A Method to Support Continuous Planning at the Team Level

Background: Software development occurs in dynamic contexts subjected to events that must be carried off promptly and may lead to changes of previously defined plans. Although agile methods became popular by focusing on flexibility and constant adaptation, they still lack proper support for the continuous evolution of project plans. Continuous planning refers to the planning process in rapid and parallel cycles so that plans evolve according to the events. Objective: We present COPLAM (Continuous Planning Adoption Method), which supports continuous planning at the team level of agile software development, covering release, iteration, and day cycles, according to the organization’s context and projects’ needs. Method: We applied Design Science Research principles to define COPLAM. Results: We executed a case study to evaluate COPLAM’s ability to support continuous planning practices and the perceptions of usefulness, ease of use, and self-predicted future. The project planner was able to define planning cycles for projects and evolve plans accordingly to events. Conclusions: Initial evidence shows that COPLAM can support the adoption of continuous planning at the team level by fostering plan definition in rapid and parallel planning cycles and the management of events along with plans’ execution.