Exploring the difference between Agile and Lean

110 Pages·2013·1.58 MB·English

Exploring the difference between Agile and Lean:
A stakeholder perspective

Mohammad Shahidul Islam
Sentayehu Tura
Uppsala University
Department of Informatics and Media

Exploring the difference between Agile and Lean:
A stakeholder perspective

Mohammad Shahidul Islam
Sentayehu Tura

Supervised by:
Pär Ågerfalk

Thesis for the Degree of Master of Science in Information Systems
Department of Informatics and Media,
Uppsala University,
UPPSALA, Sweden
02 May, 2013
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Abstract
In this thesis, we have identified the difference between Agile and Lean
methods based on stakeholder’s perspectives. To achieve the goal we have
deal with only Agile and Lean principles. In addition, in order to identify the
stakeholders from Agile and Lean principles we have used the relevant prac-
tices from both sides. As the principles of Agile manifesto are directly fol-
lowed by most of the organizations, we have also used Agile principles di-
rectly in this research. On the other hand lean methods have no pure princi-
ples, as a result we have used the most common and popular lean principles
derived from different authors. We have only considered the most relevant
principles that might be useful in software development. To achieve a
stronger result of this thesis we have also considered stakeholder theory.
Moreover we have identified the stakeholder’s involvement with Agile/Lean
principles and stakeholder theory.

Key words: Agile methods, Lean thinking, Lean software development,
Stakeholders, Stakeholder theory.
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Acknowledgement
This thesis came to completion after a long journey of encouraging and con-
structive feedback given to us by our adviser, Professor Pär J. Ågerfalk,
whom we would like to express our heartfelt gratitude. We also would like
to thank senior lecturer Jonas Sjöström for encouraging us to work on this
topic in the first place. And last, but not least, to family and friends, thank
you all for your patience and wonderful support.

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Contents
Abstract ........................................................................................................... 3
Acknowledgement .......................................................................................... 4
Contents .......................................................................................................... 5
List of tables: ......................................................................................... 7
1. Introduction ........................................................................................... 9
1.1 Motivation ....................................................................................... 10
1.2 Research questions .......................................................................... 11
1.3 Thesis limitation .............................................................................. 11
1.4 Structure .......................................................................................... 12
2. Research Method & Analytical Framework ........................................ 13
3. Stakeholder Theory .............................................................................. 17
3.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 17
3.2 Stakeholder Theory Models ............................................................ 18
3.3 Different Models for Identifying Stakeholders ............................... 21
4. Agile methods ...................................................................................... 24
4.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 24
4.2 Agile principles ............................................................................... 25
4.3 Practices and Tools ......................................................................... 30
4.3.1 Scrum ........................................................................................ 30
4.3.2 Extreme Programming ................................................................ 33
4.4 Summary and Definition ................................................................. 38
5. Lean methods ....................................................................................... 40
5.1 Introduction ..................................................................................... 40
5.2 Lean principles ................................................................................ 42
5.3 Practices and Tools ......................................................................... 50
5.3.1 Just-in-time ............................................................................ 50
5.3.2 Kaizen .................................................................................... 50
5.3.3 Queuing Theory ..................................................................... 51
5.3.4 Leadership .............................................................................. 51
5.3.5 Cost of delay .......................................................................... 52
5.3.6 Value stream mapping ........................................................... 52
5.4 Summary and Definition ................................................................. 53
6. Derived Agile and Lean principles ...................................................... 55
6.1 Agile principles based on stakeholder perspective ......................... 55
6.1.1 Working software frequently ................................................. 55
6.1.2 Embrace change ..................................................................... 56
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6.1.3 Simplicity ............................................................................... 58
6.1.4 Customer satisfaction ............................................................. 59
6.1.5 Stakeholder involvement ....................................................... 60
6.1.6 Motivated and self-organizing teams ..................................... 61
6.1.7 Sustainable development ....................................................... 63
6.1.8 Technical excellence .............................................................. 64
6.1.9 Face-to-face communication .................................................. 65
6.1.10 Product improvement ........................................................ 66
6.2 Lean principles based on stakeholder perspective .......................... 67
6.2.1 Define customer value by eliminating waste ......................... 67
6.2.2 Decide as late as possible....................................................... 69
6.2.3 Move towards flow and deliver values fast ........................... 71
6.2.4 Continuous improvement ....................................................... 72
6.2.5 Create learning environment .................................................. 73
6.2.6 People focus ........................................................................... 75
6.2.7 Customer focus ...................................................................... 76
6.2.8 Product excellence ................................................................. 77
6.3 Summary ......................................................................................... 81
7. Analysis ............................................................................................... 82
7.1 Comparison work ............................................................................ 82
7.1.1 Agile principles Vs Lean principles ....................................... 82
7.1.2 Stakeholder theory Vs Agile and Lean stakeholders ............. 89
7.2 Differentiating stakeholders based on Mitchell’s model ................. 94
7.3 Summary ......................................................................................... 98
8. Findings and Conclusion ..................................................................... 99
8.1 Future work ................................................................................... 101
9. References ......................................................................................... 102
Appendix: Glossary of Terms ..................................................................... 108

List of figures:

Figure 1: Jarvinen’s taxonomy of research methods (Research Questions
Guiding Selection of an Appropriate Research Method) ..................... 14
Figure 2: Four tier model for identifying relationship between stakeholders
and principles. ...................................................................................... 16
Figure 3: Traditional stakeholder theory ....................................................... 19
Figure 4: Basic two-tier stakeholder map (source: Freeman et al. 2008:51) 20
Figure 5: Basic two- stakeholder map (source: Freeman et al. 2008:62) ...... 21
Figure 6: Stakeholder typology (Mitchell, Agle and Wood, 1997:874) ....... 22
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Figure 7: The Scrum process ....................................................................... 31
Figure 8: Partitioning of Agile project stakeholders by (Koch, 2005) .......... 61
Figure 9: Possible nearest Agile versus Lean principles ............................... 83
Figure 10: Stakeholder theory relationship with derived Agile principles ... 91
Figure 11: Stakeholder theory relationship with derived Lean principles ... 93

List of tables:
Table 1: Lean principles mentioned by different authors ............................. 48
Table 2: Derived lean principles based on different authors......................... 80
Table 3: Identifying stakeholders based on Mitchell’s model ...................... 96

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Abbreviations

ASD Agile Software Development
BFS Breadth-First Search
DFS Depth-First Search
DSDM Dynamic Systems Development Methodology
FDD Feature Driven Development
GSD Global Software Development
JIT Just In Time
LSD Lean Software Development
TPS Toyota Production System
XP Extreme Programming

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1. Introduction
Today’s fast growing technology, diverse business challenges and demand-
ing customer requirements force organizations to seek and discover strate-
gies or methods that can handle such problems. Lean and Agile methods are
amongst the different methods that are capable of solving these kinds of
problems. At the beginning Lean is about manufacturing and production but
its high level goals and principles can also be applied to software develop-
ment. Whereas Agile methods did not appear out of thin air but were based
on different practices from earlier times. It is well known by its values of
customer collaboration, iterative development, self-organizing teams, and
adaptability to change (Rico, 2010).

The aim of agile software development is to overcome the limitations of
plan-driven software development like welcoming change of requirements at
any time. It focuses on close cooperation between customers and developers,
delivering software within time and budgets constraints. Agile development
process is repetitive, adaptive and minimally defined as it relays on frequent
informal face-to-face communication. There are different types of Agile
methodologies where extreme programming (XP) and Scrum are widely
used (Jalali and Wohlin, 2010). The advantage of using agile methodology
is to get benefits like flexible project management, minimize product cost,
increase communication and finally that can lead to customer’s satisfaction.
On the other hand, lean is not too far away from software development. Dif-
ferent authors advocate that the idea behind lean manufacturing might be
useful for software development (Poppendieck, 2003; Middleton, 2001;
Middleton, Flaxel &Cookson, 2005; Poppendieck & Cusumano, 2012). “In
2008/09, BBC Worldwide generated profits of £103 million on revenues of
£1.004 billion” (Middleton and Joyce, 2012 cited in BBC Worldwide web-
site, 2010, p. 21) using lean thinking in software development.

However, recently different authors suggested combining agile and lean
together for better software development, although authors argue on the dif-
ference between agile and lean. Difference between agile and lean could be
considered from two views. One view is that both have their own different
levels, like lean could be considered as a set of principles where as agile is
more practical. Another view of difference is from their scope and focus,
where Agile methods concern on specific product development only. On the
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other hand lean concerns on everywhere like business context where devel-
oping product is a small part of it (Wang, 2011). Naylor, Naim and Ber-
ry(1999) defined “agility means using market knowledge and a virtual cor-
poration to exploit profitable opportunities in a volatile market place where
leanness means developing a value stream to eliminate all waste, including
time and to ensure a level schedule”.

Stakeholder theory comes from the area of strategic management where
Freeman and Reed (1983) defined stakeholder is “any particular group or
individual who can affect the achievement of organization’s objective or is
affected by the achievement of organization’s objective”. The concept of
stakeholder theory in software development is always ignored although it is
well recognized in the field of IS. The principles and concept of stakeholder
theory may apply in software development that can help managers to under-
stand roles and responsibilities from different stakeholder’s point of view
that may also influence product development efforts. The most two common
scenarios always observed at the end of the software development are that
either customers reject the product as it does not meet their requirement or
the cost and schedule of the project become too large. To avoid such situa-
tions McManus (2004) suggested collecting three types of information about
stakeholders: information about each stakeholder separately with their roles
and profile, information about how to interact with them and finally about
their interaction with other stakeholders.

In this research we will illustrate the difference between agile and lean based
on stakeholder’s perspective. To achieve this goal we use the principles from
both agile and lean. We also identified relevant stakeholders for each ag-
ile/lean principle through practices which will help managers to choose
proper practice for specific principle concerning relevant stakeholders. And
finally we will use Mitchell’s model to differentiate several stakeholders for
each principles.
1.1 Motivation

There are two motivations for this thesis work. First motivation is why man-
agers should combine agile/lean methods and the second motivation is why
managers need to consider stakeholder theory.

Polk (2011) who was the team manager of NG (Networking Gaming) system
team development of WMS Gaming Inc tried to get the benefits using agile
software development. He tried to run his project based on agile principles.
He divided eighteen members in three teams and later on worked with a
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