A Framework of Critical Success Factors for Agile Software Development

TL;DR

This paper systematically reviews literature to identify and categorize critical success factors in Agile software development, proposing a theoretical framework to enhance project success understanding.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive framework of 21 CSFs across five themes, derived from analysis of 53 studies, advancing understanding of success factors in Agile projects.

Findings

Team effectiveness and project management are key success factors.

Five themes of CSFs identified: organizational, people, technical, process, project.

Proposed framework guides future validation and research.

Abstract

Despite the popularity of Agile software development, achieving consistent project success remains challenging. This systematic literature review identifies critical success factors (CSFs) in Agile projects by analyzing 53 primary studies. Employing thematic synthesis with content analysis, our analysis yielded 21 CSFs categorized into five themes: organizational, people, technical, process, and project. Team effectiveness and project management emerged as the most frequently cited CSFs, highlighting the importance of people and process factors. These interpreted themes and factors contributed to the development of a theoretical framework to identify how these factors contribute to project success. This study offers valuable insights for researchers and practitioners, guiding future research to validate these findings and test the proposed framework using quantitative methods.