Practices connected to perceived client benefits of software projects

Abstract

It is well‐documented that many software projects deliver fewer benefits than planned. However prior research has had a stronger focus on the ability to deliver within budget, on time and with the specified functionality, than on what to do to successfully deliver client benefits. The authors have conducted a survey collecting information about benefits management practices, agile practices, use of contracts, and the perceived success in delivery of client benefits. The authors received responses from 83 software professionals with information about 73 recent and 74 older software projects. There was no statistically significant improvement of the delivered client benefits from the older to the recent projects. Statistically significant findings, applying a general linear model‐based analysis, include that the degree of success in delivering client benefits is connected to a project having: (i) a plan for how to realise the benefits, (ii) implemented practices for benefits management during project execution, (iii) frequent deliveries to production during the project execution, and (iv) a process for the evaluation of realised benefits after project completion. The authors argue that greater use of these practices represents a potential for organisations to increase their success in delivering benefits from software projects.

The characteristics of successful military IT projects: a cross-country empirical study

“…With regard to the success variable "client benefit delivered," the mean projects delivered just over 80% of planned benefit, a share that corresponds closely to some previous findings concerning success in the delivery of client benefit [9], [50]. Our mean percentage was somewhat higher than the percentages reported by Flyvbjerg and Budzier and [49], for which IT projects experienced a mean shortfall of 29.3% of planned benefit.…”

Realising benefits in public IT projects: A multiple case study

“…More recent studies have found that the implementation of benefits management practices contributes to the realisation of benefits in IT projects, as summarised in a systematic literature review by Holgeid et al [4]. Benefits management practices that have been documented as associated with success in terms of realising benefits include identifying and structuring benefits (e.g., [5][6][7]), planning the realisation of benefits (e.g., [3,[8][9][10]), ensuring responsibility and incentives for realising benefits (e.g., [5,[11][12][13][14][15]), implementing benefits management practices during the execution of the project (e.g., [6,10,16]), and evaluating and reviewing the realised benefits ( [5][6][7]).…”

“…[4]. Benefits management practices that have been documented as associated with success in terms of realising benefits include identifying and structuring benefits (e.g., [5–7]), planning the realisation of benefits (e.g., [3, 8–10]), ensuring responsibility and incentives for realising benefits (e.g., [5, 11–15]), implementing benefits management practices during the execution of the project (e.g., [6, 10, 16]), and evaluating and reviewing the realised benefits ([5–7]).…”

PlaySAFe: Results from a Virtual Reality Study Using Digital Game-Based Learning for SAFe Agile Software Development

“…As technology becomes an increasingly predominant element to individuals' daily lives, software companies are under increasing unrelenting pressure to improve their software development's quality and speed. As a result of this demand for continuous delivery and deployment, organizations are placing greater emphasis on methods of working to facilitate this requirement [1]. Many organizations are looking at agile frameworks such as the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) to achieve this, as it is one of the most prevalent utilized frameworks according to the State of Agile Survey [2].…”