Agile project dynamics : a strategic project management approach to the study of large-scale software development using system dynamics

Large-scale software engineering organizations have traditionally used plan-driven, heavyweight, waterfall-style approaches for the planning, execution, and monitoring of software development efforts. This approach often results in relatively long development schedules that are susceptible to failure, especially in a rapidly changing environment: Schedule pressure, defects and requirements changes, can drive endless redesign, delay the project, and incur extra cost. Many in the commercial software world have dealt with these pressures by adopting Agile Software Development, an approach designed to be flexible and responsive to high-change environments. Software development teams that are said to employ "Agile development" in effect practice a variety of "agile methods". These practices are advertised to reduce coordination costs, to focus teams, and to produce stable product iterations that can be released incrementally. Agile software development has become a de-facto approach to the engineering of software systems in the commercial world, and is now entering the aerospace and defense sectors. The APD model developed in this research aids in the understanding of the impact that alternative combinations of Agile practices, combined with different management policies, have on project performance, compared to a waterfall approach. This research culminates in a formulation of insights and recommendations for how to integrate Agile practices into a large-scale software engineering organization.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Engineering Systems Division.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2012

Author dc:creator

• Glaiel, Firas (Firas S.)

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Stuart Madnick.

• Engineering Systems Division.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/79513

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/79513