Plan-Driven Approaches Are Alive and Kicking in Agile Global Software Development

Abstract

Background: Agile methods are no longer restricted to small projects and co-located teams. The last decade has seen the spread of agile into large scale, distributed and regulated domains. Many case studies show successful agile adoption in GSD, however, taken as a whole, it remains unclear how widespread this trend is, and what form the agile adoption takes in a global software development (GSD) setting. Aims: Our objective is to gain a deeper understanding of how organisations adopt agile development methods in distributed settings. Specifically we aim to plot the current development process landscape in GSD. Method: We analyse industrial survey data from 33 different countries collected as part of the HELENA project that explored the wider use of hybrid development approaches in software development. We extract and analyse the results of 263 surveys completed by participants involved in globally distributed projects. Results: In our sample, 72% of globally distributed projects implement a mix of both agile and traditional approaches (termed 'hybrid'). 25% of GSD organisations are predominantly agile, with only very few (5%) opting for traditional approaches. GSD projects that used only agile methods tended to be very large. Conclusions: Globally Distributed Software Development (and project size) is not a barrier to adopting agile practices. Yet, to facilitate project coordination and general project management, many adopt traditional approaches, resulting in a hybrid approach that follows defined rules.

Expert Survey on Current Trends in Agile, Disciplined and Hybrid Practices for Software Development

“…Analysing the survey, we can observe that most of the surveyed companies in their projects used a combination of traditional and agile methods -hybrid methods. It can be concluded that despite the advantages of the agile development approach, they are far from the only and universal solution [13].…”

“…In various specific cases, traditional process elements continue to be used in agile development scaling approaches. For example, the waterfall model, which has been frequently criticized, is still in use [13].…”

“…The requirements are prioritised and the effort required to implement them is estimated 13 During each new iteration, the project team reviews the updated todo list, determining the scope of tasks for the next iteration 14 First, a system contour is created, to which functions are gradually added 15…”

Hybrid and evolving processes for software and systems—ICSSP 2019 special issue

“…Marinho et al showed that mixes of traditional and agile processes could also be found in a majority of globally distributed software projects. 6 The volume at hand presents the special issue of the 12th International Conference on Software and Systems Process (ICSSP) 2019, which was held in Montreal, Canada, from May 25 to 26, 2019. ICSSP 2019 is the latest in a series of conferences that have been organized by the International Software and Systems Process Association (ISSPA).…”

“…For example, Paez et al 4 and Nakatumba‐Nabende et al 5 could show that we are not just looking at a phenomenon of Western or Nordic countries but find hybrid processes also in countries like Argentina and Uganda. Marinho et al showed that mixes of traditional and agile processes could also be found in a majority of globally distributed software projects 6 …”