Are Software Startups Applying Agile Practices? The State of the Practice from a Large Survey

Abstract

Software startups operate under various uncertainties and the demand on their ability to deal with change is high. Agile methods are considered a suitable and viable development approach for them. However, the competing needs for speed and quality may render certain agile practices less suitable than others in the startup context. The adoption of agile practices can be further complicated in software startups that adopt the Lean Startup approach. To make the best of agile practices, it is necessary to first understand whether and how they are used in software startups. This study targets at a better understanding of the use of agile practices in software startups, with a particular focus on lean startups. Based on a large survey of 1526 software startups, we examined the use of five agile practices, including quality related (regular refactoring and test first), speed related (frequent release and agile planning) and communication practice (daily standup meeting). The findings show that speed related agile practices are used to a greater extent in comparison to quality practices. Daily standup meeting is least used. Software startups who adopt the Lean Startup approach do not sacrifice quality for speed more than other startups do.

Technical and Organizational Agile Practices: A Latin-American Survey

“…Bertrand Meyer categorizes agile practices in technical and organizational in his extensive review of agile [1]. Pantiuchina et al distinguish between speed and quality practices, roughly matching our categorization of organizational and technical practices [2]. Kropp et al distinguish between technical and collaborative practices (they also differentiate a few advanced practices, like limited work in progress and BDD) [13].…”

“…This categorization has been applied by researchers and practitioners, although it takes slightly different forms: Meyer uses technical and organizational/managerial [1] while Pantiuchina et al use speed and quality [2]. A right balance between technical and organizational practices seems reasonable, given that technical practices support product quality and effectiveness, while organizational practices in general affect cost, schedule and team sustainability.…”

How do Startups Develop Internet-of-Things Systems - A Multiple Exploratory Case Study

“…Developers in software startups typically prioritize speed over quality when producing MVPs [15,17]. Bosch et al advocated for adjusting the Lean startup methodology to accommodate the development of multiple ideas and integrated them when the time for idea validation is too long [19].…”

“…Startups, new companies with limited resources, short operational histories, looking for scalable business models [5,6,16] appears as a special context in which traditional product development approaches might not be directly applicable. The need for the product development methodologies to be adapted to a projects scope, magnitude, complexity, and changing requirements in the startup context is generally acknowledged, however, there exists a lack in guidance on how software startups can adapt their process to their situational context [15]. The combination of Internet-of-things and startup contexts led us the Research Question:…”

Initial Coin Offerings and Agile Practices

“…Agile methodologies were used in Sabrix, Inc. (San Ramon, CA, USA) [12], a startup software company that, to accommodate the pressing demands of users, exploited the urgency as the main engine for the product development, and allowed the startup to switch from a initial chaotic management to the correct implementation of a software product-team and product progressed simultaneously. In order to verify if Agile practices are applied in software startups, [13] performed a survey involving 1526 software startups, with questions related to five Agile practices, including regular refactoring, agile planning, frequent release, and daily standup meeting. The survey was focused on the relationship between velocity and quality in Agile practices, and they discovered that the software startups favored velocity over quality.…”