Knowledge withholding intentions (KWI), defined as the likelihood an individual will give less than full effort on knowledge contribution. If every member withholds knowledge in a software development team, it results in poor project performance. However, little research has been conducted to investigate the factors that influence knowledge withholding intentions. The purpose of this paper is to develop a theoretical model based Social Cognitive Theory and extends it with Social Exchange Theory to analyze the antecedents of knowledge withholding intentions from personal cognitions and contextual factors. Furthermore, the contextual influencers are subdivided into dimensions of rational choice, normative conformity, and affective bonding with a comprehensive view. Through a survey of 227 participants who have experience in software development, task interdependence, procedural justice, leader-member exchange, team-member exchange were found to have negative influences on knowledge withholding intentions. On the contrary, knowledge withholding outcome expectations and knowledge withholding self-efficacy were found to have positive influences on knowledge withholding intentions.

Context. Industry is moving from co-located form of development to a distributed development in order to achieve different benefits such as cost reduction, access to skillful labor and around the clock working etc. This transfer requires industry to face different challenges such as communication, coordination and monitoring problems. Risk of project failure can be increased, if industry does not address these problems. This thesis is about providing the solutions of these problems in term of effective roles and responsibilities that may have positive impact on GSD team. Objectives. In this study we have developed framework for suggesting roles and responsibilities for GSD team. This framework consists of problems and casual dependencies between them which are related to team’s ineffectiveness, then suggestions in terms of roles and responsibilities have been presented in order to have an effective team in GSD. This framework, further, has been validated in industry through a survey that determines which are the effective roles and responsibilities in GSD. Methods. We have two research methods in this study 1) systematic literature review and 2) survey. Complete protocol for planning, conducting and reporting the review as well as survey has been described in their respective sections in this thesis. A systematic review is used to develop the framework whereas survey is used for framework validation. We have done static validation of framework. Results. Through SLR, we have identified 30 problems, 33 chains of problems. We have identified 4 different roles and 40 different responsibilities to address these chains of problems. During the validation of the framework, we have validated the links between suggested roles and responsibilities and chains of problems. Addition to this, through survey, we have identified 20 suggestions that represents strong positive impact on chains of problems in GSD in relation to team’s effectiveness. Conclusions. We conclude that implementation of effective roles and responsibilities in GSD team to avoid different problems require considerable attention from researchers and practitioners which can guarantee team’s effectiveness. Implementation of proper roles and responsibilities has been mentioned as one of the successful strategies for increasing team’s effectiveness in the literature, but which particular roles and responsibilities should be implemented still need to be addressed. We also conclude that there must be basic responsibilities associated with any particular role. Moreover, we conclude that there is a need for further development and empirical validation of different frameworks for suggesting roles and responsibilities in full scale industry trials.

To seize and make use of knowledge in organizations is important for their competitiveness, amongst other things. To do this is, however, not entirely straightforward and therefore the use of so called knowledge management systems is common. There are different kinds of systems for managing knowledge, for example systems that are known as traditional knowledge management systems. However, a number of difficulties and problems with the traditional knowledge management systems has led to the usage of other systems, for example wikis, for knowledge management. We have, in this thesis, studied the role of a wiki as a knowledge management system in a distributed software development team. We have also studied how a wiki can relate to a traditional knowledge management system. A case study was conducted and five software developers were interviewed. The study showed that the usage of wikis can be versatile and that there are both similarities and differences to traditional knowledge management systems, both regarding the use and the content. The study also showed that wikis and traditional knowledge management systems can be used combined. The conclusions of the study shows that both wikis and traditional knowledge management systems can support and facilitate the management and dispersion of knowledge in organizations. / Att kunna ta vara på kunskap som finns inom organisationer och omsätta denna är viktigt bland annat för organisationers konkurrenskraft. Att göra detta är dock inte helt enkelt och därför tar man ofta hjälp av så kallade kunskapshanteringssystem. Det finns olika typer av system för att hantera kunskap, exempelvis de som benämns som traditionella kunskapshanteringssystem. Ett antal svårigheter och problem med dessa system har lett till att man börjat använda andra system för kunskaphantering, exempelvis wikis. I denna uppsats har vi undersökt en wikis roll som kunskapshanteringssystem inom ett distribuerat mjukvaruutvecklingsteam. Vi har även undersökt hur wikis förhåller sig till traditionella kunskapshanteringssystem. För att undersöka detta genomfördes en fallstudie där fem mjukvaruutvecklare intervjuades. Studien visade att användningen av wikis kan vara mångsidig och att det finns både likheter och skillnader med traditionella kunskapshanteringssystem, både gällande användningen och dess innehåll. Det visade sig också att wikis och traditionella kunskapshanteringssystem kan användas samverkande. Slutsatserna visar att både wikis och traditionella kunskapshanteringssystem kan vara ett stöd och underlätta hanteringen och spridningen av kunskap i organisationer.

The goal of the diploma thesis "Upgrade of agile development support tool" is to study agile methodologies and its use in practice. Thesis is focused on the Scrum framework used by The Corporate Technology department of Siemens, s.r.o. in Brno. Furthermore the thesis analyzes and compares the most used software support tools for agile methodologies which also gives an inspiration for the upgrade of support tool used by the department of Siemens. Thesis identifies possible upgrades based on an analysis with the goal to make agile development even more effective. Results were consulted with the representative of the Siemens company and then modules for Code review and Retrospective were chosen to implement. Implementation consists even of some minor upgrades of the tool. Goals of all implemented upgrades were to save time, optimize administrative work and make development even more effective. Benefits and further upgrades are consulted at the end of the thesis.

The increase of globalization of business led to the creation of global virtual software development teams in which communication plays an important role. The lack of recent studies raises the need to investigate communication in the context of agile and the current Covid-19 pandemic. This study identifies in literature three factors present in global virtual software development teams: technology, culture, and trust. It aims to explore how they influence internal communication. A qualitative method is conducted on a case study by combining data collected from semi-structured interviews and observations. The case study is a global virtual software development team which implemented the agile Scrum methodology. The findings provide a deep understanding of the positive and negative influences of the factors on communication, including their interrelations and context. Some of the main findings are: (I) the best set up for collaboration among global team members is the combination of synchronous and asynchronous communication through technological tools, (II) cultural diversity leads to differences in the ways members communicate, (III) trust is the precondition of working collaboratively and communicating effectively, (IV) global team members need to occasionally have in-person interactions to nurture their interpersonal relations, (V) the agile Scrum methodology influences internal communication positively, (VI) each communication factor is influenced by time; thus, the theoretical framework developed for this study is updated with this addition, (VII) the Covid- 19 pandemic affects communication to a certain extent.

In rapidly changing environments organization and management theories have to consider more flexible approaches to match the demands (1) (2). Agile methods attempt to enable flexible efficient ways of working in team structures (1). In this thesis we empirically study a model from a constructivist approach in an attempt to contribute to knowledge on the eternal problem of people working efficiently in the structure of teams. Social processes are argued to have a major impact on the general application of agile methods (3). However, the practitioners of agile methods tend to focus more on the physical and technical infrastructure as enablers of successful teamwork rather than the social processes of team development (4). Hence, without knowing how the social processes of a team affects the usage of agile methods for team development, an organization is at risk of becoming less efficient over time without realizing why (5) (6).Therefore it is essential to study how an agile method for team development affects and influences the social processes within a team in order to understand how it can be used for efficient teamwork. The purpose of this thesis was to study how an agile method for team development can aid a software development team to improve their way of working. We empirically tested a team-level workshop-based agile method for team development, SHC, in a case study at the Swedish Police Authority IT Department. This included 14 focus group sessions with seven development teams. We posed the following main research question to fulfill the purpose of the study: how can the use of an agile method for team development help software development teams improve theirway of working? We conclude that there are several ways in which an agile method for team development can help teams improve their way of working, and that these depend on the unique social processes within each team. The purpose of the study was fulfilled by the findings of how an agile method can serve teams in different stages of team development by fulfilling different purposes, how it can assist a team in taking action, as well as the potential it has to enable Shared Leadership. / I snabbt föränderliga miljöer måste organisations-och management-teorier ta hänsyn till mer flexibla angreppssätt för att möta kraven (1) (2). Agila metoder har som mål att möjliggöra flexibla och effektiva arbetssätt i teamstrukturer (1). I denna uppsats studerar vi empiriskt en modell ur ett konstruktivistiskt perspektiv i ett försök att bidra till kunskapen om det eviga problemet i att arbeta effektivt i teamstrukturer. Sociala processer anses ha en stor påverkan på den generella appliceringen av agila metoder (3). Utövare av agila metoder tenderar dock att fokusera mer på den fysiska och tekniska infrastrukturen som mögliggörare för effektivt teamwork snarare än de sociala processerna kring teamutveckling (4). Om en organisation alltså inte vet hur de sociala processerna hos ett team påverkar användandet av en agil metod så riskerar organisationen att bli mindre effektiv över tid utan att inse varför (5) (6). Därför är det essentiellt att studera hur en agil metod för teamutveckling påverkar och influerar de sociala processerna inom ett team, för att förstå hur metoden kan användas  för effektivt teamarbete. Syftet med denna uppsats var att studera hur en agil metod för teamutveckling kan hjälpa ett mjukvaruutvecklingsteam att förbättra sitt arbetssätt. Empiriskt testade vi en workshop-baserad agil metod på team-nivå, SHC, i en fallstudie på Polismyndighetens IT-avdelning. Denna inkluderade 14 fokusgruppsessioner med 7 olika utvecklingsteam. Vi ställde följande huvudsakliga forskningsfråga: hur kan användandet av en agil metod för teamutveckling hjälpa mjukvaruutvecklingsteam att förbättra sitt arbetssätt? Vi nådde slutsatsen att det finns flera sätt som en agil metod för teamutveckling kan hjälpa team att förbättra sitt arbetssätt, och att dessa sätt beror på de unika sociala processerna inom teamet. Syftet med studien uppfylldes av slutsatserna kring hur en agil metod kan stödja team i olika stadier av teamutveckling genom att fylla olika syften, hur en agil metod kan stödja ett team i att agera, samt potentialen metoden har i att möjliggöra delat ledarskap.