Agile methods for Information Systems Development (ISD) projects are claimed to encourage developers to be more flexible and efficient by means of arrangements in the development team’s physical and social environment. Research has, however, not yet answered the questions of how, why, and in what contexts agile methods work. ISD can be understood as a highly complex undertaking, which requires the developers’ creativity. The creative process is susceptible to the individual’s task motivation, which in turn is affected by the physical and social environment. In view of this, I argue that theories of motivation, such as the Self-Determination Theory, and theories of creativity could be usefully applied in such research. This study analyses Scrum, one of the most popular agile methods. Empirical data were collected through focused interviews with developers who had extensive experience of working in projects using various agile methods. Narratives of work episodes with perceived high and low motivation were analyzed in terms of motivation theory. Interview data were classified according to the type of motivation experienced and analyzed in relation to the agile method arrangement involved. The results of the investigation demonstrate how agile methods affect developers’ motivation in ways that are conducive to creative performance. The most pronounced effects are related to the individuals’ perceived work-related competence, autonomy, and sense of belonging to the team. Several agile arrangements in combination affect motivation in the positive direction, the single most influential factor being the team’s daily stand-up meetings. The agile arrangement that seems most difficult to implement without causing episodes of low motivation is the product owner role. The analytical approach taken in this study contributes to a better understanding of the aspects that are critical to the successful implementation of agile methods.

Agila metoder för systemutvecklingsprojekt syftar till att öka utvecklarnas flexibilitet och effektivitet genom arrangemang av utvecklarnas fysiska och psykosociala arbetsmiljö. Forskning om hur, varför och i vilka sammanhang agila metoder fungerar är dock ännu otillräcklig. Systemutveckling kan beskrivas som en komplex uppgift som fordrar utvecklarnas kreativitet. Individens kreativa process påverkas av individens uppgiftsmotivation, vilken i sin tur påverkas av faktorer i den fysiska och psykosociala arbetsmiljön. Mot den bakgrunden framhålls psykologisk teori om motivation, som Self-Determination Theory, och teori om kreativitet, som relevant för forskning om agila metoder. I avhandlingen analyseras Scrum, en av de mest populära agila metoderna. Empiriska data har hämtats från fokusintervjuer med utvecklare med lång erfarenhet av arbete i agila projektmiljöer. Deras berättelser om episoder med starka motivationsupplevelser har analyserats med stöd av teorin. Intervjudata har klassificerats avseende motivationstyp och i relation till inverkande agila arrangemang. Resultaten visar hur agila metoder inverkar på utvecklares motivation i avseenden med relevans för kreativa prestationer. Starkast var inverkan relaterad till utvecklarnas upplevelse av arbetsrelaterad kompetens, autonomi och samhörighet med utvecklingsteamet. Flera samverkande agila arrangemang inverkade positivt på motivationen; allra starkast inverkan hade teamets dagliga stå-upp-möte. Det agila arrangemang som var svårast att implementera utan att bidra till uppkomsten av negativt inverkande episoder var rollen produktägare. Studien bidrar med kunskap relevant för implementering av agila metoder i systemutvecklingsprojekt. 

Agile project methods are said to encourage flexibility and efficiency in Information Systems Developmentprojects. The questions of how, why, and in what contexts agile practices work remain to a large extentunanswered by research. The authors argue that contemporary theory on human motivation and creativework, such as the Self-Determination framework (Deci & Ryan, 1985) and the Progress Principle(Amabile & Kramer, 2011), should be applied in such research. Using the Progress Principle as theprimary theoretical lens, the authors present an evaluation of one of the popular agile methods, namelyScrum (Schwaber, 2004). Findings from an ongoing research project on agile praxis indicate that theimplementation of agile practices may be instrumental in fostering a motivational culture conducive to aheuristic as well as creative performance. This analytical approach contributes to a better understandingof the aspects of the agile practices that are critical to a useful implementation.

We systematically searched for research literature specifically dealing with motivation in relation to agile methods. We searched for peer-reviewed articles published in databases indexing many of the leading journals in potentially relevant fields (ACM Digital Library, AIS Electronic Library, Business Source Premier, Engineering Village, IEEE Xplore Digital Library, PsycINFO and Scopus). We applied no restricting time limit for the publication; the search was performed in December, 2012; we used search strings combining “agile” with “motivation”.

Very little research applying theory on motivation on the agile field was found. The single study found that explicitly aims at exploring motivation in agile projects (a case study of two agile teams: McHugh et al. 2011) used as the framework for interpretation the list of 21 “motivators” and 15 “de-motivators” compiled by Beecham and colleagues’ in a literature study (2008). The conclusion is that theory on motivation is not sufficiently applied in research on agile practices.

The ability to use the project work form tends to be increasingly important for long-term profitability in most organizations, thus, strategic management nowadays normally comprises management of projects and project portfolios. Many significant decisions concerning the organization's vision, goals and operations origins from a few basic questions in a strategic perspective. Some of these are related to developing a strategic position: Which products should we offer? How can we retain old customers and attract new ones? How can we increase our internal efficiency? The answers to these questions often results in decisions to initiate projects for product development, marketing campaigns or internal improvements. Other projects are related to operating from an established strategic position: delivering customer orders and producing events. The purpose of this paper is to describe and discuss a project typology, derived from a strategic management perspective. The typology consists of five project archetypes: Product development projects, Marketing projects, Internal improvement projects, Customer order projects, and Event projects. The typology highlights distinctive characteristics in the result perspective, i.e. variations in project deliverables, goals and intended effects, which have significant consequences for business oriented project steering in practice. Variations between project archetypes are described focusing on business decision processes, the purpose and content of project phases, progress control/follow-up, and organizational principles. The typology represents one of three analysis models in a framework for Structured Project Analysis (the SPA framework) developed during a doctoral study 2004-2009. (C) 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Att arbeta i projektform har i många organisationer blivit ett vanligt arbetssätt. Att kunna samarbeta med människor från andra delar av organisationen, med olika kompetenser, mål och förutsättningar har därför blivit en viktig framgångsfaktor.Litteratur om hur människor i samarbete fungerar brukar inte ha projekt och tillfälliga arbetsgrupper som utgångspunkt. Detsamma gäller också för en stor del av forskningen om individer, grupper och ledarskap. Den här boken ändrar på det.Med projektet som utgångspunkt beskrivs vad som händer i det första mötet med andra och hur samarbetsnormer och lärstilar skapar en gruppdynamik som leder gruppen framåt. Boken skapar förståelse för hur konflikter uppstår och hanteras samt ger perspektiv på spelet i mötet mellan olika människor. Vidare behandlas hur samarbete i arbetsgrupper förändras över tid, hur man gör för att kunna ta upp och reagera på varandras beteende och hur man leder andra. Texten illustreras med många exempelsituationer från verkligheten.På bokens webbplats www.studentlitteratur.se/janssonochljung finns ett omfattande digitalt material med bland annat övningar, lästips och bildmaterial från boken.

Today, it is almost impossible to find organisations without any ongoing projects. Projects seem to play an increasingly important role in most organisations. Projects are nowadays often small, frequent and a normal way of organising work. Most project managers are working in arenas quite different compared with those where the standard toolbox was originally developed, i.e. large construction and development projects. During the last two decades, several researchers have stressed the necessity of adapting leadership style and usage of techniques, e.g. for project planning, to meet the specific requirements of each project type. In this paper we move one step further, and suggest that the choice of project management methods and techniques must be based on the characteristics of each individual project. If there would be only one common tool in the toolbox for every project manager it ought to be an analysis model or method to create an understanding of the actual projects characteristics. Supported by three comprehensive case studies in three different organisations, carried out through an action research methodology during 5 years (2004-2009), this paper presents two models for such project analysis. The first model is a suggested project typology consisting of five project archetypes derived from a strategic management perspective. The second is a project diagnosis, featuring 15 questions formulated to reveal important project characteristics with relevance for the required leadership. We argue that these two models can serve as useful tools for project management and business oriented steering, since they are aiming at guiding leaders towards effectively focusing their attention to the areas most critical for project success