Agile practices
in production
development
PAPER WITHIN: Production development AUTHOR: Filip Davidsson & Samuel Anderzon JÖNKÖPING: June 2021
Investigation of how agile practices may be applied
in a production development context and what the
expected effects are.
This exam work has been carried out at the School of Engineering in Jönköping in the subject area Production system with a specialization in production development and management. The work is a part of the Master of Science program. The authors take full responsibility for opinions, conclusions and findings presented. Examiner: Carin Rösiö
Supervisor: Julia Trolle
Scope: 30 credits (second cycle) Date: 2021-06-02
III
Abstract
Globalization has continuously brought an increased competition among companies, which entails a need for faster and more frequent deliveries of new products. Traditional project management methods, such as stage-gate and waterfall, are commonly used in production development projects and builds on a sequential approach. These methods have proven to have some disadvantages in flexibility, long lead times and it often creates communication barriers between the actors at each stage. The software industry has already encountered these obstacles and responded by introducing agile project management. Which improves the adaptability and allow changes to be made, due to new requirements from stakeholders or customers, throughout the entire development process. However, it remains unknown how agile models can improve production development. The purpose of this study was therefore to investigate how agile models can be applied to production development and what the effects are.
The authors have performed a case study at eight different companies within the automotive industry. The purpose of it has been to gain a deeper understanding about the case companies current production development processes and review how familiar the organizations are with the concept of agile project management. The extraction of the empirical data was conducted by questionnaires, interviews, and document reviews. An analyzation was done by comparing the empirical findings with the theoretical background out of eleven different categories that relates to project management (e.g., project goals, process, customer integration etc.). The analyzation concluded that the case company exclusively conducts their production development project by using a sequential approach.
The analyzation and the eleven categories where, together with the theoretical background about agile project management, later used to create the result by brainstorming different practices to become more agile. The results are presented out of three different scenarios, depending how agile the companies would like to be. For instance, are two process models suggested, one that is completely agile and one that is a hybrid of an agile and a stage-gate. Furthermore, are the implementation of self-organized teams, holistic approach towards internal and external partners, and reduced demand for documentation some of the practices that are suggested. Additionally, are three considerable aspects for the implementation presented.
The expected outcome and effects of applying these practices are discussed in the final chapter. Some of these outcomes are a company culture that will attract and retain talented personnel, where shared responsibilities and authorities triggers the employees to an increased commitment and sense of ownership towards their projects. Furthermore, are the companies expected to experience a more flexible and responsive approach towards conducting production development projects with a high focus on customer requirements and creating customer value.
Keywords: Production development, Agile project management, Agile model, Sequential model, Self-organizing teams.
Acknowledgement
IV
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to start this report by recognizing and show our appreciation towards the people that have supported us and made this study possible. First, we would like to thank our supervisor, Julia Trolle, at the University of Jönköping for invaluable support and guidance throughout the study. Secondly, we would like to send our deepest thanks to our company supervisor, Fredrik Johansson, at IDC West Sweden AB for fruitful discussions and for the help of identifying and initiating contact with the case companies. Thirdly, we would like to send our gratitude towards the company representatives and interviewees for sharing their extensive knowledge and experience with us. Last but not least, we would also like to thank our examiner, Carin Rösiö, at the University of Jönköping for initiating this study and setting up the contact with IDC.
_______________________ _______________________
V
Table of contents
1
Introduction ... 1
BACKGROUND ... 1
PROBLEM FORMULATION ... 2
PURPOSE AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS ... 2
DELIMITATIONS ... 3
OUTLINE ... 3
2
Theoretical background ... 4
PRODUCTION DEVELOPMENT ... 4
2.1.1 Sequential project models ... 5
INTEGRATED PRODUCT- AND PRODUCTION DEVELOPMENT ... 7
2.2.1 Integration with external parties ... 7
2.2.2 Communication within dispersed teams ... 8
SUCCESS FACTORS IN PROJECTS ... 10
AGILE PROJECT MANAGEMENT ... 10
2.4.1 The agile manifesto ... 11
2.4.2 Sequential models vs Agile methods ... 13
2.4.3 Implementing an agile project management ... 14
SCRUM ... 15
2.5.1 The Scrum team ... 16
2.5.2 Planning and visualizing the progress of the project ... 17
3
Method and implementation ... 18
RESEARCH DESIGN ... 18
LITERATURE STUDY ... 19
CASE STUDY ... 20
3.3.1 Case selection ... 20
QUESTIONNAIRE ... 21
SEMI-STRUCTURED INTERVIEWS ... 21
Table of contents
VI
ETHICS ... 23
RELIABILITY ... 24
VALIDITY ... 24
AUTHORS APPROACH FOR THIS STUDY ... 24
4
Findings... 27
INTRODUCTION ... 27
DECISION MAKING AND PROJECT ORGANIZATION ... 27
4.2.1 Involving external parties ... 28
PRODUCTION DEVELOPMENT PROCESS ... 29
4.3.1 Opinions about the process ... 30
PROJECT MANAGEMENT ... 32
OPINIONS ABOUT AGILE PROJECT MANAGEMENT ... 34
5
Analysis ... 36
RQ1: WHAT ARE THE CURRENT PRACTICES OF USING AGILE MODELS IN PRODUCTION DEVELOPMENT? ... 36
5.1.1 Goals ... 36
5.1.2 Process ... 36
5.1.3 Time schedule ... 37
5.1.4 Responsibility and authority ... 37
5.1.5 Customer integration ... 38 5.1.6 Power distribution ... 39 5.1.7 Information ... 39 5.1.8 Documentation ... 40 5.1.9 View on change ... 40 5.1.10 Process measurement ... 41 5.1.11 Knowledge development ... 41 5.1.12 Summary of RQ1 ... 42
6
Results ... 43
RQ2: WHAT PRACTICES CAN BE IMPLEMENTED IN THE PRODUCTION DEVELOPMENT PROCESS TO INCREASE THE LEVEL OF AGILITY? ... 43
6.1.1 Scenario 1: Sequential model with agile practices ... 44
6.1.2 Scenario 2: Hybrid model of an Agile and Sequential Approach ... 46
VII
6.1.4 Implementation of proposed Scenarios ... 52
SUMMARY OF THE RESULT... 53
6.2.1 Process maps for the three different scenarios. ... 54
7
Discussion and conclusion ... 55
DISCUSSION OF METHODS ... 55
DISCUSSION OF RESULTS ... 58
7.2.1 Discussion of Scenario 1 with ingoing practices ... 59
7.2.2 Discussion of Scenario 2 and 3 with ingoing practices ... 64
7.2.3 Discussion of the implementation ... 69
7.2.4 Summary of the expected effects of applying the practices, which answers RQ3 ... 72
CONCLUSION ... 74
FUTURE RESEARCH AND RECOMMENDATIONS ... 74
8
References ... 76
Introduction
1
1
Introduction
The introduction covers a brief background of how globalization and the increasing competition has forced companies to act faster and more frequent to changes in their production systems. The chapter then introduce agile project management, which has supported other industries (e.g., software industry and product development) in similar context. Hence, derives the problem formulation, stated purpose and research questions for this report. Finally, is the delimitation and an outline of the report presented.
Background
Globalization has continuously brought an increasing competition among companies and enhanced the need to for instance reduce lead times and increase the level of customization in order to stay competitive (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010; Koren, 2010). It has triggered an increasing demand for new product development due to shorter product life cycle time, technological improvements, and environmental requirements. With frequent product changes, time has been a crucial factor in order to quickly adapt to new market needs. (Chen et al., 2010)
The new market needs forces the manufacturing companies to have flexible production systems that are able to change according to new products and also adapt as new production equipment is launched (Bennett & Forrester, 1993; Koren, 2010). Bellgran and Säfsten (2010) has identified several factors that affects the production system solution, those are categorized into: actual options (e.g., available technology and work environment), external influencers (e.g., trends and globalization) and strategies and fundamental attitudes (e.g., management strategies and company culture). Hence, there are several factors that can trigger changes both in the existing production system as well as during its development phase. This dynamic environment has created a need for more flexible models in the management of production development projects, in order to keep up with the frequent changes. (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010; Koren, 2010) Traditional sequential methods, such as waterfall and stage-gate, are commonly used in production development projects which are gradual step-by-step processes that does not allow changes from previous steps. For example, the requirement specification should not be alternated during the design phase. (Wuest et al., 2014)
The software industry has experienced the same “stiffness” in the traditional stage gate model and acted on the lack of flexibility by during the 1990s introduce a new type of project management model called Agile project management (Conforto & Amaral, 2016). Agile models improve the adaptability to changes in for instance technologies or requirements throughout the entire development process. Instead of having a gradual step-by-step process where the requirements are settled early in the process, emphasizes an agile model on several shorter cycles where the project may adapt to emerging changes or new knowledge as the project progresses. (Manole & Avramescu, 2017) The purpose of using agile models varies among for instance achieving shorter development times, increased product quality and to better fulfill customer requirements (Albers et al., 2020).
2
Furthermore, the flexibility that agile models provide has also been recognized by companies that focus on (physical) product development. These companies strive for implementing these principles to better cooperate with the dynamic environment and constant changes that were mentioned previously. (Albers et al., 2020) Production development and product development are in several ways similar and dependent on each other (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010). One unexplored hypothesis is therefore that agile project management also could be applicable for production development and expect similar outcome.
Problem formulation
Agile models have had its major breakthroughs in the software industry and are rising in product development. However, agile models have not had the same attention within production development, which also needs to be flexible and are exposed to the similar dynamics as product development. Instead, are the traditional sequential methods often used when developing new production systems (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010; Koren, 2010). This has proven to have some disadvantages as it for instance often is time consuming and creates communication barriers between the actors at each stage (Duhovnik et al., 2009). This lack of communication often results in such as late engineering change orders that triggers the project to exceed budgets and deadlines (Wlazlak, 2019).
It remains unknown how agile models can improve production development. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate how agile models can be applied to production development and what the expected results are.
Purpose and research questions
The purpose of this study is to investigate how agile models can be applied to production development and what the expected effects are.
The purpose of this study has been decomposed into three research questions.
RQ1: What are the current practices* of using agile models in production development? RQ2: What practices can be implemented in the production development process to increase the level of agility?
RQ3: What would be the expected effects of applying these practices?
*Practices - refers to both hard (e.g., working procedures) and soft (e.g., cultural) aspects of project management.
Introduction
3
Delimitations
This study has been delimited to ensure a reasonable scope of the study that is manageable during the available timeframe. The collection of empirical data has been delimited towards the automotive industry as this is the area of which the case companies act. Furthermore, the study will only focus on the managerial aspect in the production development process. Also, the study will not examine which kind of supporting tools (such as project management software, design of the project boards etc.) the companies are using. The study will not include any calculations or estimated numbers e.g., costs for implementing the practices or lead times for conducting projects. Hence, the expected effects that will be outlined for RQ3 will not be presented in any numerical way but merely focusing on a soft evaluation of the effects of for instance managing and participating in the projects.Lastly, due to the pandemic of Covid-19 has no company visits, interviews or document review been performed physically but instead managed through digital tools such as Microsoft teams.
The study will only consider the production development process, see grey marked phases of Figure 1, and not regard the product development or the aftercoming sales activities within the product life cycle. However, some of the integration between the production development process and precedent and subsequent phases will be included. The study will cover the entire production development process, from initial investigations and planning of a production system to start of production.
Figure 1: Process chart of a products lifecycle where the production development domains have been highlighted (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010).
Outline
This first chapter has introduced the reader to the subject and identified a specific problem area that the purpose of this report addresses. The second chapter proposes a theoretical background that is necessary to form a fundamental knowledge and understanding for the topic. Later, in the third chapter, is the method outlined where the authors present their approach towards this study. Following the method are the findings presented in chapter 4. Chapter 2 and 4 forms the basis for chapter 5, which presents the analysis where the authors answers to RQ1. The analyzation has been used for brainstorming different practices to become more agile, which forms chapter 6 and the result of this study. Chapter 6 is also where the authors will answer RQ2. Additional discussion and conclusions around the result and method is presented in chapter 7, where RQ3 is answered. Lastly, is a list of reference presented together with appropriate appendices.
4
2
Theoretical background
This chapter presents the theoretical background that are used in the report. It begins by explaining traditional production development and how it has been driven through a sequential project management approach. Thereafter is the concept of having an integrated product development explained, where the concept of production development has been integrated into the product development process. Finally, is the theory behind agile project management presented and more practically explained by using the one of the agile frameworks, Scrum.
Production development
Production development is mainly known for being development of production processes equipment in for instance a factory. Production development is a concept that is less common than product development and its often merely regarded as something that is included within the scope of the product development. (Vielhaber & Stoffels, 2014) The lack of focus causes innovation to be directed towards product development, despite that improved production processes often lead to improved quality, reduced manufacturing costs and more stable processes (Trolle et al., 2020). However, the rapid and unpredictable changes needs to be considered in the next generation of manufaturing systems (Mehrabi et al., 2000). The changes may be derived from for instance new or updated products, fluctuated demands and governmental or social requirements. Hence, companies and researchers have developed a concept called “Reconfigurable manufacturing systems”. It is combined with dedicated manufacturing lines together with flexible manufacturing systems to easier adapt the production systems while still being able to maintain a high output. (Koren & Shpitalni, 2010) Projects within production development are often carried out in a sequential manner, and even though the terminology between the different models are not always the same, the different literatures propose similar approaches (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010; Bennett & Forrester, 1993; Dandy et al., 2017). Bellgran and Säfsten (2010) propose a framework for production system development. It consists of phases within planning, design and evaluate and implementation. Planning focuses on management and control which brings up questions in structural design activities and in project management such as resources, priorities, and work teams. Design and evaluate consists of preparatory design and design specifications with the aim of creating requirement specifications for the production system. Implementation consists of a system solution that is a description of the production system. In this phase there is a realization of the production system from previous activities and start-up is carried out in parallel. The initial phases are characterized with higher level of uncertainty and complexity, while the design of the production system is not yet decided. The level of uncertainty and complexity gradually decreases as the project decides upon the design and features of the production system. (Bellgran & Säfsten, 2010)
In today’s environment have a sequential manner proven to not satisfy the ever-increasing customer demands due to that development times are considered as too long. Furthermore, parameters such as quality, cost, and delivery times are more demanding than before. It is therefore increasingly important to be more dynamic to keep up with the customer demands. (Yazdani & Holmes, 1999)
Theoretical background
5 2.1.1 Sequential project models
The main idea of having a sequential project model is to have a structured way of working. A project is decomposed into a simple step-by-step plan that simplifies project management as each step includes some specific deliverables and deadlines that are easy to keep track and follow up on. Sequential approaches entails a high level of documentation which can be used in similar projects further on. (Patil, 2019) Sequential models are easy to implement since it is a linear model and little resources are needed for explaining and implementing the model (Balaji & Sundararajan Murugaiyan, 2012). However, a major drawback is that if one phase is delayed, the following phases are also going to be affected and without intervention, the deadline of the project might be postponed. A sequential approach are therefore not as applicable for bigger and more complex projects where the requirements are not as well-defined. (Patil, 2019). Furthermore, the idea of having a structured approach fails if the project moves on despite if not all issues within each phase are properly dealt with. Also, having a pre-defined plan for the entire project makes the project “stiff” and the customer may not alter or adjust the requirements after the project entered the design phase. (Balaji & Sundararajan Murugaiyan, 2012) Van Berkel et al. (2016) claims that the frequency of activities and decision-making increases as deadlines approaches in a sequential project model. This complicates the coordination within the project as well as with the external organization, which also can be affected by the temporarily increased need of resources (van Berkel et al., 2016). Two common sequential project models are the stage-gate model and the waterfall model. They are quite similar but will be explained in separately.
6
Stage-gate is commonly used for developing new products within the industry. Figure 2 shows a general example of a five-steps stage gate process where each step is followed by a gate where the project decides whether the deliverable of the previous step is fulfilled or not. If fulfilled, the project may continue to the next step. If not fulfilled, the project shall await final adjustments until entering the next phase. (Cooper, 2001)
• Discovery, this is an initial stage, before a project has been assigned, where the pre-work is brought forward to explore and brain-storm ideas.
• Stage 1, Scoping, includes a brief research, investigation, and scope of what the project will contain.
• Stage 2, Build the Business Case, is a much more detailed analysis about market and technical including, project and product definition, project plan and project justification.
• Stage 3, Development, is where a detailed design and accurate production processes are formulated.
• Stage 4, Testing and Validation is where the requirement fulfillments are verified.
• Stage 5, Launch, is the final stage where the commercialization begins of full production, marketing and selling of the product. (Cooper, 2001)
Figure 2: General stage-gate process (Cooper, 2001)
Waterfall is another model that follows a sequential structure, see Figure 3. It does not include specific gates, as in the stage-gate model, but each step still needs to be fulfilled before entering the next phase. This entails no overlapping between the phases. Each phase is constrained by a specific time schedule and needs to be completed within the assigned interval. The documentation and validating occurs at the end of each phase which strengthen and maintains the quality throughout the project. Each step is frozen before moving on to the next step when working with waterfall. (Balaji & Sundararajan Murugaiyan, 2012)
Theoretical background
7
There are some major drawbacks with sequential activities. Firstly, the barriers that often occurs between departments and lack of common language complicates the communication that increases the risk for misunderstanding or loss of information. (Duhovnik et al., 2009) Communication is one of the most crucial success factors and if it contains barriers, it should be identified as soon as in the project design or implementation phase or it may be catastrophic (Antony & Gupta, 2019; Pinto & Mantel, 1990). Secondly, an increased workload and time pressure are often occurred at the end of the project due to that the initial phases are not as strict with their deadlines and deliverables (Patil, 2019).
Integrated product- and production development
Every industrialization process require some communication and collaboration between responsible for the product design and responsible for the production system (Wlazlak, 2019). However, many companies lacks in integration between departments for product development and production development, despite that they often are heavily dependent on each other (Trolle et al., 2020). Furthermore, companies are still conducting their new product development projects in a sequential manner, despite that it has proven to be one of the most common reasons for a reduced project performance or even failure. One way of counteracting this would be to integrate other functions, e.g. production, into the product development process and have a more holistic approach. (Sommer et al., 2014; Takeuchi & Nonaka, 1986). Having an integrated approach enables the project activities to overlap and therefore reduce the time to market (Duhovnik et al., 2009). In contrast to traditional product development, integrated product development puts more emphasis on other aspects such as communication, project management, organizational structure, and human resources. Integrated product development is due to the integration and holistic perspective more suited for projects with higher degree of uncertainties than traditional product development. (Sommer et al., 2014)
Involving production in the product development process might inhibit disturbances in the production ramp-up, which reduces the time to market as well as the cost for industrialization. Furthermore, such initiative often improves the manufacturability of the product which improves product quality as well as productivity. (Almgren, 2000; Rauniar et al., 2008) The earlier in the process of developing a new product, the higher degree of freedom in the product design, which simplifies design changes (Ulrich & Eppinger, 2016). However, the integration can be rather challenging due to differences within the organizational domains and individual backgrounds. These differences have the potential to disrupt the industrialization process through late engineering changes, complex product designs or unclear requirements. (Wlazlak, 2019)
2.2.1 Integration with external parties
Including external parties like the suppliers while developing new products or processes has been more and more recognized as a necessity to reach a competitive supply chain (Stjernström & Bengtsson, 2004). Some benefits of it are reduced time to market and increased quality and available knowledge and capabilities (Stjernström & Bengtsson, 2004) which increases the innovation potential (Le Dain et al., 2020). Furthermore, such collaboration may simplify managing risks that are related to that specific supplier (Le Dain et al., 2020).
8
Despite obvious advantages in integrating suppliers to the product development, it comes with questions that needs to be considered, such questions concern for instance; the level of design responsibility, timing of integration, cross-organizational communication, and strategical alignment with respect of that particular product. (Handfield et al., 1999)
A case study by Terwiesch et al. (2001) showed that 20 of 55 issues during one production ramp-up in the disk drive industry where related to suppliers inability to deliver enough material that met the requirements. Another study showed that the most frequent cause of disturbances during a pilot study and the production ramp-up of the Volvo S80 where related to late engineering changes and the suppliers inability to update their fixtures and process methods accordingly (Almgren, 2000). One countermeasure for those late engineering change order is to increase collaboration between OEM and supplier by for instance having regular face to face meetings (Wlazlak et al., 2019).
2.2.2 Communication within dispersed teams
Working in dispersed teams at different locations and countries creates organizational-, geographical-organizational-, linguistical-organizational-, and cultural barriers that needs to be taken in for consideration (Wlazlak, 2019). Therefore is assigning adequate communication channels already from the beginning identified by Pinto and Slevin (1987) as a crucial factor for successful project implementation. This entail having proper communication both internally (within the project team) and externally (with surrounding organization and other stakeholders).
The loss in communication in dispersed teams are often underestimated and managers often thinks that this might be compensated due to the technological advancements within the field of communication. Effective teams are dependent on effective communication, which in turn relies heavily on trust. Trust is particularly important for the collaboration within computer-mediated teams (Eisenberg & DiTomaso, 2019). Smith and Blanck (2002) therefore, encourages project teams to at least have a start-up-meeting face to face, and if that is not possible, at least use high quality videoconferencing equipment. A start-up meeting is perhaps the most powerful tool for building trust among the team members, and it can be difficult to build later in the project. Trust is built on interpersonal relationship and requires that people create their own perceptions about each other. Team member tends to fill the information gap with assumptions if they do not know each other. (Hamburger, 1992; Smith & Blanck, 2002) Social interaction must therefore be regarded as a necessity rather than a distraction. Another, riskier, approach would be to hope for that a “swift trust” is built up among the team members that relies more on second-handed data through for example the reputation of the co-members. This kind of trust however are developed spontaneously and might not even appear. (Smith & Blanck, 2002)
Once trust is built, the project management must maintain it because maintaining trust is easier than to rebuild. The more dispersed a team are, the more difficult it become to build and maintain trust as the team must overcome for instance geographical-, linguistic-, organizational- or political barriers. One way of encountering these obstacles would be to strengthen the bonds between each individual and combine work with personal information or matters. (Smith & Blanck, 2002; Sole & Edmondson,
Theoretical background
9
2002) Eisenberg and DiTomaso (2019) concludes that having the sense of psychological safety within the team nurtures a positive interaction among the members.
Selecting the way of communicating within the team are crucial and no technique fits all purposes, but the team needs to choose according to each specific task. (Eisenberg & DiTomaso, 2019; Smith & Blanck, 2002) Furthermore, varying between different techniques are important as simply communicating through e.g., Email or teleconferencing might become stale. Regardless of which technique that is used, the outcome of a meeting depends heavily on that it fulfills the basics by for instance: (1) having a clear predefined purpose of the meeting, (2) the participants have been notified properly with clear expectations of the meeting, and (3) the agenda for the meeting is based on the expected outcome. (Smith & Blanck, 2002)
Wheelan (2009) view on group development is that it characterizes on dependency and inclusion and that the development requires time. If a group overcome conflicts, then trust and commitment is made in the group which increase cooperation. This builds trust and structure with negotiations in roles, procedures, and the organization. With sufficient group development there may lead to benefits in increased productivity and effectiveness. (Tonnquist, 2018; Wheelan, 2009)
A study made by Allen et al. (2008) indicates that engineers require reasons for communicating technical matters with each other. Simply putting them closer together will increase the probability for communication, but it is still not likely if the engineers does not have any organizational or operational reasons for doing so. The data of Allen et al. (2008) showed that having offices at different building only made a small improvement from sitting at different sites, the highest probability of technical communication where shown whenever the engineers shared the same building and floor. However, the probability of communication where still quite low if the engineers lacked in organizational relationship and therethrough reasons for communicating, see Table 1.
Table 1: Probability of communication between engineers located at the same floor and building at one (organization H) of two organizations that where under study. (Allen et al., 2008)
Organisational relationship
Probability of communication Different departments and projects 0.16 Shared department but different projects 0.69 Shared project but different departments 0.71 Shared department and project. 0.95
10
Success factors in projects
Managers and people of R&D projects are facing increasing challenges in today’s project management. For instance, new innovations in technologies create uncertainties and forces the development to be more dynamic if these innovations are to be implemented. (Pinto & Slevin, 1987) There are several factors that support project success. Belassi and Tukel (1996) groups these factors in four categories; project, project manager and team members, organization, and external environment.
There are some characteristics that should be considered for a project. The size and value of the project, unique project activities, density of the project, project life cycle and urgency of the project’s outcome. (Belassi & Tukel, 1996)
The project manager influences all other categories and should have relevant competence and skills within social interaction, technology, and administration (Pinto & Slevin, 1987). As a project manager is it important to be an effective planner and scheduler to follow time schedule and avoid exceeding budgets. The project manager needs also to be coordinated and communicative towards internal and external stakeholders. Furthermore, a project manager should also select an effective controlling and monitoring process with support of suitable technologies that fits the organization. (Belassi & Tukel, 1996; Pinto & Slevin, 1987)
In the organization is it crucial to have top management support for the project that covers all concerned parties (Pinto & Slevin, 1987). A person within top management that advocates a project increases the potential for achieving its objectives as it might get proper priority. It can otherwise be difficult to acquire the adequate resources and require some negotiating skills and power within the organization. Clearly, full support from the organization for the project helps to facilitate and implement strategies for the successful completion of projects. (Belassi & Tukel, 1996)
Agile project management
Agile methods were originally developed in the software industry and began to emerge in the 1970’s. The methods were described as an incremental (building finished pieces, step-by-step) and iterative (to improve the previous solution in every step) working procedure. However, it was not until the 1990’s that well-known agile methods like Scrum and Extreme Programming (XP) were introduced and agility gained more recognition. Traditional sequential project methods could not provide enough flexibility, which became increasingly important. Since projects often were quite inflexible it was too hard to predict the right requirements from the start. Furthermore, the agile methods gained inspiration from the lean philosophy with its focus on waste reduction and resource efficiency. (Gustavsson, 2020) There are several approaches towards agile project management, Extreme programing (XP), Dynamic Systems Development (DSDM) and Scrum are the most common methods. XP is a flexible method commonly used in the software industry with little documentation. (Anwer & Aftab, 2017) DSDM is suitable for a timeline scheduling (Ahmed, 2020) whereas Scrum consists of an in-depth framework (Srivastava et al., 2017)
Theoretical background
11
In chapter 2.5 will agile project management be further explained in a more fundamental and practical way by using Scrum as an example. The reason for using Scrum is that it is the agile method that has gained most recognition and been most developed within research and literature.
2.4.1 The agile manifesto
The agile manifesto was written in 2001 and is a document that is designed to support and guide practitioners into working agile. It includes twelve main principles and four core values for the agile philosophy. The core values states that practitioner should prioritize: (Coram & Bohner, 2005; Darrin & Devereux, 2017; Gren & Lenberg, 2019)
Individuals and interactions over Processes and tools
Working solutions over Comprehensive documentation Customer collaboration over Contract negotiation
Responding to feedback over Following a plan
Important to notice is that the manifesto does not exclude or diminishes the
importance of the items to the right, but the items to the left are valued as higher. Focusing on individuals and interactions over processes and tools increases the responsiveness for people to change (Ahmed, 2020). Consider people over process open the possibility for more creative solutions, since even the best processes cannot compensate for the flaws of the individuals (Darrin & Devereux, 2017).
Documentation can be valuable but takes time to produce and maintain (Darrin & Devereux, 2017). Furthermore, documentation is more a formal requirement with little customer value. The reason to focus on working solutions over comprehensive documentation is to increase the organizations' ability to adapt more easily and focus on creating value. (Ahmed, 2020)
Customer collaboration and involvement is vital in all agile methods. Including the customer through early collaboration creates a mutual respect and valuable input for the product design, furthermore, the project may take advantage from the customers development as he or she might change or add new requirements (Coram & Bohner, 2005). Contracts are often quite static and inflexible which might not satisfy customers changing needs (Gren & Lenberg, 2019). Instead of writing contracts, the customer should actively be participating in the development of the product which allows the customer to develop and change their mind (Coram & Bohner, 2005).
Responding to feedback or change is considered more important than following a strict plan since a plan is commonly only valid when it is originally written. If something changes throughout a project, the plan must also. It is not unusual that changes happens faster than the plan can be adjusted. In order to be able to respond to changes, plans needs to be more agile and light weighted. (Coram & Bohner, 2005)
12
Besides the four core values that were presented on previous page, the agile manifesto also consists of twelve principles that guides an agile team in what to prioritize and how to act. The principles are presented in Figure 4, where for instance the fourth principle establishes the importance of communication and work collaboratively within the team. The principles could address both the project itself and the way of the team shall work. For instance, the tenth principle addresses simplicity and that the team shall strive for working in a simple way and in the same manner not overproduce the product.
Theoretical background
13
2.4.2 Sequential models vs Agile methods
There are plenty of differences between the traditional sequential approach and the agile approach, Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla. shows some of the characteristically differences.
Table 2: Characteristically differences between having a sequential approach and an agile approach. (Karrbom Gustavsson & Hallin, 2014)
Categories Sequential approach Agile approach Goals SMART, (specific,
measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound)
Adjusted during the process in collaboration with customers.
Process Sequential Iterative
Time schedule For the entire project, from start to finish
The project is divided into smaller elements
Responsibility and authority
Different roles entail different responsibilities and authorities
Responsibilities and authorities are equally shared among the team members.
Customer integration Only involved at specific decision points
Involved throughout the project and represented in the team.
Power distribution Top-down control Self-organizing teams Information Structured and traceable Oral and personal Documentation Thorough and traceable Reduced or excluded View on change Deviations from plan,
which becomes a problem
Potentially an increased customer satisfaction Process measurement With respect to original
plan
With respect to deliver a functional end product Knowledge development Sequential process of
lessons learned, managed by knowledge
management systems
Iterative learning process, reoccurring reflection, and subsequent adjustment
14
2.4.3 Implementing an agile project management
Digital.ai (2020) have presented the result of a survey with 1 121 randomly selected respondents, out of which 95% of the respondents claims to practice agile development methods within their organizations, from different industries, roles, and places all over the world. Figure 5 indicates that most of the barriers for adopting and practice more agile project management are related to the organizational culture and top-management support.
Figure 5: Barriers for adopting and up-scaling agile project management. (Digital.ai, 2020)
The support from top level management is essential for the success of implementing agile methods and an agile culture (Livermore, 2007; Tolfo et al., 2011). If there is a culture that is hostile towards agile methods, the chances of succeeding is drastically reduced (Tolfo et al., 2011). A transition from traditional project management into agile project management require changes at all levels within the organization. Furthermore, all team members and managers need to engage themselves, cooperate and be willing to learn and strive to overcome all barriers and challenges that the transition entails. Having a continuous learning process should be a natural part within the organizational culture. It is therefore mandatory that top management supports the transition and the long term goal of working agile. (Paterek, 2017) Top management support is important as they have a big influence on the overall corporate vision and organizational culture. Furthermore, an agile project team needs as few hierarchical and organizational boundaries as possible to simplify communication and increase the flow of information and feedback. An agile top management should instead reward self-organizational teams and continuous learning (Babb et al., 2013).
Hayes (2018) proposes a change management process that is divided in several steps. First step is to identify the need for a change and initiating it. The next stage is to consider what needs to be changed and formulate a future state of preference. Afterwards come steps of planning and implementing the change, and finally sustain it. It is important to, throughout the change process, have a continuous learning process and lead the people involved and manage the issues that will arise during the transition. (Hayes, 2018)
Theoretical background
15
Scrum
The Scrum expression originates from a study that was published in 1986 by Takeuchi and Nonaka (Vasconcelos De Carvalho & Mello Pereira, 2011). Takeuchi and Nonaka (1986) found similarities between successful new product development teams and the way rugby teams play during a “Scrum” where the team are clustered together to push the ball forwards. To work as a team is what Takeuchi and Nonaka recognized as one of the main characteristics of the successful projects that were under study (Fowler, 2018). Scrum is an iterative process that collects the requirements in a product backlog, in a specific structure and order of priority decided by the product owner. The team then selects some items in the product backlog, that seems reasonable to manage within the time frame of one iteration (or sprint) and translates through the sprint planning the requirements into activities. After performing the activities and delivered what the sprint have accomplished, the team conducts a sprint retrospective to reflect upon the way of working before moving on with the next iteration, see Fel! Hittar inte referenskälla.6. (Hema et al., 2020) According to Digital.ai (2020) does 58% of the respondents to their survey utilize Scrum and additionally 18% uses some sort of Scrum hybrid in combination with another project management approach.
Figure 6: Illustration of the workflow of Scrum (Hema et al., 2020)
Looking at the definition of Scrum might give a brief understanding about its core characteristics.
“[Scrum is] A framework within which people can address complex adaptive problems, while productively and creatively delivering products of the highest possible value.” (Fowler, 2018)
16
The definition outlines three important aspects of Scrum that deserves to be highlighted. • The definition refers to creating value. Meaning that the framework of Scrum
focuses on maximizing value of the end-product and not necessarily increase productivity, flexibility, or efficiency of the project team.
• Scrum is a framework that includes a mindset and a culture and not just a set of methods or tools.
• Scrum addresses complex and adaptive problems and is therefore not as applicable for simple and non-complex problems. (Fowler, 2018) 2.5.1 The Scrum team
One of the main aspects of succeeding with Scrum is to appropriately organize the people by creating teams. This is also identified by Fowler (2018) as one of the most difficult challenges for the companies who wants to embrace the Scrum framework. A Scrum team is rather different from traditional project teams as it discards a hierarchical structure but emphasize instead on self-organization, cross-functionality and shared responsibility and authority among the members. This does, among other things, entail that a Scrum team does not have a traditional project manager that is responsible for the decision making and held accountable for the project success or failures. These elements lay instead in the team, where all members are regarded as equally responsible. (Fowler, 2018) Tolfo et al. (2011) emphasize that an agile team must value discussion, mutual respect, consensus and participation within the team.
Despite that the Scrum framework strives for sharing the organizational responsibilities equally among the team members, there are however some aspects that cannot be shared but instead addressed to specific roles. A Scrum team therefore includes three main roles that needs to be in place: The Scrum master, the product owner and the team members.
The Scrum Master is responsible for ensuring that the team complies and work in accordance with the rules, practices, and values of Scrum. It is also the Scrum Masters’ responsibility that the team keep deadlines and the time plan. (Azanha et al., 2017) A delivery schedule is used to state necessary deadlines for all concerned parties, both internally and externally. It does not cover all activities in the project but focuses on the essential deliveries, for instance whenever an external part might need a specific input from the project. (Gustavsson, 2020) The Scrum Master is not to be equated with a traditional project manager, but more as a facilitator and agile coach for the team. Despite that this role is essential for the success of the team, does it not entail any particular authority or glorious titles. (Holtzhausen & de Klerk, 2018) Additionally, the Scrum Master is supposed to handle the interaction with the rest of the organization and remove obstacles so that the team may focus on their tasks (Shastri et al., 2021). The product owner is responsible for that the team optimizes the product out of a customer perspective, so that the team prioritizes the features and functions of the product according to the opinion of the customer (Azanha et al., 2017). This role entails acting as a customer representative and convey its requirements and wishes (Shastri et al., 2021). Looking at the first outlined aspect from the definition of Scrum that referred to creating value, this is the focus of the product owner, to create value for the customer and knowing what the customer values (Fowler, 2018). The product owner is the only member that manages the content of the product backlog (Azanha et al., 2017).
Theoretical background
17
The team members usually consist of approximately three to nine people. The team decides jointly about how much to include in each sprint and what actions to take to achieve its objectives. (Azanha et al., 2017) The team needs cross-functional team members so that different capabilities and skill set are covered within the team and some members might be of senior level while others at more junior level. To further emphasize on equity and shared responsibility are all members called developers and does not entail any further subdivision such as programmer or mechanical engineer. (Fowler, 2018)
There is a gap between theory and practice as theory does not express the need of an addressed project manager as the responsibilities may be shared among the team members. Despite this, a study made by Shastri et al. (2021) showed that many practitioners still have an agile project manager. One reason for this is that agile projects are still quite novel and that the practitioners are in the transition between traditional and agile principles. Furthermore, the agile practices and rules are not fully adjusted to the surrounding organizations as someone still needs to be responsible for example the budgeting and tracking the progress of the project. (Shastri et al., 2021)
2.5.2 Planning and visualizing the progress of the project
The product backlog contains an ordered list of all product features that the project needs to consider (Azanha et al., 2017). The product backlog is often produced by all team members, but it is the product owner that is responsible for managing it and thus its content. It may contain requirements at different detail levels, for instance some are more detailed with given numerical values while others are less detailed user stories. It is important that the project team strives to formulize the requirement according to the original customer requirement to avoid misinterpretations. Furthermore, all requirements are given a specific identification number to maintain traceability when planning actions that addresses that particular requirement. (Gustavsson, 2020) The product backlog can grow and adapt as more is learnt about the product and the demands from the customers (Mahmud & Veneziano, 2011). The items of the product backlog are later, as the project progresses, transferred into the sprint backlog where the team together with the product owner prioritizes and decides what requirements and activities to include in the upcoming sprints (Azanha et al., 2017). The period of time for each sprint are predetermined and are usually no longer than two to four weeks (Kayes et al., 2016). This allows the team to plan each sprint in a much more detailed manner and the sprint backlog includes what the team shall deliver by the end of the sprint (Azanha et al., 2017).
The Scrum team are supposed to have frequent or even daily stand-up meetings, Daily Scrum, where the team gathers and debriefs each other with actual status and coordinates activities and issues that the team needs to deal with (Gustavsson, 2020). The daily stand-ups is the agile related techniques that most frequent companies have employed (Digital.ai, 2020). To visualize the progress that the team has made during an ongoing sprint is a burndown chart often used. This is a tool that supports the Scrum team as it relates how much of the ongoing sprint that is done and how much work that remains. By this tool, the team can evaluate how much effort that is required until the end of the sprint and agree whether the team is before or after schedule. (Gustavsson, 2020)
18
3
Method and implementation
This chapter presents the methodology of this study, to give the reader the possibility to follow how the research project has been conducted. Firstly, is the research design presented, which summarizes the methods that have been used and connects the expected outcome to each research question. Later are each method described and motivated, these are literature review and case studies where the data collection has been performed by Questionnaire, Interviews and Document review. The authors also present which actions that has been taken to increase the ethical considerations, reliability, and validity of the study. Finally, is a summary outlined of how the authors has approached this study and what other tools that has been used.
Research design
Three research questions (RQ) have been decomposed from the purpose of this study, see Figure 7, to structure this study. These were answered separately to fulfill the purpose. RQ1 is designed to analyze the current practices among companies and practitioners and to evaluate whether they are conducting any agile practices or not. It is answered by a comparison between the empirical data and the theoretical background, which has been created through a literature study. The literature study focuses on creating a knowledge foundation within production development and project management. Furthermore, the theoretical background has also been used to explore existing literature within agile project management and how it applies to different development contexts. Some parts of the background have deliberately been directed towards the area of product development as it both have gained more recognition within the field of science and because it already has begun to implement agile practices. Product development and production development are heavily interlinked and in several fundamental aspects quite similar, especially integrated product development has been useful due to its similarities with the agile approach. Additional theory within project success factor were added to explore causes of successful project management.
Method and implementation
19
RQ2 is designed to investigate what practices companies may implement in order to become more agile. It has been answered by using the outcome of the analyzation related to RQ1 and then have reasonable practices been suggested by conducting a brainstorming out of the agile related literature in the theoretical background. The suggested practices are presented in the result of this study. Finally have RQ3 been designed to explore the expected results of applying these practices. RQ3 has been answered by combining the outcome of RQ1 and RQ2 in the discussion.
Literature study
The literature search has been conducted by following the framework suggested by Patel and Davidson (2011), which includes preparations, introduction to the subject, appropriate search tools, search literature, select material and evaluate.
While preparing and looking at the research questions and purpose of the study some initial filtering were made and found headings such as production development, agile methods, and Scrum to be a central part to of the subject area. Furthermore, finding factors for successful project management was interesting due to that it can be essential to include in the suggested model as well as compare with agile principles. To obtain an introduction to the subject area, the researchers reviewed appropriate introductive literature that were connected to the headings in the subject area to get a brief understanding and knowledge of the subject. The researchers looked for appropriate search tools through the webpage of the University Library and found Scopus as the most suitable database, to find relevant literature for the study. Scopus was by the University library identified as “popular” and includes peer reviewed research literature within for example the scientific and technical fields. From the headings and the introductive literature, the following subject search strings were formulated and used for the literature search:
• (Agil* OR Scrum) AND (Product OR Production) AND Development
• (Traditional OR Sequential OR Stage-Gate OR Waterfall) AND (Project OR "Project Management")
• Project AND (Success OR Failure*) AND Factor* • “Integrated product development”
The searches were conducted within the title, abstract and keywords of the title. All hits where later filtered by only including for instance; articles which the researchers had full access to, articles within the subject areas of engineering and computer science. Additional filters were added to reduce the number of hits and limited towards the research scope. Next step, select material, were conducted through a three-step filtration process suggested by Booth et al. (2016) . Where the researchers removed articles that were not deemed interesting based on; 1. the title of the article, 2. the abstract of the article, 3. the entire article. The remaining articles formed the foundation of the theoretical background. The final step, evaluate, was conducted in parallel with the previous step as the researchers made some highlighting while briefly reading through the articles. Furthermore, where some snowballing conducted together with a bibliography review to explore more fruitful information. Finally, after evaluated the existing framework where some minor and more specific searches conducted to find complementary information to the theoretical background.
20
Case study
Case studies are suitable when the researcher want to find in-depth information and empirical data about a specific topic (Saunders et al., 2016). It supports the researcher in understanding the natural settings of the phenomena and the researcher may put the data into a context for deeper understanding (McBurney & White, 2007; Ridder et al., 2014). This research method has become increasingly popular within for example the field of management research as it has outlined some innovative and revolutionary insights that has contributed to the expansion of human knowledge (Ridder et al., 2014). To gain a deep understanding about practitioners’ actual production development and review how familiarize the organizations are to agile project management has case studies been performed. The extraction of all necessary empirical data has been done by interviews and document reviews.
3.3.1 Case selection
The case studies have been conducted at several companies to gain empirical data from more than one practitioner so that the study can be more generalizable. The following two criteria where the prerequisites of the company collection:
1. All companies shall have several years of experience of development projects and especially within production systems.
2. One or several of the companies shall besides developing production systems also be the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM).
The idea of the second criteria is that companies that have both the development and production in-house can receive much more extensive feedback about the production system, regardless of whether its positive or negative. Additionally, such company have a better understanding of where different requirement on the production system originates.
All focal companies that have been studied are working within the automotive industry and have many years of experience of developing production systems. The industry itself are facing multiple challenges and are characterized with rapid changes as they act in a globalized environment with many competitors and increased focus from society due to for instance the global environment. In total have eight companies been included in the study, see Table 3.
Table 3: Company collection for the case study
Criteria fulfillment Location in the Supply chain
1 2
Company A x x OEM
Company B x x OEM
Company C x x OEM
Company D x x OEM
Company E x Sub-contractor and Consultant Company F x Sub-contractor
Company G x Sub-contractor Company H x Consultant
Method and implementation
21
Questionnaire
Questionnaire is a data collection method that is used to gather a larger quantity of data in a relatively short amount of time and effort. Questionnaires are standardized, which means that each respondent should answer the same questions under equal conditions. It is important to consider and evaluate the questions and their purpose, this entail for instance considering in which order the questions are asked and how the answer options should be designed (opened- or closed answers). (Lundahl & Skärvad, 1999)
A questionnaire where formulized, see appendix 1, to make some initial data collection from the companies about their processes for production development and existing knowledge about agile project management. All answers were closed and the respondents had between two and three different options (no neutral option). The questions where partly designed so that the answers became minor indicators for whether the companies have a more agile or traditional approach in their project management. The questions covered different aspects of project management, for instance communication, project organization, and power-distances. Finally, the respondents were asked to answer about whether they considered their organization as agile or not. The respondents had the opportunity to in the end of the questionnaire make comments on their answers, however, they were forced to answer all questions with no neutral option as it forced them to make a stand. These data where later used in the interview where follow up questions were asked. Additionally, some cross-questioning was done to examine the consistency of the respondents’ answers and to get a firmer understanding about their perceptions about agile project management.
Semi-structured interviews
Semi-structured interviews are useful when you are doing an exploratory study that needs explanation on in-depth elements. Semi-structured interviews enable the correspondent to build on to the respondents’ answers and to ask follow-up questions. This might lead to a discussion and extraction of findings that otherwise would not have been considered and it also helps to deepen the researchers understanding. It is important to consider some key aspects before the interview take place. Firstly, the researcher need to have some knowledge in the topic before preparing the interview. (Saunders et al., 2016) Secondly, the purpose and expectations of the interview must be clear for the respondent (Patel & Davidson, 2011). Thirdly, it is beneficial for the respondent to be supplied with useful information before the interview so he or she can be prepared and be able to collect supporting documents for the correspondents. The questions that are asked should also have a clear and logical order so the respondent easily can follow. (Patel & Davidson, 2011) Lastly it is important to set-up an interview location that is appropriate for the interview. The location should be convenient, so the respondent feel comfortable to answer questions without being disturbed. (Saunders et al., 2016)
22
In total has 12 semi-structured intervieews been held with representatives from all eight companies, see Table 4. All respondents where notifed by e-mail where the correspondent presented themselves and attached the questions that where going to be asked together with a stated purpose of the interview, see appendix 2. The respondent had to fill in the questionnaire before the interview, so that the correspondent had some initial data about the company and their way of working before entering the interview. All interviews where held through videoconferencing over microsoft teams due to Covid-19, and the correspondent received the consent from all respondents to record each interview. The correspondents took notes throughout the interviews besides recording each interview. For the sake of traceability, when revieweing the recording and making complementary notes, did the correspondent also note for each question when during the recording it was answered.
Table 4: Interviews # C om p an y Location in the Supply
chain Role of the respondent Years* Durat
ion Date A1 A OEM Senior Technology Development Engineer 15 1,0h 2021-03-08 B1 B OEM Manufacturing Technology Manager 15 1,0h 2021-03-16 C1 C OEM Technology Manager 30 1,2h 2021-03-15
D1 D OEM Head of Manufacturing Engineer 26 1,0h 2021-03-09 E1 E Sub-contractor Strategic Sales Advanced Manufacturing 16 1,0h 2021-03-02 F1 F Sub-contractor Head of business development 7 1,2h 2021-03-17 F2 F Sub-contractor
Head of product- and
process engineers 27 1,5h 2021-03-18 G1 G
Sub-contractor Director of technology 10 1,0h 2021-03-16 H1 H Consultant Industrial Developer 35 1,5h 2021-03-09 H2 H Consultant Industrial Developer 35 1,5h 2021-03-05
H3 H Consultant CEO 27 1,5h 2021-03-15
H4 H Consultant
Head of Business
development 35 1,3h 2021-03-08
Method and implementation
23
The questions for the interviews where divided into the following five different sections; a brief motivation about that specific section is given.
1. Introduction to get a brief understanding about the respondents role in the organization and their experience and competences in the subject.
2. Working process to get an understanding about their current methods and processes during project for developing production systems. This section was combined with a document review where the respondent where asked to send applicable templates of their processes.
3. Project organization to understand how their organization share responsibilities and authorities within their projects. This section also concerned how the project involves external parties and how the human resources are shared with the surrounding organization.
4. Project management to understand how the project manager operates in their projects.
5. Agile project management to better understand the responents experiences, knowledge and perception about agile project management.
Document review
Document reviews are often secondary data and is for instance, agendas, minutes of meetings or other internal documents. Documents is valuable source for case studies but should always be used as a source to strengthen other sources credibility to avoid inaccurate data. The risk is that companies might refine or temper with the data, which reduces its trustworthiness. Therefore, it is important that internal documents should be treated carefully and mainly used to support other data collection methods. It can be useful to use another method such as interviews to confirm and ask questions about the secondary data in order to increase its trustworthiness. (Yin, 2007)
The authors collected the process charts from each of the case companies and clustered them in an Excel-file to get an easy overview and by skimming them through multiple times, identifying themes and communalities within the different processes. The authors could thereby identify one general process chart that is presented in the findings (see figure 9, p.29).
Ethics
Ethical aspects have been considered for deciding suitable approaches for the data collection. It is important that researchers follows ethical rules when doing a case study. There are a few requirements that should be fulfilled in research. While working in research projects it is important that the reseacher enlighten the particpants the purpose of the study and that they participation is voluntarely. Furthermore, particpants should also feel safe that their information is confidential and that their personal data is safely stored and that the collected data only should be used for research purposes. (Patel & Davidson, 2011)
To improve the ethical consideration of this study has the participitation from the case companies been voluntarely and all participtants has been kept anonymous in the report and granted confidentiality. The researchers has been clear and transparent about the purpose of this study throughout the data collection. All respondents has had the possibility to decline to answer or return later about specific questions. Also, all
