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Companies worldwide have enabled their employees to work remotely as a consequence of the Covid 19 pandemic. Software development is a human-centered discipline and thrives on teamwork. Agile methods are focusing on several social aspects of software development. Software development teams in Germany were mainly co-located before the pandemic. This paper aims to validate the findings of existing studies by expanding on an existing multiple-case study. Therefore, we collected data by conducting semi-structured interviews, observing agile practices, and viewing project documents in three cases. Based on the results, we can confirm the following findings: 1) The teams rapidly adapted the agile practices and roles, 2) communication is more objective within the teams, 3) decreased social exchange between team members, 4) the expectation of a combined approach of remote and onsite work after the pandemic, 5) stable or increased (perceived) performance and 6) stable or increased well-being of team members.
Social skills are essential for a successful understanding of agile methods in software development. Several studies highlight the opportunities and advantages of integrating real-world projects and problems while collaborating with companies into higher education using agile methods. This integration comes with several opportunities and advantages for both the students and the company. The students are able to interact with real-world software development teams, analyze and understand their challenges and identify possible measures to tackle them. However, the integration of real-world problems and companies is complex and may come with a high effort in terms of coordination and preparation of the course. The challenges related to the interaction and communication with students are increased by virtual distance teaching during the Covid-19 pandemic as direct contact with students is missing. Also, we do not know how problem-based learning in virtual distance teaching is valued by the students. This paper presents our adapted eduScrum approach and learning outcome of integrating experiments with real-world software development teams from two companies into a Master of Science course organized in virtual distance teaching. The evaluation shows that students value analyzing real-world problems using agile methods. They highlight the interaction with real-world software development teams. Also, the students appreciate the organization of the course using an iterative approach with eduScrum. Based on our findings, we present four recommendations for the integration of agile methods and real world problems into higher education in virtual distance teaching settings. The results of our paper contribute to the practitioner and researcher/lecturer community, as we provide valuable insights how to fill the gap between practice and higher education in virtual distance settings.
Die Covid-19 Pandemie hat zu einem signifikanten Anstieg der Remote Work geführt. Die Veränderung in der Interaktion und Kollaboration ist für viele agile Teams eine Herausforderung gewesen. Diverse Studien zeigen unterschiedliche Effekte und Auswirkungen auf die Zusammenarbeit agiler Teams während der Pandemie. So ist die Kommunikation sachlicher und zielgerichteter geworden. Ebenso wird eine Verminderung des sozialen Austauschs in den Teams berichtet. Unser Artikel thematisiert die Veränderung der Interaktion in agilen Teams durch die Remote Work. Wir haben eine qualitative Fallstudie bei einem agilen Software-Entwicklungsteam bei Otto durchgeführt. Unsere Ergebnisse zeigen einen Zusammenhang zwischen den Auswirkungen auf die Interaktion und der persönlichen Autonomie der Team-Mitglieder. Darüber hinaus haben wir keine signifikanten negativen Effekte durch die veränderte Interaktion auf die agile Arbeitsweise festgestellt.
This Innovative Practice Full Paper presents our learnings of the process to perform a Master of Science class with eduScrum integrating real world problems as projects. We prepared, performed, and evaluated an agile educational concept for the new Master of Science program Digital Transformation organized and provided by the department of business computing at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts - Hochschule Hannover in Germany. The course deals with innovative methodologies of agile project management and is attended by 25 students. We performed the class due the summer term in 2019 and 2020 as a teaching pair. The eduScrum method has been used in different educational contexts, including higher education. During the approach preparation, we decided to use challenges, problems, or questions from the industry. Thus, we acquired four companies and prepared in coordination with them dedicated project descriptions. Each project description was refined in the form of a backlog (list of requirements). We divided the class into four eduScrum teams, one team for each project. The subdivision of the class was done randomly.
Since we wanted to integrate realistic projects into industry partners’ implementation, we decided to adapt the eduScrum approach. The eduScrum teams were challenged with different projects, e.g., analyzing a dedicated phenomenon in a real project or creating a theoretical model for a company’s new project management approach. We present our experiences of the whole process to prepare, perform and evaluate an agile educational approach combined with projects from practice. We found, that the students value the agile method using real world problems. However, the results are mainly based on the summer term 2019, this paper also includes our learnings from virtual distance teaching during the Covid 19 pandemic in summer term 2020. The paper contributes to the distribution of methods for higher education teaching in the classroom and distance learning.
Agile methods require constant optimization of one’s approach and leading to the adaptation of agile practices. These practices are also adapted when introducing them to companies and their software development teams due to organizational constraints. As a consequence of the widespread use of agile methods, we notice a high variety of their elements:
Practices, roles, and artifacts. This multitude of agile practices, artifacts, and roles results in an unsystematic mixture. It leads to several questions: When is a practice a practice, and when is it a method or technique? This paper presents the tree of agile elements, a taxonomy of agile methods, based on the literature and guidelines of widely used agile methods. We describe a taxonomy of agile methods using terms and concepts of software engineering, in particular software process models. We aim to enable agile elements to be delimited, which should help companies, agile teams, and the research community gain a basic understanding of the interrelationships and dependencies of individual components of agile methods.
In 2020, the world changed due to the Covid 19 pandemic. Containment measures to reduce the spread of the virus were planned and implemented by many countries and companies. Worldwide, companies sent their employees to work from home. This change has led to significant challenges in teams that were co-located before the pandemic. Agile software development teams were affected by this switch, as agile methods focus on communication and collaboration. Research results have already been published on the challenges of switching to remote work and the effects on agile software development teams. This article presents a systematic literature review. We identified 12 relevant papers for our studies and analyzed them on detail. The results provide an overview how agile software development teams reacted to the switch to remote work, e.g., which agile practices they adapted. We also gained insights on the changes of the performance of agile software development teams and social effects on agile software development teams during the pandemic.
Context: Companies adapt agile methods, practices or artifacts for their use in practice since more than two decades. This adaptions result in a wide variety of described agile practices. For instance, the Agile Alliance lists 75 different practices in its Agile Glossary. This situation may lead to misunderstandings, as agile practices with similar names can be interpreted and used differently.
Objective: This paper synthesize an integrated list of agile practices, both from primary and secondary sources.
Method: We performed a tertiary study to identify existing overviews and lists of agile practices in the literature. We identified 876 studies, of which 37 were included.
Results: The results of our paper show that certain agile practices are listed and used more often in existing studies. Our integrated list of agile practices comprises 38 entries structured in five categories. Conclusion: The high number of agile practices and thus, the wide variety increased steadily over the past decades due to the adaption of agile methods. Based on our findings, we present a comprehensive overview of agile practices. The research community benefits from our integrated list of agile practices as a potential basis for future research. Also, practitioners benefit from our findings, as the structured overview of agile practices provides the opportunity to select or adapt practices for their specific needs.
Context: Agile software development (ASD) sets social aspects like communication and collaboration in focus. Thus, one may assume that the specific work organization of companies impacts the work of ASD teams. A major change in work organization is the switch to a 4-day work week, which some companies investigated in experiments. Also, recent studies show that ASD teams are affected by the switch to remote work since the Covid 19 pandemic outbreak in 2020.
Objective: Our study presents empirical findings on the effects on ASD teams operating remote in a 4-day work week organization. Method: We performed a qualitative single case study and conducted seven semi-structured interviews, observed 14 agile practices and screened eight project documents and protocols of agile practices.
Results: We found, that the teams adapted the agile method in use due to the change to a 4-day work week environment and the switch to remote work. The productivity of the two ASD teams did not decrease. Although the stress level of the ASD team member increased due to the 4-day work week, we found that the job satisfaction of the individual ASD team members is affected positively. Finally, we point to affects on social facets of the ASD teams.
Conclusion: The research community benefits from our results as the current state of research dealing with the effects of a 4-day work week on ASD teams is limited. Also, our findings provide several practical implications for ASD teams working remote in a 4-day work week.
Durch die Covid-19-Pandemie und die damit einhergehenden Effekte auf die Arbeitswelt ist die Belastung der Mitarbeitenden in einen stärkeren Fokus gerückt worden. Dieser Umstand trifft unter anderem durch den umfassenden Wechsel in die Remote Work auch auf agile Software-Entwicklungsteams in vielen Unternehmen zu. Eine zu hohe Arbeitsbelastung kann zu diversen negativen Effekten, wie einem erhöhten Krankenstand, mangelndem Wohlbefinden der Mitarbeitenden oder reduzierter Produktivität führen. Es ist zudem bekannt, dass sich die Arbeitsbelastung in der Wissensarbeit auf die Qualität der Arbeitsergebnisse auswirkt. Dieser Forschungsbeitrag identifiziert potenzielle Faktoren der Arbeitsbelastung der Mitglieder eines agilen Software-Entwicklungsteams bei der Otto GmbH & Co KG. Auf der Grundlage der Faktoren präsentieren wir Maßnahmen zur Reduzierung von Arbeitsbelastung und erläutern unsere Erkenntnisse, die wir im Rahmen eines Experiments validiert haben. Unsere Ergebnisse zeigen, dass bereits kleinteilige Maßnahmen, wie das Einführen von Ruhearbeitsphasen während des Arbeitstages, zu positiven Effekten bspw. hinsichtlich einer gesteigerten Konzentrationsfähigkeit führen und wie sich diese auf die Qualität der Arbeitsergebnisse auswirken.
Gutes Arbeiten für Mitarbeiter ist je nach Arbeitskontext unterschiedlich zu bewerten, hängt jedoch von der Gestaltung bestimmter Kontextfaktoren ab. Die Kontextfaktoren guter Arbeit sind der zentrale Forschungsgegenstand dieser Arbeit. Dabei steht ein E‑Commerce-Team (EC-Team) von Otto im Fokus der Untersuchungen.
Das Ziel unseres Artikels ist es, die Kontextfaktoren zu analysieren, die dazu führen, dass gute Arbeit ermöglicht wird. Dabei ist eine auf Dauer funktionierende Arbeitsweise gesucht, welche eine hohe Arbeitsqualität und -quantität ermöglicht. Dazu sind die beiden primären Ziele zu definieren, was gutes Arbeiten ausmacht und zum anderen die Kontextfaktoren für gutes Arbeiten innerhalb des EC-Teams bei Otto zu identifizieren.
Unsere Forschungsfrage lautet: Welche Kontextfaktoren sind für gutes Arbeiten bei Otto im EC-Team in der derzeitigen Remote-Arbeit besonders relevant und entsprechend gestaltbar?
Um die Forschungsfrage beantworten zu können, wird zunächst eine Literaturrecherche zur Definition von guter Arbeit vorgenommen. Anschließend wird untersucht, welche Faktoren laut Literatur zu einer guten Arbeit beitragen, um aus den resultierenden Faktoren Cluster zu bilden.
Die Cluster werden dem Otto EC-Team zur Abstimmung mit der Mehrpunktabfrage über das virtuelle Kollaborations-Tool MiroFootnote 2 zur Verfügung gestellt. Aufbauend auf dem Ergebnis der Abstimmung, werden ein Gamification Board, Erinnerungsmails und ein Stimmungsbarometer erstellt, um die Auswirkungen des Clusters im Rahmen eines Experiments zu analysieren.
Diese Maßnahmen werden innerhalb von zwei Wochen durchgeführt. Um die Erfahrungen der Probanden zu sammeln, werden anschließend Interviews durchgeführt und ausgewertet. Die Ergebnisse der Interviews fließen in die anschließende Handlungsempfehlung ein.
