A New Chapter for Agility: Co-Creating What’s Next

Agile2025 brought together the agile community for their first major gathering since Agile Alliance joined the PMI family earlier this year. The focus was on open dialogue about the future of agility and the challenges and opportunities ahead, along with an exciting announcement.

The conference opened with Chris Murman, chair of Agile2025, and Teresa Foster, Managing Director of Agile Alliance, welcoming 1,000 attendees and unveiling a new joint logo. Then, Pierre Le Manh , President and CEO of PMI, laid out a shared vision for the future of PMI and Agile Alliance, emphasizing focus on enterprise agility as a key enabler for navigating business transformation and delivering results. As Pierre put it, we need to move beyond agility in software development toward full enterprise agility.

That theme carried through the day, highlighted by a panel on enterprise agility led by Lenka Pincot, Chief of Staff to the CEO for PMI and the PMI representative on the Agile Alliance board of directors. Lenka was joined by noted thought leaders Heidi Musser, Laura Powers, and Jurgen Appelo.

These conversations made one thing clear. Scaling agility means finding a language that reconnects agile values with the C-suite. Achieving enterprise agility requires coordination across leadership, teams, and functions, along with alignment of ways of working to real-world complexity, business goals, and a relentless focus on delivering value to the customer. This collective effort demands engagement at every organizational level to develop the strategic capability of rapid adaptation necessary in today’s fast-paced, disruptive environment.

Why agility needs to scale beyond software development

Agile started with software delivery teams—the people on the front lines iterating rapidly, collaborating closely, and adapting to evolving requirements. These teams developed practical approaches that helped them deliver better, faster software and digital products, driving transformation across industries.

“When agility flourishes — that is, you are living the values and principles — your people are doing joyous and meaningful work, and your business flourishes. When in doubt, refer to the first value." — Jon Kern

Behind those practices lies a set of values and principles formalized in the Manifesto for Agile Software Development. The manifesto, created in 2001, represented a major innovation in ways of working. Over time, this mindset spread beyond software teams to influence how organizations think about change, flexibility, and value delivery. This broader capability is what we now call enterprise agility.

Understanding this difference matters. Agile is often shorthand for the mindset and methods that originated in software development. Enterprise agility is what organizations are now trying to build at scale: the strategic capability to adapt quickly, to stay nimble, and to thrive through volatility.

“The world’s moving more quickly than it did 20 years ago. However, we’ve got to balance that with a longer-term view. That means investing in capability, not just in activity. It means outputs are nice, but impact comes from outcomes. It means prioritizing resilience over reaction.” — Laura Powers

While agile practices are widely adopted, satisfaction with those methods is declining. The 2024 State of Agile Report shows satisfaction fell from 71% in 2022 to 59% in 2024, reflecting struggles many organizations face scaling and maturing their agile ways of working.

Our own research shows that organizations with high enterprise agility are more likely to deliver projects successfully (76% vs. 67%). They also adapt faster, maintain momentum through change, and focus on value.

The need to scale and mature agile practices beyond software teams is urgent. The 2024 Accenture Pulse of Change Index reports that the pace of disruption has jumped 183% since 2019, driven by shifts in tech, workforce expectations, and global risk.

"Enterprise agility demands that we reimagine management, leadership, and transformation; we need a new version of management that’s not only more adaptable, but more human. Accelerating organizational agility is the greatest business challenge of the 21st century, and it demands courageous, adaptive leadership." — Heidi Musser

Enterprise agility: Data, trends, and impact

Enterprise agility is an organization’s ability to adapt rapidly, coordinate across teams, and consistently deliver value in complex, fast-changing environments. It’s a capability that requires team-level agile practices but extends to shape culture, leadership, and strategy across the entire enterprise—making agility a strategic asset.

This capability matters now more than ever. Change no longer arrives in predictable waves; it’s continuous and overlapping, demanding constant learning, adjustment, and collaboration across functions. Business transformations are no longer discrete, time-bound events; They are a perpetual endeavor.

"Because we are in a constant state of change, organizations need to build a strategic capability to be deliver changes in a cohesive way, to be transparent to their teams and middle management, understand how to make decisions, and respond quickly. I wonder, then, if the word ‘transformation’ will become obsolete over time due to the perpetuity of change." — Lenka Pincot

Our Enterprise Agility Thought Leadership Report shows steady progress: from 2021 to 2024, the share of organizations rating themselves as highly agile grew from 35% to 44%. These organizations report stronger skills in reprioritizing work, empowering teams, and communicating strategy—capabilities linked to better project outcomes and greater resilience.

Enterprise agility takes different forms across industries. Healthcare organizations with high agility, for example, deliver more patient-centered solutions amid ongoing operational pressures. Energy companies leverage agility to navigate regulatory shifts and innovate rapidly. Consulting firms use it to meet diverse client demands with speed and flexibility.

These diverse experiences and shared challenges have sparked a movement that the PMI and Agile Alliance communities, together, are leading.

“The future of agility isn’t faster execution—it’s ethical coordination. As intelligent agents become part of our teams, we must move beyond hierarchical control toward decentralized orchestration. Harmony means designing work for networked agentic organizations.” — Jurgen Appelo

Forging the future: The Manifesto for Enterprise Agility

Geopolitical uncertainty, regulatory shifts, technology breakthroughs, evolving customer expectations, and global workforce changes are reshaping how organizations operate, often simultaneously and unpredictably. Building on this shared understanding, PMI and Agile Alliance have taken a decisive step forward that will equip organizations to better account for and navigate these complexities.  

At Agile2025, Song Bac Toh, chair of the Agile Alliance Board of Directors, Lenka Pincot, and original manifesto co-authors Jim Highsmith and Jon Kern announced the launch of work on the Manifesto for Enterprise Agility. This manifesto complements and builds up on the original Manifesto for Agile Software Development by moving beyond software and focusing on the challenges organizations face at the enterprise level.

The Manifesto for Enterprise Agility is a community-driven effort, still in its early stages. It seeks to capture the collective wisdom of practitioners, C-suite leaders, academics, thought leaders and experts who are actively navigating enterprise agility.

“The original manifesto gave us permission to break convention. This one gives us guidance to break through bureaucracy. To replace rigidity with readiness. To empower decisions at every level. Because when the map keeps shifting, you need people across the enterprise who know how to navigate. This is a big moment for both the Agile Alliance and PMI. Together? This isn’t just a manifesto. It’s an invitation." — Jim Highsmith

Attendees were invited to join this open conversation by sharing feedback in the PMI & Agile Alliance lounge, participating in town halls, and contributing to a digital board that will guide the evolution of agility. This transparent and inclusive process will continue at Agile 2026, reflecting a shared commitment to co-creating agility’s future.

Learn more and stay connected

The journey toward enterprise agility is complex and ongoing, requiring collaboration across organizations and individuals at all levels.

“We are launching the work on the new Manifesto for Enterprise Agility to advance the vision of the Agile Alliance and PMI. This is a community-driven initiative. Join us and lend your voice to this critical work.” — Song Bac Toh

If you’re wondering how to get involved or deepen your engagement, you’re invited to:

• Co-create the future! Share your thoughts and contribute to the development of the Manifesto for Enterprise Agility on the interactive board.
• Explore our report, A New Era for Enterprise Agility, to understand how high-agility organizations perform and build capability.
• Watch the webinar Enterprise Agility: The Real Impact on Performance to explore how enterprise agility drives measurable business outcomes and what it means for your organization’s success.
• Leverage Disciplined Agile® for practical guidance to tailor your team’s ways of working, balancing flexibility with governance and compliance.
• Earn the PMI-ACP® certification, updated for today’s hybrid delivery models and complex environments, to grow your agile fluency across frameworks.
• Follow PMI and the Agile Alliance on social media for updates on how you can share your thoughts.

Agility has always been a collective effort. The challenges organizations face make this an essential moment for active participation. Now is the time to get involved and help shape the future.

Join the conversation

Enterprise agility requires cultural and strategic shifts beyond team-level practices. As we co-create the Manifesto for Enterprise Agility, your insights matter.

What’s one key lesson or experience from your work that should shape this evolving manifesto?