Main Themes:

• Agile development as a sociotechnical system: The article explores the application of sociotechnical systems theory to agile development, demonstrating how agile teams operate through the interaction of social (actors and structures) and technical (technology and tasks) subsystems.
• Conjunctural causation and equifinality in agile development: The research highlights the complex interplay of agile components, arguing that specific configurations are necessary for successful outcomes while acknowledging multiple paths can lead to the same result.
• Asymmetry in agile development: The study investigates the asymmetrical relationship between agile components and work outcomes, recognizing that the absence of a particular component does not necessarily preclude success.

Key Ideas and Facts:

• Agile development, increasingly adopted for new product development and digital servitisation, faces inconsistent performance outcomes. This study investigates the underlying mechanisms influencing these variations.
• Sociotechnical systems theory, emphasizing the balance between social and technical subsystems, provides a framework for understanding the complex interactions within agile development.
• The study uses fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) to examine data from 202 agile team members. This method enables the identification of complex, equifinal, and asymmetrical relationships within the data.
• The analysis reveals two configurations leading to successful work outcomes:
• Configuration 1: High task autonomy, high team diversity, and high incremental iterative development.
• Configuration 2: High task autonomy, high communication, and high incremental iterative development.
• Notably, successful outcomes are achievable even with the absence of one agile component, highlighting the compensatory nature of these configurations.
• Conversely, unsuccessful work outcomes are associated with the lack of either a social or technical subsystem component.

Important Quotes:

• "Agile teams may function as a sociotechnical system and these sociotechnical mechanisms may cause the performance variation."
• "The presence of both agile technical and agile social subsystems was required for successful work outcomes, indicating that agile does operate as a balanced sociotechnical system."
• "Individual agile components were also found to interact with and compensate for the absence of other agile components, confirming that the theory of constrained sociotechnical systems applies to agile development."
• "Multiple arrangements of social and technical subsystems' constituent agile components may provide the functional equivalence for similarly successful work outcomes."

Implications for Practice:

• Understanding the sociotechnical nature of agile development allows managers to better implement and manage agile teams.
• Recognizing the compensatory nature of agile components enables organizations to tailor their agile implementations based on specific contextual factors.
• Emphasizing both social and technical aspects is crucial for successful agile development, fostering collaboration, communication, and effective use of technology.

Source: Malik, M., & Orr, S. (2022). A configurational examination of agile development as a sociotechnical system. Industrial Marketing Management, 104, 325–339.