Targeted Scrum: Applying Mission Command to Agile Software Development

Software engineering and mission command are two separate but similar fields, as both are instances of complex problem solving in environments with ever changing requirements. Our research hypothesis is that modifications to agile software development based on inspirations from mission command can improve the software engineering process in terms of planning, prioritizing, and communication of software requirements and progress, as well as improving the overall software product. Targeted Scrum is a modification of Traditional Scrum based on three inspirations from Mission Command: End State, Line of Effort, and Targeting. These inspirations have led to the introduction of the Product Design Meeting and modifications of some current Scrum meetings and artifacts. We tested our research hypothesis using a semester-long undergraduate level software engineering class. Students developed two software projects, one using Traditional Scrum and the other using Targeted Scrum. We then assessed how well both methodologies assisted the software development teams in planning and developing the software architecture, prioritizing requirements, and communicating progress. We also evaluated the software product produced by both methodologies. We found that Targeted Scrum did better in assisting the software development teams in the planning and prioritization of the requirements. However, Targeted Scrum had a negligible effect on improving the software development teams external and internal communications. Finally, Targeted Scrum did not have an impact on the product quality by the top performing and worst performing teams. Targeted Scrum did assist the product quality of the teams in the middle of the performance spectrum.