Hi All,

I’m hoping that someone out there can assist me with some research I’m doing for a Master’s thesis in Project Management at RMIT. I’m following a line of enquiry which suggests there are organisations that, while having adopted agile development methods, do in fact use some aspects of plan-driven methods in managing their software development projects. This conjecture was first made by Barry Boehm from UCLA in 2002, and since explored in more detail in “Balancing Agility and Discipline” which he co-wrote with Richard Turner in 2004.

My thesis’ current, somewhat clunky, working title is “Agile and Plan-driven Software Development Methodologies Co-existence: a Case Study”. What I’m hoping to find are examples of where agile and some aspects of plan-driven methods do co-exist. To that end I need to interview people across different levels - from developer to management - and functions within an organisation, gathering their views and experience on this matter.

Ideally, the organisation will belong to a somewhat larger enterprise, with the development group large enough to be running a number of projects simultaneously. My supervisor suggests that I need to conduct at least a dozen interviews in order to obtain a good result. It would be great to conduct all these in one organisation, but realistically I think I’ll be taking smaller samples from a number of organisations.

While I’d be ecstatic to discover an organisation that does indeed use a combination both agile and plan-driven methods, I’m happy to conduct interviews with an organisation that just uses agile. For my purposes a null result is still a valid result.

In order to reduce your inconvenience I’d be coming to your work place in order to conduct the interviews. These could then be held on or off site. The information gathered will be confidential; anonymity is guaranteed.

What’s in it for you and your organisation? You’d be contributing to the agile – plan driven debate, and assisting with academic research. I’d be more than happy to distribute my findings once they’re published. I don’t have a budget for this, but if coffee is needed as a bribe then so be it.

If your organisation, or one you know of, would be interested in contributing to this academic research then I’d love to hear from you. Similarly, if you have any questions, then feel free to contact me. My mobile number is 0422 643 236.

Regards,

John Paterson

Hi John,

I am not sure I fully understand your cast study but would be more than happy to be interviewed by yourself. Agile projects are driven from a release plan.

You can contact me on 0437 676959

Regards,
Martin Kearns.