AGIS: Towards an ISO9001 based Tool for Measuring Agility

Abstract

ISO9001:2008 is probably the most widely adopted process improvement model in the world. ISO9001:2008 is a general purpose standard for service and production organizations, which established the groundwork for improving system processes in an enterprise. This standard has also been widely adopted in the software industry. On the other hand, agile development methodologies have been steadily gaining acceptance and popularity in the past decade. At a first glance, these two approaches are opposite. While agility preaches interaction above processes, ISO is a process-oriented approach to improvement. Nonetheless, both approaches share the same conundrum: both hold claims of compliance but there have been few data-backed-up success case studies. However, since ISO is a general purpose standard, its achievement is fairly attainable. In contrast, the agile development ecosystem is full of false positives that claim agility without achieving project success. This paper presents an assessment tool to measure agility based on ISO 9001:2008 process improvement principles. Our tool is capable of measuring a degree of agility aligned with the agile manifesto values. Its goal is to provide an objective measurement of agility that avoids false positives on both sides.