured today two decades later and whether they are still relevant to software developers. Further, are they positively correlated with work and affective outcomes of software development projects? We find out by conducting a survey with team members of 58 software development project in one of the largest global IT firms. To our surprise we find that overall, the Agile principles have endured and were positively correlated with team motivation, project effectiveness and project innovation. However, they were negative correlated with project efficiency. As expected, projects using Agile and plan-driven methodologies showed differential findings.