What is the Agile Manifesto Values health check?
The Agile Manifesto Values health check takes the four values from the Agile Manifesto and asks your team where it really sits on each one. Every dimension runs from the agile value at one end to its traditional counterpart at the other, with a balanced midpoint: individuals and interactions or processes and tools, working software or documentation, customer collaboration or contract negotiation, responding to change or following a plan. The manifesto itself says the items on the right have value too, so a perfect agile score isn't the goal. What you're looking for is whether the team leans where it means to, and whether people agree. When one person rates Responding to Change as fully agile and another places it near following a plan, you've found a tension worth talking through.
Dimensions
Agile Manifesto Values
The four foundational values from the Agile Manifesto that guide how agile teams prioritize their work and collaborate.
Individuals and Interactions
Reflects whether the team prioritizes people and direct communication over rigid processes and tooling.
- We value individuals and interactions
- We balance people and process
- ...over process and tools.
Working Software
Reflects whether the team prioritizes delivering functional software over producing extensive documentation.
- We value working software
- We balance software and documentation
- ...over comprehensive documentation.
Customer Collaboration
Reflects whether the team prioritizes ongoing collaboration with customers over fixed contract terms.
- We value customer collaboration
- We balance collaboration and contracts
- ...over contract negotiation.
Responding to Change
Reflects whether the team prioritizes adapting to change over strictly adhering to a predefined plan.
- We value responding to change
- We balance change and planning
- ...over following a plan.
When to use this health check
- When you want to check how closely your team's everyday behavior matches the Agile Manifesto.
- During an agile transformation, to set a baseline and track shifts in mindset over time.
- In a retrospective, when you suspect process is starting to win over people.
- When a new team forms and needs to agree on shared values and expectations.
Tips & tricks
- Run it every few months to see how your team's mindset changes over time.
- Tell the team there are no wrong answers. A rating near the traditional end is useful information too.
- Spend most of the discussion on the values where ratings spread widest, since they show the real tensions.
- Turn what you find into one or two experiments for your next retrospective.