The social nature of agile teams
Agile is a term often (but not always) associated with ‘project chemistry,’ or the positive team climate that can contribute to high performance. This report presents findings from a qualitative study into personal experiences in development teams. The results draw from socio-psychological literature to explain not only how, but WHY agile methodologies support effective teamwork. Valuable for anyone curious about the socio-psychological aspects of teamwork: managers interested in guiding team activity; practitioners hoping to better understand their team experiences; or newcomers looking for insight into why agile works at all.
Session history: this talk was presented at XPDay 2007. The audience feedback was extremely positive. Several individuals pulled me aside later to tell me how the results presented in the talk strongly resonated with their own experiences, but also pulled the theory together in a non-obvious way. I would love to have the chance to share this unique piece of research with more people, as well as improve on the slides/presentation from the first talk.
Background: the talk presents the results of a year-long masters study. The study involved semi-structured interviews with 22 participants. The methodology used to analyze participant experiences was grounded theory. Interview transcripts were scrutinized line-by-line to isolate common occurrances/themes across participants, and these themes were further linked back to teamworking and socio-psychological literature. You can find a copy of the thesis here: http://www.ewhitworth.com/documents/Thesis_final.pdf
Introduction to research (5 minutes)
Introduction to social identity theory & how it comes to play in software development (5 minutes)
Overview of social forces in agile teams and how agile practices support them.(15 minutes) This section covers some of the major precursors for team involvement and motivation from a social perspective. In particular, how agile development practices such as daily team meetings not only reduce physical barriers to communication, but also reduce existing social barriers to collaboration and increase the willingness of team members to communicate and resolve conflict with other team members.
Topics will include: in-group/outgroup bias (social identity & culture), social pressure and responsibility, social support and belonging, ownership and effort, and requirements for ‘whole team’ communication and motivation.
- Audience questions (5 mins)