ABSTRACT
Introduction Sustainability entails the preservation, regeneration, and development of the ecological, economic, and social resources of a system. There is a clear movement afoot to change the generally unsustainable situation in the software development industry. Systems are regularly delivered late or over budget, if they are delivered at all. Systems often don’t meet the needs of their customers and often have to be developed again and again. The difficulty stems from a lack of understanding and trust on the part of the customer. In an effort to succeed, software developers frequently work long hours and often become burned out (see also Chapter 4 in this volume). This chapter addresses the social and economic sustainability of a software development firm (referred to here as SDF) at the organizational, managerial, and individual levels. For SDF, sustainability means continuous strong technical leadership, continuous innovation, and ongoing development of its technical staff. These factors are reflected in a software industry manifesto (the “Manifesto for Agile Software Development”) expressing four value preferences: individuals and interactions over processes and tools; working software over comprehensive documentation; customer collaboration over contract negotiation; and responding to change over following a plan (Ambler 2002).
