Software Process Improvement Using Agile Methods in Financial Institutions. LHV Bank Case

Töökorraldus suurtes finantsinstitutsioonides ja finantstehnoloogia ettevõtetes on rajatud erinevatele alustele. Selgemalt kui kusagil mujal on see näha nende ettevõtete tootearenduses, kus tuleb välja oluline erinevus uue toote turule toomise kiiruses ja tarkvara arendusprotsessis tervikuna. Paljud finantsinstitutsioonid püüavad lahendada probleemi, mis on seotud tootearenduse ja tarkvara arendusprotsesside kiirendamisega, et vastata ärikeskkonnast tulenevatele muutustele.Ajalooliselt on suured finantsinstitutsioonid tuginenud oma tarkvara arendusprotsessides kose-meetoditele, mis tõid varem häid tulemusi, kuid mis ei vasta enam muutunud ärikeskkonnast tulevatele vajadustele. Suurem üleminek kose-meetodil toimivalt tarkvara arendusprotsessilt välk-meetodil toimivale tarkvara arendusprotsessile on nendes organisatsioonides toimunud alles viimase viie aasta jooksul. Uue põlvkonna finantstehnoloogia iduettevõtted on aga rajanud kogu oma tegevuse välk-meetodil põhinevale tarkvara arendusprotsessile.Magistritöö eesmärgiks on leida vastus küsimusele, kuidas skaleerida väledaid tarkvara arendusprotsessi meetodeid finantsinstitutsioonides. Selleks viiakse läbi LHV Panga tarkvara arendusprotsessil põhinev juhtumiuuring. Magistritöös kirjeldatakse LHV Panga olemasolevat tarkvara arendusprotsessi, analüüsitakse läbi teoreetiline kirjandus ja viiakse läbi praktilised intervjuud. Võttes arvesse analüüsi tulemusel kogutud tähelepanekuid, pakutakse LHV Panga näitel välja ettepanekud, kuidas kiirendada tarkvara arendusprotsessi finantsinstitutsioonis.Magistritöös tuuakse välja kaheksa ettepanekut protsessi kiirendamiseks LHV Pangas. Kogu organisatsiooni tasemel tuleb väledad meetodid ja juhtimiskultuur tervikuna kasutusele võtta laiemalt nii juhtimises kui ka äri-, toote- ja IT-arenduses. Selleks tuleb korraldada vajalikud koolitused. Meeskondade tasemel tuleb arenduse kiiruse tõstmiseks moodustada konkreetsed tootemeeskonnad, seada ühised eesmärgid kõikidele meeskonnaliikmetele ja anda meeskondadele suurem otsustusvabadus. Protsesside tasemel tuleb üle vaadata hetkel kehtiv tarkvara arendusportsess ning täiendada seda viimaste praktikate ja organisatsiooni enda poolt viimase viie aasta jooksul kogutud kogemustega. Tehnilisel tasemel tuleb automatiseerida tarkvara kasutuselevõtmisprotsess ja kasutada rohkem väiksematest osadest koosnevat infosüsteemi ülesehitust.Large financial institutions and fintech companies have fundamentally different ways of working. More clearly than anywhere else, this is seen in their product development cycles. There is significant difference in time to market for new products and in speed of software development. The problem where many financial institutions find themselves now is the need to respond faster to the changes in the business environment and have faster product and software development processes.Large financial institutions have historically relied on waterfall-inspired methods for software development. These methods have delivered great value for a long time, but are not corresponding to the current changing needs in the business environment. A larger shift from waterfall towards agile software development in these organizations has taken place just in the last five years due to the changes in the competition, where the new generation fintech companies have relied purely on agile development.In light of this context, this thesis addresses the research question of how agile software development process can be scaled up within the context of financial institutions. This is achieved by means of a case study carried out on LHV Bank software development process. The current processes at LHV Bank are mapped, suggestions for changes are derived through review of existing research on agile methods and from in-depth interviews. Based on the analysis, the findings that are the most important for benefiting from agile development are identified and suggested for improving the software development process at LHV Bank.There are eight key recommendations for improving the process at LHV Bank. On the organizational level, the agile methods and management culture should be introduced in larger scale, including the management, business, product and software development, with relevant trainings to be organized. On the teams level, to increase the efficiency of the development, concrete product teams should be assembled, common objectives set for team members and more autonomy given to the teams. On the process level, the agile development method used with its components should be reviewed by learning from the latest best practices and experience the organization has collected during the last five years when implementing agile practices. On the technical level, the release process should be automated and modular system architecture and microservices should be used more

Structuring postponement strategies in the supply chain by analytical modeling

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Software Process Improvement in Very Small Entities: An investigation of Software Development Knowledge Management and Team issues in maintaining and evolving software process and process improvement.

technique at both management and team level in software development VSEs. These methods assisted the researchers in examining the attitude and perceptions of practitioners towards the research issues. The researchers also made use of survey questionnaires in VSEs in order to gain more input and to validate the qualitative data. The findings from the first stage analysis (qualitative analysis), in which the content analysis and grounded theory coding approaches were used, show the pattern and detailed categories that influence and are related with the software process and process improvement in VSEs. These categories are related to each other and allow the researchers to produce and validate the studies theoretical model. Likewise the second stage analysis (quantitative analysis) assisted the researchers in conforming and enhancing the first stage findings. This investigation shows that SPI programmes in VSEs are being undertaken in a very informal manner and also in indirect ways. The primary reasons identified for the informal nature of VSE SPI are due to cost, time, customer and company size, which give a higher priority to the product rather than process. In relation to teams, the small team size coupled with the working and management style have lead VSEs to be more informal in their knowledge management process and team organization. Moreover VSEs are largely ignoring the best practice SPI models. The reasons and acceptance criteria for this are discussed. This research also confirmed that SPI does not solely depend on technology but also the contributions of human aspects have a strong emphasize, especially in VSEs. Therefore a contribution of this research is to provide an extended knowledge and understanding of SPI research area in general and within VSEs domain in particular

Investigating the relationship between software process improvement, situational change, and business success in software SMEs

While we have learned a great deal from Software Process Improvement (SPI) research to date, no earlier study has been designed from the outset to examine the relationship between SPI and business success in software development small- to- medium- sized companies (software SMEs). Since business processes are generally acknowledged as having an important role to play in supporting business success, it follows that the software development process (a large and complex component of the overall business process) has an important contribution to make in supporting business success in software development companies. However, to date we have very little evidence regarding the role of SPI in supporting business success, especially for software SMEs. The need for SPI is dependent on the extent of situational change in a software development setting, and therefore any examination of the relationship between SPI and business success would be deficient if it did not also examine the extent of situational change. Therefore, this thesis describes a novel approach to examining SPI, situational change and business success in software development companies. Furthermore, having discharged this new approach to 15 software SMEs, this thesis makes the important new discovery that the amount of SPI implemented in a software SME is positively associated with the extent of business success – especially when the degree of situational change is taken into account. This thesis describes the first published study to examine the relationship between SPI, situational change and business success in software SMEs. The findings suggest that there are business benefits to implementing SPI in software SMEs, with the degree of situational change being an important factor informing SPI initiatives. Furthermore, this research has yielded valuable new insights into the nature of SPI, situational change and business success in software SMEs

Software process improvement as emergent change: a structurational analysis

This thesis differs from the technological perspective of SPI by identifying and analysing the organisational features of process improvement. A theoretical understanding is developed of how and why software process improvements occur and what are the consequences of the change process within a specific case. A packaged information systems organisation forms the basis for a substantive case study. Adding to the growing body of qualitative research, the study takes a critical hermeneutic perspective. In doing so it overcomes some of the criticisms of the interpretive studies especially the need for the research to be reflexive in nature. By looking at SPI as an emergent rather than deterministic activity, the design and action of the change process are shown to be intertwined and shaped by their context. This understanding is based upon a structurational perspective that highlights how the process improvements are enabled and constrained by their context. The work builds on the recent recognition that the improvements can be understood from an organisational learning perspective. Fresh insights to the improvement process are developed by recognising the role of the individual to facilitate or resist the improvement. The understanding gained here can be applied by organisations to enable them to improve the effectiveness of their SPI programmes, and so improve the quality of their software. Lessons are derived that show how software organisations can support the ongoing improvement through recognition of the learning and political aspects of the change by adopting an agile approach to SPI

Proceedings of the 1st international workshop on software process education, training and professionalism (SPETP 2015)

These Proceedings contain the papers accepted for publication and presentation at the first 1st International Workshop on Software Process Education, Training and Professionalism (SPETP 2015) held in conjunction with the 15th International Conference on Software Process Improvement and Capability dEtermination (SPICE 2015), Gothenburg, Sweden, during June 15-17, 2015. During the 14th International Conference on Software Process Improvement and Capability dEtermination (SPICE 2014) held in Vilnius, Lithuania, at a post conference dinner, a group of key individuals from education and industry started to discuss the challenges faced for software process education, training and professionalism, especially with the background of the new modes of learning and teaching in higher education. Further discussions held post conference with key players in the relevant professional and personal certification fields led to a consensus that it is time for the industry to rise to the new challenges and set out in a manifesto a common vision for educators and trainers together with a set of recommendations to address the challenges faced. It was therefore agreed co-located the 1st International Workshop on Software Process Education, Training and Professionalism with the 15th International Conference on Software Process Improvement and Capability dEtermination. This workshop focused on the new challenges for and best practices in software process education, training and professionalism. The foundation for learning of software process should be part of a university or college education however software process is often treated as ‘add one’ module to the core curriculum. In a professional context, whilst there have been a number of initiatives focused on the certification related to the software process professional these have had little success for numerous reasons. Cooperation in education between industry, academia and professional bodies is paramount, together with the recognition of how the education world is changing and how education is resourced, delivered (with online and open learning) and taken up. Over the next 10 years on-line learning is projected to grow fifteen fold, accounting for 30% of all education provision, according to the recent report to the European Commission on New modes of learning and teaching in higher education. It is a great pleasure to see the varied contributions to this 1st International Workshop on Software Process Education, Training and Professionalism and we hope that our joint dedication, passion and innovation will lead to success for the profession through the publication of the manifesto as a key outcome from the workshop. On behalf of the SPETP 2015 conference Organizing Committee, we would like to thank all participants. Firstly all the authors, whose quality work is the essence of the conference, and the members of the Program Committee, who helped us with their expertise and diligence in reviewing all of the submissions. As we all know, organizing a conference requires the effort of many individuals. We wish to thank also all the members of our Organizing Committee, whose work and commitment were invaluable

An agile based integrated framework for software development.

Doctor of Philosophy in Management. University of KwaZulu-Natal. Durban, 2018.Software development practice has been guided by practitioners and academics along an evolutionary path that extends from a Waterfall approach, characterised as highly prescriptive, to an approach that is agile, embracing the dynamic context in which software is developed. Agile Methodology is informed by a set of generic principles and agile methods that are customised by practitioners to meet the requirements of the environment in which it is used. Insight into the customisation of agile methods is pivotal to uphold the evolutionary trajectory of software development methodology. The study adopted a ‘socio-technical’ orientation to enhance the implementation of Agile Methodology. The social component of the study was aligned to the role played by organisational culture in the adoption of software development methodology. The amorphous concept of organisational culture has been operationalised by implementing the Competing Values Framework to develop a model that aligns organisational culture to an optimal methodology for software development. The technical component of the study has a software engineering focus. The study leveraged experiential knowledge of software development by South African software practitioners to develop a customised version of a prominent agile software development method. The model has been developed so that it is compatible with a variant of organisational culture that is aligned with agile methodology. The study implemented a sequential research design strategy consisting of two phases. The first phase was qualitative consisting of a phenomenological approach to develop the study’s main models. The second phase was quantitative, underpinned by technology acceptance theory, consisting of a survey based approach to determine South African software practitioners’ acceptance of the agile-oriented technical model that was developed in the study. The results from the survey indicated an 80% acceptance of the model proposed in study. Structural Equation Modelling was used to demonstrate that the inclusion of organisational culture as an independent construct improved the predictive capacity of technology acceptance theory in the context of software development methodology adoption. The study’s overall theoretical contribution was to highlight the significance of organisational culture in the implementation of agile methodology and to extend the evolutionary path of software development methodology by proposing an agile oriented model that scales the software process to an organisational infrastructure level