The success of agile projects depends on team motivation. Team members are often expected to do more than follow orders and do what is asked of them. Each team member is expected to exercise professional judgment, taking the path they believe is most appropriate at each point in the project. Agile methods require more than motivated individuals. A supportive environment, support for the team as professionals, and trust that the team will exercise sound judgment. These are all criteria the Agile Manifesto authors believe are essential to building a motivated team. Command-and-control methods and Agile methods differ in several ways. As intrinsic motivation is unlikely, behaviour is enforced. People are motivated to develop their capabilities in an agile environment.
Team cultures that are self-managing, self-directing, or self-organising are encouraged by this principle. Teams are acknowledged here as entities with knowledge, perspective, and motivation rather than as command-and-control entities. Providing insight, influencing decisions, and negotiating commitments are valuable for the team and customer. According to the Agile Manifesto, this structure is crucial for increasing motivation and improving technical excellence. Team members are responsible for keeping technical issues under control and “on the radar scope” when making decisions about the project.
According to the Agile Principles, the development team faces challenges when learning from each other, developing their capabilities, maintaining their motivation, directing their activities, and acting as equal partners with management and customers.
Adaptive Software Development (ASD). Additionally, ASD recommends philosophies based on the Leadership-Collaboration Model and speculates about project missions—the Adaptive Conceptual Model: Project stakeholders as independent agents. Among the Agile methods, ASD emphasises the software development team’s role as a carrier of management’s direction and negotiating with customers. A software project is an adaptive system with multiple independent agents, such as the development team. This radical approach eliminates any hierarchy or precedence among the project agents, making them equal partners with management and customers. Team members must exert their initiative and motivation since they have no superior authority to direct them.
As a result of ASD, software projects become “complex adaptive systems” with results that can be determined versus predetermined “emergent results.” Therefore, agents’ expectations regarding project output are expected to evolve. A typical activity in this perspective is the activity of speculating. Various independent agents determine the overarching parameters for the project. The team sets a project vision in this step and assumes its features. Project Mission development cycles are determined by independent agents consulting together at the start of the project. Based on project history, their speculation is refined at the beginning of every development cycle and eliminates dictating project goals or plans to the technical team. Together, management and customers negotiate project parameters. They will be motivated to meet their commitments by organising and managing the project environment in which they will work. When you adopt independent agents and speculation, you reject command-and-control management in favour of “leadership-collaboration” management. Managers should lead rather than direct and cultivate a collaborative environment to reach a project’s goal. As a result, the team should be highly motivated and self-organised.
Team members and individuals are directly related to D.S.D.M’s second principle. Decision-making needs to be empowered by the D.S.D.M teams. It is more traditional in D.S.D.M to view technical teams, management, and customer relationships. Making a team decision that is consistent with everyone’s vision. D.S.D.M projects collaborate between the customer, management, and team (including functional objectives, budget, and schedule). Therefore, the technical team is empowered to implement what they deem necessary to achieve the goals, appealing to management and customers only when necessary. Thus, D.S.D.M allows the team to exercise professional judgment when negotiating with management and customers.
X.P practices include collective ownership and the Planning Game. The XP The planning game is played by all project stakeholders, including the technical team and the “business people” (including management and customers). To plan the work to be performed, each party contributes a unique perspective to this game. Furthermore, management recognises the project’s constraints, and the technical team is aware of their ability to complete it on time. Similarly to many other Agile methods, the Planning Game treats the technical team more like a collaborator than a subordinate. Each pair of programmers can take any action to attain their goal within an XP project. No one in XP owns the code. All pairs can make changes anytime if the changes do not fail the existing automated tests. Decision-making skills are essential in XP teams.
Feature-Driven Development (F.D.D). In F.D.D, two practices illustrate Agile Principles (class ownership and feature teams). Unlike X.P, F.D.D requires only the class owner to modify each class. According to this philosophy, individuals must assume full responsibility for their class. The software industry does not have any particular preference for class ownership. Therefore, feature teams, when applied in tandem, have great importance. F.D.D projects aim to implement identified features. Class owners form teams to implement features. Thus, the F.D.D team continually reorganises feature teams. Team members are included, do their work, and then disband.
A feature team will eventually be formed for every member of the project. A feature team can implement their feature however they see fit. The team is supplemented with owners of classes not initially identified as affected by the feature as part of this approach. F.D.D is self-organisation at its core. Each F.D.D member works with whomever they want. Members of a feature team are responsible for the classes they reside in based on their needs. Feature-driven development includes a Chief Programmer role. This role is generally assigned to team members with superior technical knowledge. By using such individuals in this position, F.D.D can enhance the skills of others on the team by leveraging their expertise and reputation. In addition to serving as a technical resource for team members, a Chief Programmer’s responsibilities extend beyond technical matters to coach and mentor team members. The Chief Programmer will likely have a hand in solving a complicated problem and bring their expertise to bear. The Chief Programmer will do difficult work well and provide insight into practical approaches to a problem that may be beyond the scope of an individual. Chief Programmers empower their teams to manage themselves and produce excellent results by contributing directly to continuous improvement.
Empowering the team (self-determination and motivation) addresses two Agile Principles tools. As per lean development (L.D.), the people who do the work should decide how it should be done. Based on this philosophy, software project teams should be able to determine their methods and processes and whether they meet the needs of their projects. Teams that self-organise are similar to those that follow LD practices.
Scrum. Scrum teams follow the Agile principles, referring to how individuals and teams work together. Sprint (development cycle) planning is a crucial responsibility of Scrum development team members. For a Sprint plan to be acceptable, the team must be committed to achieving the Sprint goals as part of the planning process. Scrum teams have the authority to take any action necessary to accomplish the sprint’s objectives within each sprint. Additionally, they can end the sprint if they cannot achieve the agreed-upon goals. Hence, Scrum teams are self-managing and self-motivated (this is expected).
Agile methods are similar in addressing motivated individuals and self-organising teams. Even if there are some differences in approach (e.g., ASD considers the team as a separate entity as opposed to DSDM, which considers the team as a separate entity), these methods share remarkably similar philosophies regardless of degrees (e.g., XP feels classes a collective entity whereas FDD views them as an individual entity). Trust the technical team. Agile methods will impact many organisations when managing their project teams. Leadership based on respect and collaboration is the key to any Agile method’s success, according to the “Leadership and Collaboration” Model of ASD.
Incorporate the team into all discussions regarding the project. Do not restrict their access to customers. In the event of a technical issue, ask for their input. Please take into consideration their concerns about schedules. They will learn during the project (just as everyone else does). Please make sure they are open to participating in all plans. Negotiate with them to come up with an acceptable method. Do not limit their authority. Please give them the support and tools they need. Whenever possible, you should trust their professional judgment. It is primarily up to the development team to organise and manage itself.
Scrum Teams are staffed with motivated people. A question may be on your mind, “Where will I find motivated employees?” and “What should I do with my unmotivated employees?” You indeed have staff members who are not superstars. Generally, they are average. Using Agile methods does not mean you need a lot of highly motivated and technically savvy employees. What is critical is that by adopting an Agile Method and a management style called “leadership collaboration,” most of your current employees can become superstars. According to behavioural psychology, people are often expected to live up to (or down to) their expectations. You can apply this to your technical staff just as much as to anyone else. A person whose expertise and knowledge are valued will use those attributes to contribute to a discussion, strive to improve them, and ensure they are better prepared for future challenges. You will sometimes be surprised by everyone.
The same thing applies to career non-performers, as well as superstars. Nonetheless, these people will stand out in ways they are unaware of when they are part of a self-organising team of motivated individuals. They will likely find a role in which they will not stand out or find a position to be productive team members. Regardless of what you do, your team will be more effective.
Please consider a method coach in a scrum or XP projects. Scrum and XP recommend that the project have a person who coaches the team in applying the method. The recommendation suits any group being asked to change how they work. Coaching can help people identify old habits and replace them with new ones, which may be difficult. A coach adds value even after your team adopts the “innovative” method. Regardless of the job, your technical staff are constantly immersed in it. They often put less emphasis on the technique and how well they implement it (if they even do). Coaches keep things moving efficiently by constantly being concerned about how well the method works on the project. Coaches will be ready to help team members resolve the problem (because it impedes their work) and develop ways to improve their performance. Coaches ensure you adopt a method enabling the team to self-motivate and manage themselves.
Nearly all organisations do not practice “Pair Programming,” according to XP. It states that all technical work is performed in pairs by individuals who work together. Occasionally, these pairs will form trading partners; consequently, the step of the design process, from test case development to coding to testing, is performed in pairs. Each pair member watches, assesses, and asks questions while the other “drives” the computer. Roles are switched regularly between the two. It may seem wasteful to waste your most valuable resource (the engineers’ time), but XP’s proponents argue that the opposite is true. According to them, working together can be 50% more productive than working separately. There are several reasons for this. Observation partners can identify and correct defects in real time instead of waiting until later when diagnosis and correction can be more time-consuming. A person in the observer role tends to think about the big picture and increases the probability of detecting architecture, design, or testing problems early, allowing them to be corrected before much time and effort is spent on rework. In addition to sharpening each other’s skills, constant interaction enhances their abilities and makes them more capable of taking on more responsibilities. The loss of one person cannot cripple the project since two people become intimately familiar with the system’s components.
Those who are fresh out of school can easily contribute to the project. Programmers who benefit from pair programming should find it exceptionally motivating. While we are unaware of large-scale studies examining the claims of productivity improvement, many companies that have used Pair Programming swear by its effectiveness.In conclusion:
Agile methods, motivation and self-organisation are fundamental principles. Nothing happens automatically. Agile requires dedicated work, not just from you but from your managers and staff.
