Improving the Management of Cost and Scope in Software Projects Using Agile Practices
In:
Submitted By Words 3283 Pages 14
International Journal of Computer Science & Information Technology (IJCSIT) Vol 5, No 1, February 2013
IMPROVING THE MANAGEMENT OF COST AND
SCOPE IN SOFTWARE PROJECTS USING AGILE PRACTICES
Mariana de Azevedo Santos1, Paulo Henrique de Souza Bermejo2, Marcelo Silva de Oliveira3, Adriano Olímpio Tonelli2, Enio Júnior Seidel4
1 2 3
Mitah Technologies, Lavras, Minas Gerais, Brazil mariana@bsi.ufla.br Department of Computer Science – Universidade Federal de Lavras (UFLA) bermejo@dcc.ufla.br, tonelli@dcc.ufla.br marcelo.oliveira@dex.ufla.br
4
Department of Mathematical Sciences – Universidade Federal de Lavras (UFLA) Universidade Federal do Pampa (UNIPAMPA) ejrseidel@hotmail.com ABSTRACT
While organizations want to develop software products with reduced cost and flexible scope, stories about the applicability of agile practices to improve project development and performance in the software industry are scarce and focused on specific methodologies such as Scrum and XP. Given these facts, this paper aims to investigate, through practitioners' perceptions of value, which agile practices are being used to improve two performance criteria for software projects—cost and scope. Using a multivariate statistical technique known as Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA), the results suggest that the use of agile practices can be represented in factors which describe different applications in software development process to improve cost and scope. Also, we conclude that some agile practices should be used together in order to get better efficiency on cost and scope in four development aspects: improving (a) team abilities, (b) management of requirements, (c) quality of the code developed, and (d) delivery of software on-budget and on-time.
