The Influence of Organizational Factors on Inter-team Knowledge Sharing Effectiveness in Agile Environments

Abstract

Agile software development is known by focusing on interaction among team members to share knowledge. However, little guidance is provided to encourage interaction across agile teams. Based on a preliminary conceptual model, this paper examines influencing factors, such as organizational strategy, and communication flow and channels, regarding inter-team knowledge sharing (KS) effectiveness in agile environments. We analyze the characteristics and the influence of the mentioned factors through a survey research method. Data was gathered from seven Brazilian agile software organizations. We employed statistical analysis techniques, e.g., structural equation modeling and cross-table analysis, to analyze the results. Within the surveyed companies, organizational strategy reflects on moderate commitment towards knowledge. KS practices are carried out to an acceptable standard. Extensive communication flow and the use of several channels denote that agile companies are also fostering interaction across teams. We found strong relationship between these factors and the companies' experience on agile methods. As companies continue on an agile adoption program, they growingly focus on long-term goals and consider knowledge as strategic resource. However, they still need to improve strategy alignment to all organization levels. Thus, we recommend that agile companies consider these factors when striving on this endeavor.

Percepção dos Desenvolvedores sobre Comunicação em Desenvolvimento de Software

“…Hsu et al (2012) afirmam que a comunicação consiste no processo de transferência de informações entre os membros da equipe. Santos et al (2014) argumentam que a comunicação flui da fonte para o receptor, resultando em transferência e compreensão de um significado" e complementa, apoiando-se em Dierkes et al (2003), que este processo só é efetivo se o destinatário puder absorver o conteúdo da mensagem e utilizá-lo. Thissen et al (2007) e Staton (2017), afirmam que quando a comunicação é realizada ineficazmente prejudica o andamento das ações de rotina e cria conflitos entre as equipes de software.…”

“…De acordo com Misnevs e Demiray (2017), lacunas na comunicação geram problemas que afetam a entrega de produtos e serviços aos clientes. As tarefas podem ser erroneamente alocadas e, consequentemente, mal realizadas prejudicando tempo, custo e esforço relacionados ao desenvolvimento de software [Santos et al, 2014;Schmidt e Meures, 2016;Rutz e Tanner, 2016].…”

Impact of Execution Planning on Agile Project Success with Mediating and Moderating Mechanism

“…Recently Companies are considering the factor of sharing information for successful implementation of agile projects [6]. Different organizational work practices of sharing knowledge affect the agility practice in software development industry so it's certainly very much important that affective practices should be employed [7].…”

Improved knowledge sharing in ticket repositories

“…In software projects, the Knowledge Spiral framework is applied every day, especially on Agile projects [46]. Dorairaj [20] and Santos [58], for example, investigated how teams collect, store, and share knowledge. Both studies share the same view: software development is a suitable environment for tacit knowledge sharing among teams, mainly because of the focus on face-to-face team interaction and pair programming.…”

“…Menolli et al [38] claimed that companies should build conditions that motivate information sharing and knowledge dissemination; otherwise, valuable information could be internalized only on the mind of the employees. All these studies show that disseminating knowledge is a fundamental competence for an organization in general, particularly software companies [21,58].…”