Investigating Agile Adaptation for Project Development

Agile methodologies adaptation in software companies is an accepted norm.Rapid application development and efficient deliverables being the premise. The changing business needs, cost effectiveness and timely delivery are catered to by agile methods. Different software development models are in the literature and also are being used by the industry. Few companies have adopted agile, few are gearing up for and few are in transition. We investigated agile presence in a software company.Project management is an evolving art with innovative methods being added up.The aim of this paper is to tease about project management challenges, agile, agile transition in companies and a comparison of conventional software engineering practices with agile process model.This paper takes stock of the current status of quality in software projects and to add on quality process improvement strategies. The results presented here are after a qualitative interview study with one cross function team using streamline development framework in agile development

Personality Temperament, Character and Behavior

Existing classifications of temperament characters personality types and ways of behaviour are the disputable issues of the present-day scientific world The origins of the classifications rise from the ancient philosophy and medicine in China and India VIII BCE Greece V BCE Rome II century AD England and Germany I century USA and Russia century Tremendous amount of the classifications were worked out all over the world and not all of them withstood the test of time The references to Hippocrates and Claudius Galenus classifications occur chiefly which are tangential with regard to mentality and psychic setup and based on humoralism humorism Great empirical and experimental materials have been accumulated in scientific history without harmonious systematization in view of the absence of the integrated international system of classification that is the factor restraining the further development of typology There were curious incidents during typology march Fourier described three hundred characters for instance Unfortunately any ordinary person could not be able to remember all these descriptions Since then researches finding and admission of the optimum types became the task of paramount importance for the scientist

Experience reuse to improve agility in knowledge-driven industrial processes

Companies need to become more agile to survive to the unstable and highly changing market-place. This can be achieved through the adaptation and control of their business processes. A process sufficiently structured but not over constrained by standards and based on experience feedback principles is necessary. This article describes a proposition of agile process driven by the reuse of experiences and knowledge. For this purpose, based on Case-Based Reasoning (CBR) principles, the complete lifecycle of an agile process is introduced, from requirements definition, retrieval, reuse, adaptation, and storage steps. Finally, an example applied to the domain of industrial problem solving is presented to illustrate the methodology

A Comparison between Agile and Traditional Software Development Methodologies

Agile and Traditional software development methodologies, both are being used in different projects of software development industry. Agile software development technology is an incremental software development process. On the other hand, Traditional software development methodologies or plan-driven software can be explained as a more formal approach to software development. These methodologies come with a fully completed set of systems requirements followed by an architectural and high leveldesign development and inspiration. This research focuses on the software development life cycle, role and responsibilities of agile and traditional software development methodologies and their technical practices. It performs a comparison between both the software development methodologies. Here a questionnaire is used to collect data from the various experts of different IT related organizations of Bangladesh. In the questionnaire, there are three sections to bring out the individual knowledge from different organization, methodology knowledge of the respondents and software development experience of the respondents. The respondents are mainly software engineer, system analyst, software developer etc. A comparison is also performed between this survey result and a survey done by Ambler

Implementation of Change to Audits and Inspections Using Action Research

The audits and inspections process is a critical component related to a pharmaceutical firm’s compliance in the industry. To be out of compliance has significant ramifications both on the safety and purity of the firm’s products and its viability in the industry. Such firms are routinely audited by boards of health and customers that purchase the firm’s products to ensure they are in compliance with expected standards. The success of hosting the audits and inspection program is the first line of defense in demonstrating compliance. To succeed at these audits and inspections changing with the times is a necessity. The implementation of change in an organization is fraught with challenges. Issues such determining who in the organization are the right people to discover, develop, and diffuse change is a complex process for management. This study will describe how the use of Liberating Structures and coaching were used to change the audits and inspection process for a major pharmaceutical firm. The changes are evaluated through the lens of Adaptive Space and the use of action research to integrate theory and action with the goal of answering the following questions: How might I get the right people on the team to implement a digital auditing process? How might I implement a digital auditing process? In the time involved with the completion of this action research study, COVID-19 hit. This led me to another question: What modifications to the auditing process must be made as a result of COVID-19, how can I modify the auditing approach to incorporate site restrictions The outcome of this effort transformed the auditing process at the firm and was implemented at the firm’s sites worldwide

Discovering the Role of Information Technology In Disruptive Innovations - Enabler, Sustainer or Barrier

IT Capability has traditionally been used as one of the constructs used to high-light the value of IT both to competitive advantage and firm performance. However, a school of thought is rising with the banner that IT no longer matters as a source of competitive advantage. The argument is that IT is becoming a utility like electricity and organizations need to look elsewhere for unique competitive advantage. This dissertation is therefore positioned to investigate the value (if any) of IT in today’s organisations particularly in disruptive innovation scenarios. Disruptive innovations (DI) are innovations that typically gain initial adoption at the fringe of a market but gradually attract the mainstream customers of an established firm thereby threatening the survival of such firms. Disruptive Innovations have caused leading firms to drop from their esteemed position not because of bad management or lack of technological skills but because they introduce a different set of business rules and performance measures. Therefore, DI can be a source of competitive advantage for the firm that successfully implements it and a cause for alarm for firms facing such disruptions. By adopting a qualitative study and extensive review of literature and secondary data, the dissertation explores how IT plays a role in disruptive innovations in two streams – IT as DI and IT for DI. IT as DI considers - what is the significance of IT when the disruptive innovation is a digital/IT Innovation? While IT for DI considers - what is the essence of IT in the creation or response to disruptive innovations (regardless of the type of innovation)? For the IT as DI study, the dissertation advances a theoretical proposition of Wickempowerment using the theory of empowerment and wicked problems to articulate the identified duality when a disruptive innovation is also a digital/IT innovation. Using IT capability as a theoretical lens for the IT for DI study, the dissertation posits that IT remains a potent source of competitive advantage in two ways. These are conceptualized as Disrupt-ability (ability to create disruptive innovations) and Disruptability (ability to be disrupted or expressed conversely as ability to respond to disruptive innovation threats). With this theoretical conceptualization, we articulate three roles of IT capabilities in disruptive innovations – IT as an enabler, IT as a sustainer and IT as a barrier.Yrityksen kykyä hyödyntää tietotekniikkaa (IT) on perinteisesti tutkimuksessa tarkasteltu yhtenä merkittävänä yrityksen tulokseen ja kilpailukykyyn vaikuttavana tekijänä. Toisaalta osa tutkijoista on esittänyt, että tietotekniikka ei enää ole merkittävä kilpailuedun lähde. Tämän näkemyksen mukaan tietotekniikka on sähköverkkojen tavoin osa kaikille yhteistä infrastruktuuria ja organisaatioiden tulisi hakea muita tapoja erottautua kilpailijoistaan. Tämä väitöskirja asemoituukin tutkimaan sitä, millainen arvo tietotekniikalla on yritysten markkina-asemaa voimakkaasti muuttavien disruptiivisten innovaatioiden (DI) muotoutumisessa. Disruptiiviset innovaatiot on määritelty innovaatioiksi, jotka alkuvaiheessa kiinnostavat vain pientä osaa toimialan asiakkaista, mutta jotka vähitellen tavoittavat myös suuria asiakasryhmiä ja näin uhkaavat alan perinteisten suurten yritysten markkina-asemaa. Muutos ei siis johdu välttämättä huonosta johtamisesta tai puutteellisista teknisistä taidoista, vaan siitä, että innovaatio muuttaa alan liiketoiminnan sääntöjä ja menestystekijöitä. Yrityksen kyky tuoda tällainen uusi innovaatio markkinoille voi siis tuoda yritykselle merkittävää kilpailuetua, mutta samalla sen tulisi herättää alan muut yritykset vastaamaan uuden innovaation aiheuttamiin muutoksiin. Käsillä oleva tutkimus hyödyntää laadullisen tutkimuksen ja systemaattisen kirjallisuuskatsauksen menetelmiä tarkastellakseen tietotekniikan roolia sekä tietotekniikkaan perustuvissa innovaatioissa erityisesti (IT as DI) että liiketoimintaan liittyvissä innovaatioissa yleisemmin (IT for DI). Ensimmäinen tutkimuskysymys (IT as DI) siis tarkastelee erityisesti digitaalisten innovaatioiden syntyä ja vaikutuksia. Toisen tutkimuskysymyksen kautta (IT for DI) huomio kohdistuu tietotekniikan rooliin liiketoiminnan innovaatioiden luomisessa ja innovaatioihin vastaamisessa (innovaation tyypistä riippumatta). Digitaalisten innovaatioiden tarkastelussa teoreettisena viitekehyksenä hyödynnetään monitahoisten ja vaikeasti ratkaistavien ongelmien käsittelyyn ja voimaistamiseen liittyvää kirjallisuutta. Näin tarkasteltuna digitaalisissa innovaatioissa voidaan erottaa kahdensuuntaiset (positiiviset ja negatiiviset) vaikutukset niin yksilöiden, yritysten kuin yhteiskunnankin tasolla. Toisen tutkimuskysymyksen tarkastelu perustuu IT kyvykkyyksiä käsittelevään tutkimukseen. Tältä osin tutkimuksessa esitetään, että IT voi tuottaa yritykselle kilpailuetua kahdella eri tavalla: IT kyvykkyydet ovat osa yrityksen kykyä luoda uusia disruptiivisia innovaatioita (Disrupt-ability), IT kyvykkyyksien puuttuminen taas voi heikentää yrityksen kykyä vastata muiden luomiin innovaatioihin (Disruptability). Tämän teoreettisen viitekehyksen kautta IT kyvykkyyksilletunnistetaan kolme roolia disruptiivisissa innovaatioissa: IT mahdollistajana, IT ylläpitäjänä ja IT esteenä.Siirretty Doriast

The hidden pitfalls of Kanban in software development

ABSTRACT: Objectives of the Study: The objective of this thesis is to explore the hidden pitfalls of Kanban in software development. The aim is to discover the reasons behind the pitfalls and actions that nourish Kanban's failure. Academic background and methodology: Software development industry has been shifting towards more iterative, responsive and people-oriented development methods, which present the values of lean and agile thinking. Being characterized as the antidote for bureaucracy, the shift towards agile development methodologies has been one of the most significant factors affecting the software industry. Kanban as an agile change management framework has been perceived as the fairy godmother of software development making the reasons behind struggling Kanban projects particularly interesting. Thesis interviews five agile experts in the software development and studies their experiences of unsuccessful Kanban implementations. Emphasis is given to similar experiences and perceptions on how Kanban fails to redeem its value proposition. Findings: The primary finding of the study is that an organization that is unable to change its mindset to support Kanban is a pitfall affecting the whole project, inevitably causing Kanban to fail. This is a challenge that all agile methods have in common. Agile can flourish only when agile values are being appreciated. The secondary finding is that many software teams claiming to be using Kanban have implemented only a shallow imitation of the real method thus creating a superficial implementation, which prevents achieving Kanban induced benefits. Thus, creating a superficial implementation, which prevents achieving Kanban induced benefits. Furthermore, the erroneous human interpretation of what Kanban really is and how to apply it correctly is a key factor contributing to the emerge of the pitfalls. Keywords: Kanban, software development, pitfall, agile, change management, framewor