The Manifesto for Enterprise Agility was created in response to global shifts, such as remote work, AI, and a new generation of digital-native talent, that have made “business as usual” impossible. According to the Manifesto, achieving true enterprise agility is about more than simply scaling Agile frameworks or practicing SAFe.
As Janie Leddy-Jones, Director of Program Management at Lucid, explains:
“For the PMI Agile Alliance, releasing this Manifesto now signals a major pivot in the industry, moving away from rigid processes and control toward a human-centric model of shared agency. It’s a recognition that in a world of constant change, the only way to survive is to stop controlling the future and instead build an organization that is designed to learn and pivot in real time.”
Differences between the Manifesto for Enterprise Agility and the Agile Manifesto
Many companies that have looked into enhancing agility are familiar with the Agile Manifesto, which was written in 2001. The original Manifesto contains four values and 12 principles that became the foundation for the Agile movement as teams focused on achieving incremental progress, delivering value more frequently, and enhancing collaboration as they responded to change.
So what are the differences between the Agile Manifesto and the Manifesto for Enterprise Agility? The Agile Manifesto focused on agility at the team level, specifically with delivery teams. The Manifesto for Enterprise Agility moves beyond delivery teams to focus on agility at the enterprise level, taking a top-down approach with a focus on leadership behavior.
“An organization is not just made up of delivery teams,” Jeff Rosenbaugh, Senior Director of Professional Services at Lucid, says. “All the pieces need to move in concert, and it starts at the top. Your job as a leader now is to create conditions for agility, rather than direct the work.”
PMI Agile Alliance’s Manifesto scales team collaboration and delivery to the macro level, emphasizing executive trust, employee autonomy, and cultural resistance across an organization’s structure. The new Manifesto also addresses the gap where agile transformations often fell short as tech teams moved fast, while departments such as HR and finance remained siloed. With enterprise agility, companies prioritize cross-functional coordination and operate with coherence so everyone follows the same fixed purpose.
“We often think about agility in terms of building products. But, really, it’s a whole business philosophy. It’s not just about moving fast. It’s about constantly evolving.”
—Dave Grow, Chief Executive Officer, Lucid
PMI Agile Alliance’s own research shows that reinvention is the norm: 93% of CEOs say they must challenge assumptions of their operating models at least every five years. As global changes create a new operating reality, CEOs need to rethink how they lead and no longer ask, “What is our plan?” but instead ask, “Are we built for change?”
How to put the Enterprise Agility Manifesto’s principles into action
Enterprise agility is all about an organization’s ability to see, decide, and act at speed. How can you actually put enterprise agility into practice?
The Manifesto for Enterprise Agility has nine principles that act as starting points for implementing agility, organized into three distinct sections: leadership behavior, organization design, and execution. Here are some tips for putting the Manifesto’s principles into action and scaling agility at your organization.
Leadership behavior
The three principles of leadership behavior in the Manifesto for Enterprise Agility are:
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Create clarity of purpose and align on enterprise outcomes.
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Expand agility across partners and ecosystems.
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Embrace technology and distributed talent.
The Manifesto suggests that leaders should link individual goals and incentives to overall business goals while anchoring agility in long-term purpose. It’s also important to make any changes to leadership behavior clear to all employees. When people see that the organization is serious about adopting change, and they know where they’re going and why, they respond more quickly.
You can enhance clarity and alignment by making goals, behaviors, or objectives visible and establishing a clear way to track progress. For example, with a visual collaboration solution like Lucid, you can keep resources (such as OKRs) in one place that’s easily accessible to everyone. You can also use reporting shapes, such as progress bars, so people can understand how their work connects to business goals at a glance.
