Agile development is a software development methodology that originated in 2001 (Beck, et al.). It has since gained wide recognition and use in the software industry, and is characterized by iterative development cycles. Organizations outside of the software industry are also finding ways to adapt Agile development to their contexts. BYU Independent Study (BYUIS) is an online education program at Brigham Young University that provides online courses at the high school and university levels. In April 2016, BYUIS implemented the Agile development process to the design and development of online courses. This thesis is a case study that looks specifically at the adoption of Agile at BYUIS, from its implementation in April 2016 to the time of this study in summer of 2017. The question this qualitative study seeks to answer is as follows: how and why did the adoption of the Agile development methodology to instructional design practices at BYUIS reflect or differ from the 12 principles of Agile development? To answer this research question, the researcher used multiple data sources: semi-structured interviews with three administrators, two production team managers, and three instructional designers; surveys for BYUIS student employees (i.e., scrum team members) after each week of observation; and field note observations of three Agile scrum teams for two weeks each. The data from each of these sources was analyzed through a descriptive coding process and then organized into a thematic network analysis. The Results section analyzes evidence from the interviews, surveys, and observations that reflect or differ from each of the 12 principles of Agile. The Discussion addresses three main issues of implementing Agile at BYUIS: how to accommodate for part-time schedules, the complexity of working on different projects, and how to facilitate communication in scrum teams if co-location is not possible. It also looks at how these three issues could be manifest in other organizations and introduces potential solutions. The researcher then presents suggestions for future research on Agile in instructional design or other contexts.

Ämnet innovation har avhandlats gediget inom företagsekonomin. De specifika villkoren för innovation inom olika branscher är emellertid lika välgranskade. Denna studie undersöker Scrum, vilket är ett agilt utvecklingsramverk populärt bland mjukvaruutvecklingsföretag, och sammanlänkar det med de teoretiska modellerna innovationsvärdekedjan och innovationshantering för att dra slutsatser om hur Scrum påverkar innovationsprocesser samt hur det kan bistå företag i att hantera de utmaningar, risker och möjligheter som kan uppstå i samband med innovation. För detta används en kvalitativ metod baserad på intervjuer med aktiva utvecklare på tre företag. Resultaten pekar på att Scrum hjälper utvecklare att hantera risker i innovationsprocesser genom att alterera dem på ett sådant sätt att tiden mellan produktutveckling och återkoppling på utfört arbete minskar, samt att Scrums rolltilldelning bidrar till företagets länkar mellan produktägare och intressenter. De dagliga ceremonierna inom Scrum utgör eventuellt även ett mindre bidrag till en innovativ organisationskultur. Dessa slutsatser antyder att Scrum utgör ett stöd i mjukvaruutvecklingsföretags innovationshantering. Fortsatta studier rekommenderas med förslag på en processtudie av enskilda mjukvaruutvecklingsprojekt.

The purpose of this dissertation was to explore critical issues and challenges that might arise in agile software development processes with Scrum. It also sought to provide management guidelines to help organizations avoid and overcome barriers in adopting the Scrum method as a future software development method. A qualitative research method design was used to capture the knowledge of practitioners and scrutinize the Scrum software development process in its natural settings. An in-depth case study was conducted in two organizations where the Scrum method was fully integrated in every aspect of two organizations' software development processes. One organization provides large-scale and mission-critical applications and the other provides small- and medium-scale applications. Differences between two organizations provided useful contrasts for the data analysis. Data were collected through an email survey, observations, documents, and semi-structured face-to-face interviews. The email survey was used to refine interview questions; all of the interviews were audio-taped and transcribed, and later coded for analysis. Triangulation in the data collection process provided useful information for different perspectives on the issues, allowed for cross-checking, and yielded stronger substantiation of concepts and common categories. The research presented four common categories of issues and challenges of the Scrum method, and management guidelines to help organizations that are already using the Scrum method or planning to employ it in the future. The framework for a hybrid software development model is then proposed as a future study.

The objective of this thesis is to obtain knowledge regarding how effective user centred evaluation methods are and how user centred evaluations are conducted by IT professionals. This will be achieved by exploring user centred evaluation in experimental and practical settings. The knowledge gained in these studies should inspire suggestions for further research and suggestions for improvements on the user centred evaluation activity. Two experimental studies were conducted. One compares the results from using three user centred evaluation methods, and the other examines two factors while conducting heuristic evaluation. The results show that the think-aloud evaluation method was the most effective method in finding realistic usability problems of the three methods. The number of critical problems found during think-aloud evaluation increases, if heuristic evaluation is conducted prior to the think-aloud evaluations. Further, two studies of user centred evaluation in practical settings were performed. The IT professionals participating in those studies were using the software development process Scrum to plan their work. The results show that user centred evaluation is infrequently conducted in Scrum projects, compared to testing activities like acceptance testing. The main type of evaluation is qualitative. Few participants measure user performance or use surveys to gather quantitative results on the usability and the user experience. IT professionals get feedback from users in an informal way and gather informal feedback from peers. Many participants use a mixture of methods for gathering feedback on their work. The outcome of this thesis shows that IT professionals should be encouraged to include users whenever possible when evaluating software, for example by using the think-aloud method. Using heuristic evaluation prior to conducting think-aloud evaluations is also recommended. In addition, IT professionals are encouraged to evaluate their software in an informal way frequently, rather than waiting for the right time to conduct a thorough quantitative evaluation. To advance this field further, researchers who want to improve the evaluation activity for the IT professionals should study how user centred evaluation methods could be combined in an efficient way and how the use of qualitative evaluation methods could be made more effective. / QC 20120522

This thesis has been performed at consulting firm Sweco Position in Jönköping. The thesis is divided into two main sections: theoretical and practical. The theoretical section contains an investigation into the possibilities of implementing a geographical information system (GIS) for administrations of wells with the integration of Bing Maps for Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8. The practical work comprises the development of a prototype for Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8. The students review the Model-View-ViewModel-pattern on a theoretical basis, compares the differences between Windows 8 Pro and Windows RT. The thesis also contains and investigation into the pros and cons of a web based application compared to a native one. The result of the thesis will be comprised of a GIS-service developed in C# in co-operation with XAML with the options of saving data locally and a WMS-based service layer for Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8. / Detta examensarbete har utförts på konsultbolaget Sweco Position i Jönköping. Arbetet har varit uppdelat i två större delar: teoretiskt och praktiskt arbete. Teoretiska delen omfattade en utredning kring möjligheterna att implementera ett geografiskt informationssystem (GIS) för administration av brunnar med hjälp av Bing Maps tillsammans med Windows 8 och Windows Phone 8. Praktiska arbetet omfattade skapandet av en prototyp till Windows Phone 8 och Windows 8. Studenterna går bland annat genom Model-View-ViewModel-mönstret på en teoretisk nivå, beskriver skillnaderna mellan Windows 8 Pro och Windows RT. Ett utredande om för och nackdelar vid utveckling av webbaserade applikationer och native-applikationer. Resultatet av examensarbetet kommer innefatta en GIS-lösningen utvecklad i C# i samverkan med XAML och omfatta lokalt sparad data med WMS-tjänst baserad interaktion till Windows 8 och Windows Phone 8.

Global systemutveckling (GSD) är en ökande trend inom systemutvecklingsbranschenoch möjliggör för verksamheter att reducera utvecklingskostnaderna, få tillgång tillexpertis till lägre kostnader samt öka flexibilitet och effektivitet genom att konstantbedriva systemutveckling över olika tidszoner. Global mjukvaruutveckling ikombination med agila metodologier visar sig bli allt vanligare då framgångsrika agilaprojekt kan producera programvara av högre kvalitet som bättre uppfylleranvändarnas behov. Tidigare forskning konstaterar dock att utmaningar ochkomplikationer kan uppstå i globala mjukvaruutvecklingsmiljöer ur perspektivet avindivider som arbetar i geografiskt separerade projektgrupper. Syftet med dennastudie har varit att undersöka vilka problem och utmaningar som individer upplever iglobala mjukvaruutvecklingsmiljöer där den agila metodologin Scrum tillämpas.Problemen och utmaningarna som i denna studie undersökts relaterar till följandehuvudområden: kommunikation, språkliga och kulturella skillnader,gruppsammanhållning och laganda samt kunskapshantering. Studien syftar även tillatt redogöra för hur de uppkomna utmaningarna förslagsvis kan hanteras. Enundersökning har genomförts på ett mjukvaruutvecklingsföretag i Växjö som verkarinom ekonomitjänstebranschen. En kvalitativ undersökningsmetodik i form avsemistrukturerade intervjuer har genomförts med arbetstagare som arbetar i ettmjukvaruutvecklingsprojekt som bedrivs globalt.Slutsatserna som dras av studien är att individer som arbetar inom globalamjukvaruutvecklingsprojekt ställs inför flera utmaningar. Kommunikationsrelateradesvårigheter upplevs bl.a. på grund av bristen på informell kommunikation vilketresulterar i misskommunikation, missförstånd och långa svarstider. För en förbättradkommunikation kan kombinationen av synkrona och asynkrona verktyg användassamt skärmdelning och videosamtal. Scrum aktiviteter som daily scrums ochretrospectives kan även förbättra kommunikationen inom projektgruppen. Avseendekulturella skillnader visar studien att det upplevs svårt att definiera om utmaningarkan relateras till kulturella skillnader mellan olika länder eller om det avser skillnaderi organisationskulturer. Språkrelaterade skillnader visar sig upplevas som en barriäroch leder bl.a. till svårigheter att uttrycka sina idéer och tankar och att arbetetförsvåras eftersom att översättning krävs. Beträffande gruppsammanhållning upplevsdet råda en bristande gruppsammanhållning när projektmedlemmarna är fysisktseparerade och att gruppsammanhållningen tenderar att öka inom respektive separeradgrupp snarare än projektgruppen som helhet. Den geografiska spridningen påverkaräven tilliten inom projektgruppen. För ökad gruppsammanhållning och tillit ärinformella sammanträffar en nyckelfaktor. Medlare ses även som en nyckelfigur föratt länka samman teammedlemmarna i de fysiskt separerade grupperna. Avseendekunskapshantering upplevs den geografiska spridningen inom projektgruppen som enmöjlighet att dra nytta av varandras olika bakgrunder och erfarenheter för att på så sättöka kunskapen inom hela projektgruppen. Utmaningar som relaterar tillkunskapshantering är att samma misstag kan begås flera gånger inom projektet p.g.a.en avsaknad av informellt kunskapsutbyte. För förbättrad kunskapshantering inomprojektgruppen ges förslag på användning av t.ex. code reviews, checklistor ochkunskapstävlingar för främjandet av kunskapshantering inom projektgruppen / Global software development (GSD) is a growing trend within the software industryand enables companies to reduce development costs, get access to expertise to lowercosts and increase flexibility and efficiency by constantly conducting softwaredevelopment across different time zones. Global software development combinedwith agile methodologies proves to be more common as successful agile projects canproduce software of higher quality that better meet user needs. Previous researchconcludes however that challenges and complications can arise in GSD environmentsfrom the perspective of the individuals working in geographically separated projectteams. The purpose of this study was to examine the problems and challenges thatindividuals experience in GSD environments where the agile Scrum methodology isapplied. The problems and challenges that have been examined relate to the followingareas: communication, language and cultural differences, group cohesion and teamspirit and knowledge management. The study also aims to explain and exemplify howthe challenges can be mitigated. A study has been conducted at a softwaredevelopment company in Växjö operating in the finance service industry. Aqualitative research method in the form of semi-structured interviews was conductedwith employees working in a global software development project.The conclusions drawn from the study are that individuals working within GSDprojects face several challenges. Communication related difficulties are experiencedpartly due to of the lack of informal communication, which results in failedcommunication, misunderstandings and long response times. In order to improve thecommunication, a combination of synchronous and asynchronous tools can be used aswell as screen sharing and video calls. Scrum activities such as daily scrums andretrospectives can also improve the communication within the project team.Regarding cultural differences, the study shows that it’s difficult to distinguishwhether challenges are related to cultural differences between the countries, orwhether it relates to differences in organizational cultures. The language-relateddifferences prove to be perceived as a barrier and lead to difficulties for individuals toexpress their ideas and thoughts, as well as understanding other individuals. Thelanguage differences also hamper the work because translation is required. Challengesrelated to group cohesion include that individual’s experience a lack of groupcohesion when project members are physically separated and that the group cohesiontends to increase in each separated group instead of the project team as a whole. Thegeographic dispersion also affects the trust within the project team. In order improvegroup cohesion and trust within the team informal gatherings are a key factor.Mediators are also seen as a key figure for linking the team members in physicallyseparated groups. Knowledge management is seen as an opportunity to benefit fromeach other's different backgrounds and experiences to increase the knowledge withinthe entire team. Challenges related to knowledge management are that the samemistakes can be committed several times in the project due to a lack of informalknowledge exchange. In order to improve knowledge management within the project,suggestions are given such as the use of code reviews, checklists and to organizeknowledge competitions to promote knowledge sharing within the project team.

There are several ways of conducting software testing where some may include users and others may include personnel whose work task is to execute test on systems. Although most developers and project managers understand the point of testing the system, it is not always being done and the most common reason is that there is no time for it. However, this is a false assumption as it may instead cause some bugs in the system that would not have been there in the first place if tests had been there to prevent bugs in the code. My purpose for this thesis was to find suggestions for changes in the development process in an ongoing project used by Acino and Svenska Försäkringsfabriken in order to increase the quality of the system used. In this thesis, I have approached the purpose by pursuing a case study of the two companies through observation and interviews. By doing this I acquired the relevant information to make suggestions for change. In my case study, I have analysed the work process, which includes the types of testing and development conducted on the system. Through this I have found suggestions for changes that can generate better quality of both the system and work process. The changes that I've suggested are directed against both the code that the system consists of and the work processes used by the two companies. While the suggestions I have found is not entirely new for the companies it is something that’s not included in either the code or process, but my hope is that I have created an awareness which could ultimately generate a positive change.

En este trabajo de tesis se propone el diseño de un modelo de simulación del proceso de desarrollo de software que utiliza la Metodología de desarrollo Ágil Scrum. Se ha realizado un análisis de la metodología Scrum, la Metodología de Dinámica de Sistemas y de trabajos similares, correspondientes a simuladores de desarrollo de proyectos de software tanto de metodologías ágiles como tradicionales. El modelo se ha construido utilizando la metodología de dinámica de sistemas propuesta por Jay Forrester , que consta de la fase de Conceptualización, Formulación y Evaluación. El modelo diseñado se ha divido en los siguientes Subsistemas: Planificación, Producción, Desarrollo de Tareas, Pruebas de Desarrollo, Pruebas de Integración, Presión en el Plazo, Desarrollo de Tareas Extras, Promociones de R.H., Experiencia de R.H., Cansancio de R.H., Horas Trabajadas de R.H., Inasistencias de R.H. Para la implementación del modelo se utilizado la herramienta Vensim PLE en versión educativa. Para la validación del modelo se han utilizado tres casos de proyectos reales de software que siguieron la metodología Scrum. Dentro de los parámetros que se pueden establecer previo al inicio de cada simulación se encuentran: la duración y la velocidad de cada Sprint, la velocidad estimada de desarrollo de las tareas, Factores de Cansancio, de Presión en el plazo, Cantidad de integrantes del Team según su experiencia en la metodología y las tareas extras que se prevén puedan surgir. A través de la modificación de valores de los parámetros durante su ejecución el usuario puede establecer o modificar la cantidad de integrantes del Team que abandonan el proyecto, clasificar al Team mediante la asociación de estos a su experiencia en Scrum en Juniors o Expertos, cambiar la cantidad de horas estimadas de duración del proyecto, generar horas extras e inasistencia de los integrantes de manera determinística o pseudoaleatoria, entre otros. Una vez validado el modelo se propusieron cuatro casos de experimentación, los cuales se sometieron a distintas políticas para probar las posibilidades del modelo construido frente a situaciones que se dan en los proyectos de software que utilizan Scrum para su gestión. Las políticas propuestas, simulan decisiones de los Scrum Master y el team y tienden a que los proyectos puedan completarse en el tiempo previamente estimado o por el contrario extender el tiempo para terminar con todas las tareas minimizando los errores. Otro aspecto estudiado en los experimentos es el de la gestión de los recursos humanos, en cuanto a la contratación y promoción de miembros del Team, Senior y Junior. Estos modelos fueron probados en orden creciente de dificultad y utilización de la mayor cantidad de variables intervienes. Como conclusión se pude decir que el modelo cumple con su objetivo de ser de utilidad para el Scrum Master y el Team a la hora analizar el efecto del uso conjunto de la metodología Scrum en proyectos de desarrollo de software. Lo que diferencia a este trabajo de otros relacionados es que se han modelado las características esenciales de la metodología Scrum aplicada a proyectos de desarrollo de software. La dificultad de contar con datos posmortem de proyectos de software desarrollados siguiendo scrum es una dificultad que se ha presentado a la hora de validar el modelo. Es por ello que como trabajos futuros se propone el diseño de una base de datos de proyectos de desarrollo de software que utilicen metodologías ágiles. Por otro lado se pretende que el modelo construido pueda ser utilizado para el entrenamiento de Scrum Masters y Miembros del Team, en la estimación y gestión de proyectos que utilicen Scrum como Metodología.

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Agile methodologies have become a popular and widely accepted method for managing software development. Since the inception of the Agile Manifesto over ten years ago, agile development techniques have superseded waterfall methods in many, if not most, software development organizations. Despite its apparent success, many companies have struggled with the adoption and implementation of agile, and exactly what level of adoption provides optimum agility. Agility is commonly held in the literature to be constructed of elements external to a company or project but may in fact be composed of both external and internal elements. The exact relationship of the adoption of agile development techniques and their relationship to the actual agility of a business remain unclear. A primary contributor to this uncertainty is the somewhat amorphous definition of agile itself. In academic literature, the concept is still relatively young and loosely defined. In practice, organizations have largely opted for a hybrid approach to agile, mixing its concepts and methods with existing Stage Gate or waterfall methodologies. This has made the management of agile even more complex. Crucially, there is no definition or criterion available to determine the appropriate mix of agile and waterfall processes in an embedded software development context nor is there a method to determine the impact of one against the other. These issues beg the question: how do organizations manage agility? This interpretive case study provides an empirical account of how stakeholders manage both market and process agility in an embedded systems context via a hybrid agility implementation and product genesis. As a result, we provide the notion of agile vorticity, as the point at which market and process agility collide to produce business momentum at a specific point of innovation within the agile business vortex.