Challenges and success factors for large-scale agile transformations: A systematic literature review

TLDR

Agile methods, originally designed for small teams, have become attractive for companies seeking performance gains, yet scaling them introduces challenges in synchronizing teams and interfacing with other organizational units. This review systematically examines how agile and lean software development are adopted at scale, concentrating on reported challenges and success factors. The authors performed a systematic literature review of industrial large‑scale agile transformations, searching 1,875 papers and selecting 52 publications that describe 42 industrial cases. The review uncovered 35 challenges across nine categories and 29 success factors across eleven categories, with the most salient factors being management support, model selection and customization, training and coaching, and mindset and alignment, while 90 % of the included papers were experience reports.

Abstract

Agile methods have become an appealing alternative for companies striving to improve their performance, but the methods were originally designed for small and individual teams. This creates unique challenges when introducing agile at scale, when development teams must synchronize their activities, and there might be a need to interface with other organizational units. In this paper we present a systematic literature review on how agile methods and lean software development has been adopted at scale, focusing on reported challenges and success factors in the transformation. We conducted a systematic literature review of industrial large-scale agile transformations. Our keyword search found 1875 papers. We included 52 publications describing 42 industrial cases presenting the process of taking large-scale agile development into use. Almost 90% of the included papers were experience reports, indicating a lack of sound academic research on the topic. We identified 35 reported challenges grouped into nine categories, and 29 success factors, grouped into eleven categories. The most salient success factor categories were management support, choosing and customizing the agile model, training and coaching, and mindset and alignment.