Managing Dependencies in Large-Scale Agile

Vedal, Henrik; Stray, Viktoria; Berntzen, Marthe Nordengen; Moe, Nils Brede

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-88583-0_6

Cited by 7 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Rammeverket er ment å vaere fleksibelt og kontekstuavhengig for å kunne tilpasses de fleste storskalasammenhenger. Fra et praktisk perspektiv erkjenner vi at analysen kan fremstå tidkrevende, avhengig av blant annet størrelsen på utviklingsmiljøet, antall deltakere og mekanismer, eksempelvis mellom 27 og 14 (Dingsøyr et al, 2023), 22 (Vedal et al, 2021) og 15 (Moe et al, 2018). Det høyere antallet mekanismer identifisert hos Entur kan forklares på ulike måter.…”

Section: Hvordan Brukes Koordineringsmekanismer For å Møte Koordineri...unclassified

Et rammeverk for koordinering i storskala smidig systemutvikling

Berntzen

2024

Magma

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Digitaliseringen i offentlig sektor fører ofte med seg store IT-systemer som utvikles og driftes av mange team, ofte ved å benytte smidige utviklingsmetoder. I slike storskala settinger er god koordinering avgjørende på grunn av avhengigheter mellom teamene som kan senke farten og kvaliteten på leveransene. For å håndtere avhengigheter brukes koordineringsmekanismer som for eksempel sørger for informasjonsflyt og at ressurser er tilgjengelig på rett sted til rett tid. Denne artikkelen presenterer funn fra et feltstudium gjennomført over halvannet år fra 2018 til 2020 av en storskala offentlig bedrift som benyttet smidige utviklingsmetoder. I løpet av feltarbeidet observerte vi 118 møter og holdt 37 intervjuer på tvers av organisasjonsnivåer. Vi fant 47 koordineringsmekanismer som bidro til å håndtere avhengigheter mellom team i case-organisasjonen. Studiens hovedbidrag er et rammeverk for å kartlegge koordinering i storskala smidig systemutvikling bestående av fire trinn: 1) kartlegging av koordineringsmekanismer gjennom kategoriene koordineringsmøter, -roller og -verktøy, 2) analyse av hvordan mekanismene håndterer avhengigheter, 3) analyse av endringer i koordinering, og 4) utforming av koordineringsstrategier. Rammeverket er kontekstuavhengig og utformet slik at organisasjoner kan bruke det i egen kontekst for å få innsikt i om koordineringsmekanismene fungerer som de skal, eller om det er behov for å justere eller skifte ut mekanismer, for å få bedre innsikt i egne koordineringsbehov og hva som skal til for å møte dem. Abstract in English Digitalization in the public sector often involves large IT systems that are developed and operated by many teams, often using agile development methods. In such large-scale settings, good coordination is essential due to dependencies between the teams that can reduce the speed and quality of the deliveries. To manage dependencies, coordination mechanisms are used to, for example, ensure information flows and that resources are available in the right place at the right time. This article presents findings from a one-and-a-half-year field study in a large-scale agile development program in a public company from 2018-2020. During the fieldwork, we observed 118 meetings and conducted 37 interviews across organizational levels. We found 47 coordination mechanisms that helped manage dependencies between teams in the case organization. The study's main contribution is a framework for mapping large-scale coordination in an agile manner consisting of four steps: 1) mapping coordination mechanisms through three categories: coordination meetings, roles, and tools; 2) analysis of how the mechanisms handle dependencies; 3) analysis of changes in the organization and in the coordination mechanisms; and 4) formulating coordination strategies. The framework is context-independent and designed so that organizations can use it in their own context to gain insight into whether the coordination mechanisms are working as they should or whether there is a need to adjust or replace mechanisms, and thus increase insight into their coordination needs and requirements for meeting them.

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Section: Hvordan Brukes Koordineringsmekanismer For å Møte Koordineri...unclassified

Et rammeverk for koordinering i storskala smidig systemutvikling

Berntzen

2024

Magma

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“…To answer this question, we relied on the lens of RCT [5] and studied two agile teams in a Norwegian agency with 50,000 employees who were working distributed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Our work builds on a preliminary analysis of the data collected in one of the teams, presented in [19].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) and Slack: A Case Study of Coordination in Large-Scale Distributed Agile

Stray¹,

Moe²,

Vedal³

et al. 2023

Preprint

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Today, many large-scale software projects have members working from home, which has changed the way teams coordinate work. To better understand coordination in this setting, we conducted a case study through which we examined two teams in a large-scale agile project by observing meetings and conducting 17 interviews. Through the lens of Relational Coordination Theory (RCT), we analyzed the use of the goal-setting framework Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) and the collaboration tool Slack. Slack was used for frequent, timely, and problem-solving communication and, and its use decreased the number of planned meetings. However, discussions often started on Slack and continued in virtual ad-hoc meetings. The use of OKRs facilitated knowledge sharing, helped the teams align their goals, and provided inter-team insights. The main implication of our research is that projects using OKRs need to support project members, especially in formulating the key results that align and motivate the teams to work toward the same mission.

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Coordination in Agile Product Areas: A Case Study from a Large FinTech Organization

Berntzen,

Engdal,

Gellein

et al. 2024

Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing

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Product teams organized into product areas are becoming more and more prevalent in large-scale agile. While such arrangements are thought to improve the development process and overall product delivery, it is still not clear how this form of organizing alleviates the coordination challenges commonly associated with large-scale agile. In this paper, we report on a case study from a product area in a large FinTech organization. Through analyzing interviews, observations, and strategic documents, we describe how organizing into a product area with vertical and horizontal teams supported inter-team coordination. Further, we describe seventeen coordination mechanisms used in the product area. Our findings have three main contributions. First, we propose that the product area represent a distinct organizational level that can support coordination in large scale development settings. Second, we found that the team types used in the product area represent different team typologies. Third, pull requests and pair programming were used as inter-team coordination mechanisms, and our findings suggest that pair programming to some extent could replace the PR mechanism to further improve product area coordination.

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Managing Dependencies in Large-Scale Agile

Cited by 7 publications

References 16 publications

Et rammeverk for koordinering i storskala smidig systemutvikling

Et rammeverk for koordinering i storskala smidig systemutvikling

Using Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) and Slack: A Case Study of Coordination in Large-Scale Distributed Agile

Coordination in Agile Product Areas: A Case Study from a Large FinTech Organization

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