PEOPLE FACTORS IN AGILE SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT

With the increasing popularity of Agile Methods, many software organisations are moving away from traditional methods to adopt Agile development methodologies. Instead of being predictive, Agile is rather adaptive and people-focussed. It advocates a small and collaborative team that work closely together. But team size is a factor that is in turn constrained by people factors. When implementing Agile, these key factors are often overlooked. This study aims at identifying the underlying people factors to consider when adopting Agile for a team to be effective. The method used is the study of three different sized Agile teams developing products based on the same technologies and using Scrum. Both objective and subjective measures were used and the results are supported by a survey. The results clearly show that for agile methodologies to work well, it is crucial to select the right people for the right team.