Motivation theory in research on agile project management : A systematic literature review
Tomas Jansson · Diva portal (Dalarna University Library) · 2013
We systematically searched for research literature specifically dealing with motivation in relation to agile methods. We searched for peer-reviewed articles published in databases indexing many of the leading journals in potentially relevant fields (ACM Digital Library, AIS Electronic Library, Business Source Premier, Engineering Village, IEEE Xplore Digital Library, PsycINFO and Scopus). We applied no restricting time limit for the publication; the search was performed in December, 2012; we used search strings combining “agile” with “motivation”. Very little research applying theory on motivation on the agile field was found. The single study found that explicitly aims at exploring motivation in agile projects (a case study of two agile teams: McHugh et al. 2011) used as the framework for interpretation the list of 21 “motivators” and 15 “de-motivators” compiled by Beecham and colleagues’ in a literature study (2008). The conclusion is that theory on motivation is not sufficiently applied in research on agile practices.