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The Role of Communication in Agile Systems Development (Categories…
The Role of Communication in Agile Systems Development
Categories
Influence of team distribution on communication mechanisms of agile
SD teams.
Co-Located teams
Communicate more efficiently
physical proximity
layout of the working space
Hinder communicaiton
office spaces, hard to focus and
concentrate
In contrast, others find that conversations in co-located office spaces are not perceived as distracting (Whitworth and Biddle 2007).
Distributed teams
Chanllenges
Communication issues mainly from different
time zones, languages, and cultures
the amount of verbal communication is lower in distributed projects compared to co-located teams (Niinimäki 2011), which may result in miscommunication, misunderstandings, and confusion among team members
Mitigation
distributing
work within the same time zone
Agile Methods
synchronizing work hours
Trusted relationships as well as a shared
understanding
communication
tools, multiple communication
modes,
Asynchronous media
synchronous communication
Influence of project domain on communication mechanisms of agile
SD teams.
frequent communication played an important
role in the agile SD process.
the changing customer requirements could only be captured by frequent face-to-face ommunication.
In terms of maintenance projects, first reported findings suggest that using only oral communication may become problematic later on during maintenance because implemented changes to the system are often not documented (Kajko-Mattsson 2008).
Influence of agile methods and practices on communication
mechanisms of agile SD teams.
Scrum
it has been found that the higher the communication frequency, the more productive the roject (Braithwaite convergence, which in turn positively influences virtual team performance (Nevo and Chengalur-Smith 2011).
Communication is mentioned to be challenging when team members are engaged inmultiple projects and the plan changes frequently, as well as when clear responsibilities are missing (Pikkarainen et al. 2012).
The emphasis on face-to-face conversations may also lead to challenges for team members with weak communication skills (Conboy et al. 2011).
Extreme Programming (XP)
“XP is all about maximizing communication” (Murru et al. 2003, p. 39).
Consequently, the most beneficial aspect of XP is reported to be more frequent communication within the team (Fruhling and de Vreede 2006; Layman
et al. 2004; Ramesh et al. 2010)
XP developers reportedly spend a quarter of their time on communication (Coman and Succi 2009).
However, other findings suggest that the introduction of XP did not affect the way andhow often the team communicated with the surrounding organization as well as with stomer representatives (Svensson and Höst 2005).
The most frequently investigated XP practice in terms of communication is pair programming.
“every study of pair programming has shown that it is a communicationsintensive process” (Begel and Nagappan2008, p. 125).
Influence of communication mechanisms of agile SD teams on SD
success.
Influence of team size on communication mechanisms of agile SD
teams.
large teams tend to be
distributed and smaller teams
communication is stated to be easier for smaller agile SD teams because collaboration becomes more and more complex as the team size grows
The major advantage reported for small teams is that informal face-to-face communication occurs naturally, which leads to the building of tacit knowledge (Kajko-Mattsson 2008; Nevo and Chengalur-Smith 2011).
Discussion
“Communication and collaboration are at the heart of agile software development” (Karhatsu et al. 2010, p. 298).
Communication is no ‘silver bullet’ for successful agile SD because over-communication may become an inhibitor, and communication hurdles arise in distributed or extended environments with many stakeholder groups and development teams.