A Methodology for Assessing Agile Software Development Methods

Agile methods provide an organization or a team with the flexibility to adopt a selected subset of principles and practices based on their culture, their values, and the types of systems that they develop. More specifically, every organization or team implements a customized agile method, tailored to better accommodate its needs. However, the extent to which a customized method supports the organizational objectives, i.e. the `goodness' of that method, is questionable. Existing agile assessment approaches focus on comparative analyses, or are limited in scope and application. In this research, we propose a structured, systematic, and comprehensive approach to assessing the `goodness' of agile methods. We examine an agile method based on (1) its adequacy, (2) the capability of the organization to support the adopted principles and practices specified by the method, and (3) the method's effectiveness. We propose the Objectives, Principles and Practices (OPP) Framework to guide our assessment. The Framework identifies (1) objectives of the agile philosophy, (2) principles that support the objectives, (3) practices that are reflective of the principles, (4) linkages among the objectives, principles and practices, and (5) indicators for assessing the extent to which an organization supports the implementation and the effectiveness of that practice. In this paper, we discuss our solution approach, preliminary results, and future work.