Social loafing prevention in agile software development teams using team expectations agreements

Abstract

Social loafing is a common issue encountered by many software development teams. In practice, agile software development teams often use team expectations agreements (TEAs), which contain rules to prevent social loafing behaviour. However, few studies in the software engineering literature examine how these rules are specified in TEAs and whether they serve the purpose. The authors intend to provide a better understanding on how to specify rules in TEAs to prevent social loafing behaviour in agile software development teams. A mixed-method approach using both qualitative and quantitative data was employed. The results of our study show that agile software development teams specify the expectations of the whole team on meeting attendance and contribution, respect of tasks, roles and teammates, and collaboration with each other. These rules have the potential to prevent social loafing behaviours. However, specifying the rules in TEAs alone is not sufficient to make them effective. It needs to be complemented with team commitment to TEA rules. The work of the authors contributes to a better understanding of how to use TEAs to prevent social loafing in agile software development teams, and provides a conceptual basis for future research to investigate social loafing prevention using TEAs.This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and no modifications or adaptations are made.

The Improving Role of Digital Leadership in the Impact of Social Loafing on Job Performance

“…For years, this concept has been called the Ringelmann Effect (Robert, 2020). In the 1970s, these experiments were repeated by using various methods such as rope, shouting, and clapping (Fronza & Wang, 2021). As a result, the sum of the individual efforts of those in the group alone was found to be more than the total effort of the individuals in the group (Wilhau, 2021).…”

“…Especially the people resorting to social loafing are called "Free Riders" in the literature. The Free Rider Effect is used to express the condition in which someone consciously takes part in a group and exhibits social loafing behavior to utilize the benefit provided by the group (Fronza & Wang, 2021;Rajaguru et al, 2020). The Sucker Effect states that individuals feel bad as a result of the fact that others benefit from the values emerging owing to their work and efforts (Robert, 2020).…”

“…Social loafing is expected to increase in virtual teams where physical distance and communication opportunities are limited (Robert, 2020). It is considered that social loafing behavior will decrease gradually when the necessary precautions in online groups are taken (Fronza & Wang, 2021). It has been found that technological changes will not reduce social loafing in group work unless necessary precautions are taken (Stieglitz et al, 2022).…”

“…It has been found that technological changes will not reduce social loafing in group work unless necessary precautions are taken (Stieglitz et al, 2022). Peer leadership and supervisor support are estimated to be the measures that could reduce social loafing in information technology teams (Fronza & Wang, 2021). It has been observed that high-quality leader-member interaction reduces social loafing among employees (Murphy et al, 2003).…”

Evaluating the Impact of Workplace Friendship on Social Loafing in Long-Term Care Institutions: An Empirical Study

“…Several studies have mentioned the factors influencing the social loafing of employees in companies and institutions. For example, Fronza and Wang [21] investigate how to avoid the software developing team members' social loafing behavior in team expectation agreements (TEAs). A negative relationship between social loafing and workplace friendship was found in the study.…”