Chances are, you’ve heard about Agile—it’s been a big buzzword within tech companies and has been widely adopted by businesses in general. The 17th State of Agile Report reveals that 71% of companies already use Agile. 

No doubt you know the definition of agility in the context of moving fast and nimble, but what does it mean to be Agile in the context of business?

Agile is all about adapting to change and providing customer value through incremental work. Teams that practice Agile constantly incorporate customer feedback and focus on continuous improvement to stay ready for whatever change may bring.

In this guide, you’ll learn all about Agile, including the definition of Agile, its origins, and the modern-day benefits to implementing Agile in your organization.

Let’s start with the full definition of Agile. Agile is both a movement and a mindset that has fundamentally revolutionized how many people work together. Through collaboration and continuous improvement, teams respond to change, learn from feedback, and make progress step by step. Agile has enabled teams to discover better ways of working, transforming how they create, adapt, and deliver value to customers. This mindset marks a dramatic shift away from top-down control.

Teams now work together across different skills and specialties, making their own informed decisions. When people are trusted to manage their work, own their outcomes, and solve problems together, something remarkable happens. People feel empowered to be transparent, brave enough to experiment, and excited to grow—all while delivering better results. This incremental approach allows teams to better react to changes, such as a shift in customer needs or a technological improvement. 

Agile also aims to bring more humanity into the workplace. Agile teams: 

• Operate at a more sustainable pace, preventing overwork and burnout. Teams are also transparent about their goals and ensure each team member understands how their individual role supports those goals.
• Focus on high-value collaboration where everyone is given an equal chance to contribute.
• Encourage risk-taking and autonomy, as team members are empowered to own their work and bring diverse perspectives to the table. 
• Are adaptable and open to feedback, whether from customers or each other. The values of transparency and listening are especially embodied by team leaders.

In many ways, it’s more important than ever for companies to implement Agile. While Agile originated in the software industry, every company can incorporate Agile practices and benefit from them. The COVID-19 pandemic showed how important it is for companies to value resiliency and have change management practices in place—and cultivating an Agile mindset helps your teams adapt well to change.

This new generation of work, where nearly every company is digital, has called for a new way of working. Since technology is constantly changing and improving, iteration has become an essential aspect of staying competitive. Today, companies need to constantly release new updates to their products, improve their services, and incorporate customer feedback. 

That’s where Agile comes in with its key principles of adaptability, customer collaboration, and responsiveness to change. Agile teams deliver work incrementally to ensure that they understand what customers need and work on the items that will provide the most value.

Agile isn’t just for software or other technical teams. It can be used by anyone. If you work in marketing, HR, customer service, or sales, you can adopt an Agile mindset to focus on continuous improvement and high-value communication.

The fundamentals of the Agile mindset—adaptability, continuous improvement, and innovation—emerged in the 1990s. The development of technology changed our world so rapidly that, by the late 20th century, people realized the way we worked needed to change with it. Practices that emerged from this period of time included close collaboration between stakeholders and development teams, self-organizing teams, and frequent delivery of business value.

These ideas were solidified in Snowbird, Utah, in 2001 when 17 software practitioners gathered, officially coined the term “Agile software development,” and formed what is known as the Agile Manifesto.

The Manifesto for Agile Software Development—or the Agile Manifesto—is a declaration written by those 17 software practitioners that became the foundation for the Agile mindset. When this group gathered in Utah, they agreed on four value statements that define Agile. Afterward, they expanded on their ideas to establish the 12 principles behind the Agile Manifesto. 

Remember, the Agile Manifesto is meant to guide decision-making and planning, but it is not a rigid methodology.

4 Agile Manifesto values

These are the four values in the Agile Manifesto: 

• Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
• Working software over comprehensive documentation
• Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
• Responding to change over following a plan

Agile practitioners acknowledge that all parts of the statements hold value, with a bias to those on the left. For example, Agile teams will still use tools to help them complete their work, but they will prioritize tools that enhance their collaboration with team members.

12 Agile Manifesto principles 

The 12 principles behind the Agile Manifesto guide teams in implementing Agile practices. 

1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through the early and continuous delivery of valuable software.

2. Welcome changing requirements, even late in development. Agile processes harness change for the customer’s competitive advantage.

3. Deliver working software frequently, from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, with a preference to the shorter timescale.

4. Business people and developers must work together daily throughout the project.

5. Build projects around motivated individuals. Give them the environment and support they need, and trust them to get the job done.

6. The most efficient and effective method of conveying information to and within a development team is face-to-face conversation.

7. Working software is the primary measure of progress.

8. Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely.

9. Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design enhances agility.

10. Simplicity–the art of maximizing the amount of work not done–is essential.

11. The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.

12. At regular intervals, the team reflects on how to become more effective, then tunes and adjusts its behavior accordingly.

Throughout our All-access Agile series, you’ll discover different ways to apply these principles and live the Agile Manifesto values in your workplace.

Why should organizations embrace the Agile movement? There are many reasons to develop an Agile approach within your business. Some of the top benefits include:

• Increased employee satisfaction and engagement, which leads to increased productivity and retention
• Enhanced customer satisfaction due to a greater focus on delivering value
• Continuous improvement and enhanced innovation
• Better risk management, as well as improved adaptability and flexibility
• Increased prioritization and problem-solving skills
• Improved collaboration and communication with greater transparency 
• Faster time to market, as well as greater cost control and predictability 

While there are many benefits to having an Agile mindset and Agile has helped businesses for decades, there are still a lot of misconceptions surrounding Agile. Many misunderstand what Agile is and how it enables teams to embrace and adapt to change. 

Here are some common misconceptions:

• Agile is a quick fix. Don’t expect to start experiencing benefits the moment you introduce the Agile Manifesto to your team. Agile is a transformation that begins on an individual level, and it takes time for a whole company to adopt the Agile mindset. 

• Agile is only for technical teams. Agile can be used by anyone, in a variety of departments and in any company. You can even use Agile in your personal life!

• Agile is rigid. Agile is a mindset, not a rigid methodology. If you need some guidance, there are Agile frameworks and methods, such as Scrum and Kanban, which will be covered later in this series. These approaches can help you determine how best to apply Agile principles.

• Agile is all or nothing. Agile adoption is a journey, not a destination. Organizations typically start small and incrementally improve along the way.

• Agile eliminates project management. Agile doesn’t eliminate project management but disperses it across different roles with a focus on supporting and enabling the team rather than directing it. In some organizations, project managers transition to these new roles, while others move into strategic positions, such as portfolio or program management. 

• Scrum masters are glorified administrators. Often miscast as administrators due to their visible work with meetings and documentation, Scrum masters are actually leaders who serve. They coach on Agile theory and practice, remove obstacles, and foster team self-organization to maximize value delivery and continuous improvement.

• Agile means more meetings, less work. Agile meetings are focused, collaborative events that are part of the work, ensuring that team members are given the opportunity to address blockers and communicate about the status of projects. Time-boxing is a common practice to increase productivity in meetings.  

• Agile solves all problems. As mentioned previously, Agile isn’t a quick fix. Implementing Agile helps to highlight issues, but it isn’t a silver bullet for all organizational challenges. 

• Agile is best for co-located teams. Again, Agile’s for everyone! Agile can be effectively implemented in distributed teams, using the right tools and practices. 

• Change management is a waste of money. While there might be some upfront costs with training and implementation, investing in structured change management during an Agile transformation pays dividends through improved delivery speed, higher-quality outcomes, and sustained organizational agility.

Remember—Agile is a mindset, a transformation, and a journey. It takes time and commitment to fully adopt Agile. But in the long run, Agile can help your company for the better at the organizational, team, and individual levels.

Interested in introducing Agile to your organization? Lucid can help you facilitate Agile events, sustain the Agile Manifesto values, and implement Agile frameworks and approaches such as Scrum. With easy-to-use features and templates, Lucid helps introduce Agile principles and values to your team.