The agile systems framework: Enterprise content management case

Abstract

In this paper, the researchers propose an agile systems framework (ASF) method to obtain quantitative measurements of a system's inherent agility. Agility is defined as the ability of a system to quickly adapt and respond to change. The measurement of agility for information technology systems can help enterprises future-proof their systems. The researchers demonstrate the feasibility of the ASF by showing that interoperability, the ability of two systems to interact effectively (Beesemyer, Empirically characterizing evolvability and changeability in engineering systems, 2012), is positively related to agility. The design of the experiment to test this hypothesis is in an enterprise content management (ECM) case, but the ASF can be applied to different types of systems. The experiment consists of two tests on an ECM system, with the independent variable being the level of interoperability (one test is low interoperability and the other is high interoperability) and the dependent variable being the level of agility measured with the ASF. The experiment provides support for the hypothesis, with the level of agility increasing as the level of interoperability is increased, and shows the feasibility of the Framework. A survey was used to gather expert opinion on the importance of certain criteria of agility used in the ASF, so that the framework accurately measures agility. Further research can test the relationship of agility to other aspects of a system and include more criteria of agility.