The Agile Culture: Leading through Trust and Ownership

Agile software development methods can decrease time to market and dramatically increase value to customers. However, many managers, software practitioners, and customers worry that iterative processes will increase uncertainty and risk. Even where they agree to agile, they create cultures that make success difficult or impossible. The Agile Culture will help you change all that. Many books talk about the importance of culture to agile success. The Agile Culture shows you how to make the specific culture changes you need. The authors provide proven tools and models for moving from "date-driven, internally-focused" cultures to "value-driven, customer-focused" cultures where agile can thrive and flourish. They offer clear rationales for using each tool, demonstrate it at work, present relevant case studies and examples, define expected outcomes, and show how to measure your success. Using these techniques, you can achieve the results promised by agile: you can transition to a culture of continuous innovation, transparency, and trust; one that knows how to live with uncertainty, can manage risk proactively, and makes better decisions throughout the entire software project lifecycle. The Agile Culture will be an invaluable resource to everyone who wants to lead or participate in successful agile transitions, from executives to developers, project and product managers to agile coaches.