For one of the best overviews of and introductions to the principles and state of the culture of Agile Software Development, with some ventures into Agile Product Design and Management (why is all this stuff Capitalized?), I recommend Martin Fowler’s The New Methodology.

Read it, thinking of the Academy. Of scientific and numerical work — not programming as such, and not product design surely. Research. Exploration. Discovery. The steady cycle of adaptive thinking and doing. Keyword: “adaptive”.