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On the ApplicationIFAC
of Agile Project
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55-17 (2022) 109–114 Techniques, V-Model and
On
On the
the Application
Application of
of Agile
Agile Project
Project Management
Management Techniques,
Techniques, V-Model
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On the Recent Software
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David Wilson****
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Technology (ECIT), Queen’s University
d.wilson@qub.ac.uk)
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d.wilson@qub.ac.uk) (ECIT), Queen’s University Belfast,
Belfast,
Abstract: Due to the nature of most postgraduate
Belfast,
Belfast, UK, (e-mail:theses
UK, (e-mail: in control engineering and their similarities to
d.wilson@qub.ac.uk)
d.wilson@qub.ac.uk)
Abstract:
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Keywords:online
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supervision, postgraduate
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systems engineering,Agile blended
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Keywords:
software, Control education, postgraduate thesis supervision, Agile Scrum
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management, Jira
software, online
Keywords: Control
online supervision,
education,
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control engineering,
postgraduate
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supervision,
systems engineering,Agile blended
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project
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engineering, A number
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supervision.
supervision.
INTRODUCTION A number of studies have investigated challenges and
1. INTRODUCTION solutions
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Postgraduate thesis supervision INTRODUCTION is a long-term iterative process solutions
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2405-8963 Copyright © 2022 The Authors. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license.
Peer review under responsibility of International Federation of Automatic Control.
10.1016/j.ifacol.2022.09.233
110 Pouria Sarhadi et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-17 (2022) 109–114
software tools in engineering thesis supervision. Even though
the proposed content aims at the control engineering
education, a similar context can be adopted in other fields of
study.
Further descriptions are provided in upcoming sections.
Section 2 addresses the research motivation and the gaps
between academic curriculum and industry demand in the field
of control engineering. In Section 3, a V-model for control
engineering theses progress management is introduced.
Section 4 outlines the Agile Scrum approach and
subsequently, the proposed Scrum model for thesis
supervision is presented in Section 5. The blended process to
utilise Agile Scrum, V-model and software tools in
postgraduate theses is explained in Section 6. Finally, Section
7 concludes the paper.
2. MOTIVATION
Marketplace expectations from a control specialist deviates
greatly from working only with poles and zeros or nonlinear
models, i.e., pure control theory (Hearns, 2020). Control
engineering is a multidisciplinary field that demands hands-on
knowledge and experience in a diverse range of topics such as
modelling, simulation, implementation, test, integration,
software engineering, other engineering subjects, and a
profound understanding of the system. Hence, in practice, a
control specialist with systems engineering experience is
desirable, and relevant learning materials should be envisaged
in control education. Systems engineering is a broader
integrative view which facilitates project realisation from
concepts and requirements definition to implementation, test,
verification & validation (V&V), i.e., whole life cycle of a
system. Systems engineering is widely influenced by control
engineers and related concepts such as closed-loop feedback,
optimisation, system view, etc. (Kossiakoff, et al., 2011,
Buede and Miller, 2016). Therefore, more effort in improving
students’ knowledge in systems engineering results in better
future opportunities for them.
Figure 1 illustrates a range of disciplines that make up systems
engineering knowledge, modified from (Kossiakof, 2011).
The topics above the top-dashed line (green) are typically
covered in the academic curriculum, whereas industries
demand additional skillset and expertise depicted between the
two dashed lines. Hence, there are skill gaps between a
graduated engineer and the market demand (highlighted in
Figure 1). Even though some of this knowledge can be gained
in the industry, filling the gap in academic education by
embedding systems engineering topics in curriculum and
pedagogy design, can empower the students to meet job
requirements leading in more job opportunities for them.
On the other hand, exploiting well-established systems
engineering approaches could assist the realisation of a thesis
by increasing the quality and decreasing the time. Therefore,
the application of formal systems engineering approaches is
recommended to:
1- Improve the student’s practical knowledge and cover the
mentioned gap during their study to be industry-ready.
2- Assist them in delivering high-quality thesis projects in a
timely manner.
The present study sets out to pave the way for the above-
mentioned goals.
Figure 1. Different expertise related to systems engineering;
academic curriculum covers above the top (green) line, industry
needs over the bottom (black) line and the skills gap.
3. V-MODEL APPLICATION IN CONTROL
ENGINEERING THESIS
The V-model has gained substantial interest in diverse
engineering topics, more specifically in the software and
systems engineering (Weilkiens, et al., 2015, Sarhadi and
Yousefpour, 2015). This model is rather a conceptual diagram
to illustrate the system development process. Although there
are critiques to this model, it is still widely accepted in the
systems engineering community (INCOSE, 2015). The V-
model’s emerging history goes back to the 1960s (Weilkiens,
et al., 2015), with similar roots in pedagogy dating back to the
1980s (Gowin and Alvarez, 2005). However, its major
popularity has been since 1990 in the software engineering
discipline to incorporate the verification and validation
processes (Weilkiens, et al., 2015, INCOSE, 2015).
The V-model derives from the core Systems Engineering
philosophy of “Define the requirement, then prove your
solution meets that requirement”. The different levels of the
V reflect the recognition that big problems will require
complex solutions: systems made up of a series of sub-
systems, each one of which may contain multiple hardware
and/or software components. The V-model emphasises that
the requirements at each level must ultimately be derived from
the top-level stakeholder requirements, and each sub-system
or component is to be verified against these requirements prior
to integration into the whole. Note that different system
architectures may lead to different sub-systems and/or
components; hence diverse requirements at the lower levels of
the V could still meet the same top-level need. Owing to the
affinity between control, software, and systems engineering,
and the need for effective progress control approaches in thesis
supervision, a V-model is proposed. This customised model
for control engineering theses is shown in Figure 2.
In Figure 2, the top left-side is dedicated to the conceptual
philosophy behind the thesis. Problem(s) to be solved, targets,
requirements, and the roadmap of the thesis as well as the
milestones should be defined in the first steps. As with any
conventional V-model, the top-level determines the main
concepts based on the stakeholders’ needs. The stakeholders
for a thesis are mainly the funding body of the project, the
research community, and the academic institution (supervisors
and panel). On the other hand, students are inverse
stakeholders for the supervisor and the university. Lower
 Pouria Sarhadi et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-17 (2022) 109–114 111
levels of the V-model embrace the controller design and
implementation procedure. This bottom level mainly includes
the MSDIT procedure standing for the first words of the
following: 1) Modelling; 2) Simulation; 3) Design; 4)
Implementation; 5) Testing, where (1-3) are concepts from
classic control theory. However, the implementation and test
topics should be emphasised and regularly updated based on
the industry demand. On the right-hand side and the top of the
V-model in Figure 2, employing the high-fidelity simulators
and laboratory tests such as Model/Software/Hardware in the
Loop (MIL/SIL/HIL) simulations are recommended. Practical
implementation is a desire rather than a goal. In the last stages
on the right-hand side, the community feedback over the
publications, satisfaction of the requirements and the goals of
the thesis, and the knowledge attained by students should be
considered. Verification and Validation (V&V) can be
performed by matching the left and the right-hand sides of the
V-model. Responsibility for V&V is by the supervisor(s),
student(s) and other stakeholders. From Figure 2, feedback and
review is evident for each block, so the process is iterative, and
each block may be amended based on project progress. Thus,
the proposed scheme is rather an iterative V-model compared
to the classical versions (Kossiakof, 2011).
4. AGILE SCRUM DEVELOPMENT: AN OVERVIEW
Agile Scrum (Takeuchi and Nonaka 1986) arose from analysis
of the reasons for failure in major software development
programmes and evidence that these were often driven by a
failure to fully capture or understand the fundamental
requirements. This in turn often led to an early commitment to
an inappropriate system architecture or design, with erroneous
or incomplete requirements flow-down to sub-systems and
components. In Systems Engineering terms, Agile Scrum is a
rejection of the idea that the V-model is a “one way” or a “one
shot” process. Agile Scrum instead proposes an iterative
development cycle, with the product built up incrementally
Figure 2. V-model for control engineering thesis progress management
across a series of “Sprints”. The process can be summarised as
follows:
• Capture the key customer requirements, ideally as a set of
“User Stories” or “Use Cases”, plus any known design
constraints. These form the Product (or Project) Backlog.
• Select a sub-set of (high priority) stories to be developed
first; these will form the Sprint Backlog. At a Sprint
Planning Meeting, the development team plans how to
deliver these requirements, with the resulting tasks
recorded and added to the Sprint Backlog. The team
commits to deliver in a short timescale (typically 1-4
weeks).
• During the sprint, the team meets on a regular basis (the
Daily Stand-up or Scrum Meeting) to ensure that they are
meeting their commitments and to resolve any issues that
may arise.
• At the end of the Sprint, two events are held:
o Sprint Review: the team demonstrates the delivered
product element for acceptance by the product owner.
Any refinements to the team’s understanding of the
requirements are captured in the Product Backlog.
o Sprint Retrospective: the team reflect on the approach
taken to development and propose actions to improve
their effectiveness in the future.
• The Sprint cycle is repeated until all accepted requirements
in the Product Backlog have been delivered.
The Agile Scrum approach recognises that the team has
imperfect knowledge and experience in the early stages of the
project and hence emphasises continuous improvement
through two feedback mechanisms: requirements are refined
at the Sprint Review and captured in the Product Backlog; and
the team itself is encouraged to identify better ways of working
through time explicitly set aside for the retrospective. Changes
to the system design and/or architecture as the project
112 Pouria Sarhadi et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-17 (2022) 109–114
progresses are perfectly acceptable (and even expected) if
justified by either customer feedback or team experience.
Although the V-model is sometimes (erroneously) seen as
being in opposition to Agile Scrum, it should be apparent from
the above that they are complementary methodologies. Each
User Story delivered in Agile Scrum implies a full run through
the V-model, from requirement definition through to user
acceptance, with multiple iterations of the Design-Implement-
Verify loop potentially occurring throughout the Sprint (see
figure see Figure 3).
5. AGILE SCRUM PROJECT MANAGEMENT IN
CONTROL ENGINEERING THESIS SUPERVISION
Based on the previous section’s preface, an Agile Scrum
framework for thesis supervision is proposed. There are
differences to the basic Agile Scrum and the concept of the
team is replaced with supervisor(s) student(s) group (Alblas,
2018). The proposed framework is depicted in Figure 3.
In the thesis definition, a big picture schedule of the project is
extracted. The process is to break down the project into smaller
short-term tasks (or “tickets”) to be conducted in two-week
periods, called “Sprints” (Linden, 2018). Regular Sprint
meetings are arranged biweekly for half to one hour for each
specific student. In the Sprint period, informal email or chat
contacts are carried out (e.g., sharing new references in the
field, providing feedback, etc). The principle is to define
tickets (i.e., the issues to be fixed or tasks to be done in Scrum
terminology, Igaki, et. al, 2014) to be investigated in each
Sprint. To facilitate the process, at the end of each Sprint and
one day before the meeting, students need to prepare a short
(one page) report addressing the following questions:
- What has been done since the last meeting?
- What was the key outcome/finding(s)?
- How many hours did you spend in this period?
- What will we do in the next Sprint?
- What are the problems? and what kind of help/support can
the supervisor(s) provide?
A technical report regarding the study or simulation may be
appended to the progress report. By studying the report(s),
supervisor(s) assess the progression of the students and
prepare for the meeting. This report provides a self-assessment
and feedback framework for student-supervisor. Thus, both of
the parties attend to the meeting with a precise background to
effectively use the meeting time. During the Sprint meeting,
issues are discussed whilst supervisors help in different areas
Figure 3. Agile Scrum framework for thesis supervision with supervisor(s)-student(s) affairs
such as: expressing their thoughts, providing further
references, support in coding, writing the papers, etc. Based on
Figure 3, the process is divided in six main steps (S1-S6) as
follows:
S1) Define the task(s):
In this step, the task(s) to be accomplished based on the
breakdown of the project roadmap in the next Sprint period are
defined. Those tasks can be reviewed during each Sprint.
S2) Create a backlog list:
Once any task or issue is recognised, it should be recorded in
a backlog list with adequate descriptions. So, those tasks can
be completed in a particular Sprint.
S3) Sprint planning:
Planning for the next Sprint is conducted in the Sprint
meetings. Some tasks from the backlog can be nominated to
be accomplished in the Sprint period. In this paper, formal
biweekly meetings are recommended which could initially be
set weekly adapting with students’ progress.
S4) Sprint review:
Generally, both S3 and S4 are performed during a Sprint
meeting. In each meeting, first, the task(s) considered for the
previous Sprint are reviewed. The existing problems are
identified and discussed. Then, a plan for the next Sprint and
the tasks to be performed are drawn out (Sprint retrospective).
Those tasks are named “tickets”. The backlog can also be
updated based on current findings. By implementing this
procedure, at the end of each Sprint increments (steps towards
the goals) could be achieved until the end of the thesis.
S5) Informal catchups:
Instead of daily stand-up meetings in conventional Scrum
(asking for daily progression), informal catchups during the
Sprint are recommended. The authors believe asking for daily
feedback could be considered extreme for university research
and might be non-pragmatic because of lecturing schedule.
However, informal supervisor-student contacts should be held
by email, chat, or calls to observe the progression and provide
feedback. In addition, the short report mentioned in S5 covers
the topics discussed in the conventional Scrum stand-ups.
S6) Repeat: The described procedure should be constantly and
regularly repeated until the end of the research.
Due to the nature of Scrum, the proposed method could be
easily exploited for large number of students to address the
“mixed model” supervision proposed in McCallin and Nayar
(2012).
 Pouria Sarhadi et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-17 (2022) 109–114 113
Figure 4. The proposed blended approach to be utilised in thesis supervision
Interestingly, the proposed approach can be interpreted with
the general concepts of control systems. For example, regular
meetings can be considered as the constant sampling (digital
control) of the project. The feedback and feedforward,
concepts are realised by the discussions in the Scrum meetings.
Backlogs play the role of integrators. Setpoints and outputs are
respectively defined on the top (left- and right-hand) blocks of
the V-model.
6. THE PROPOSED BLENDED APPROACH
Application of Agile approaches in education and pedagogy is
proposed in some studies (Igaki, et. al, 2014, Tengberg, 2015,
Linden, 2018, Brodtkorb, 2019, Komar, et. al, 2021).
However, this paper presents a process to integrate systems
engineering aspects, i.e., V-model (Section 3), Agile Scrum
process management (Section 4) and state-of-the-art software
tools for supervision facilitation. The proposed blended
approach is a circular framework illustrated in Figure 4.
Based on Figure 4, the procedure starts from the thesis
roadmap and breakdown on the top level. Agile Scrum is
utilised to proceed with the research. Jira software from
Atlassian, Jira (2022), is proposed to implement the Agile
Scrum introduced in Section 5. Although the main intention of
Jira is project management, it provides compelling features for
educational purposes (Scott and Campo, 2021). This application
realises an online Scrum framework that contains roadmaps,
calendar, backlogs, tickets, Sprint meetings arrangement, i.e.,
whatever is required in an Agile Scrum implementation. Jira
allows defining multiple projects-teams, and it is free to use
for small groups (<10 members). Furthermore, Jira provides
graphical boards reflecting the tasks for a particular Sprint, and
their status in different: “To Do”, “In Progress”, “For Review”,
and “Done” columns to easily monitor the progression. A
typical Jira board with the aforementioned columns is shown
in Figure 5. Overall, employing this powerful tool could be a
big step forward to realise Agile Scrum in thesis supervision.
Besides, informal catchups and contacts can be held by MS
Teams calls and chat (Microsoft Teams, 2022) as well as emails
that are compatible with online education requirements in
CoVid19 pandemic restrictions.
Control engineering is tightly interconnected with
programming and simulations tools where MATLAB and
Python are the commonly used coding frameworks.
Nevertheless, in this paper, exploiting version control
techniques such as Git are recommended instead of other code
sharing methods. As an instance, GitHub (2022) provides an
online environment for collaborative development and version
control. Further to this, Git is fast becoming one of the
essential skills to secure a job, so learning this tool could make
students more competitive on the job market (Hsing and
Gennarelli, 2019). For sharing data and reports, Microsoft
tools such as OneDrive or SharePoint can be used because of
their accessibility in most universities. Otherwise, similar
applications such as Slack, Confluence, GitLab, Bitbucket, etc.
could be replaced to close the cycle proposed in Figure 4. In
addition, there are options to integrate Jira with other tools
such as GitHub, MS-Teams, etc. Finally, the V-model
introduced in Section 3 is proposed to be used to close the
cycle by defining the requirements and establishing the V&V
process (Figure 4).
Therefore, application of this blended approach could be a key
step towards productive thesis supervision and enhancing the
students’ skills in the “university to market” gap area.
Figure 5. A typical Jira board with tasks’ status.
114 Pouria Sarhadi et al. / IFAC PapersOnLine 55-17 (2022) 109–114
7. CONCLUSIONS
The paper presents a blended approach and relevant tools to
support the supervision of postgraduate student theses. Firstly,
some of the current skill gaps between university education
and job market demand for graduate control engineers are
discussed. To fill this gap, and facilitate the student’s research,
a chain of systems engineering techniques and recent software
solutions are proposed. A customised V-Model for thesis
accomplishment is presented which considers the whole life
cycle and relevant stakeholders. An Agile Scrum process to
define and follow up sub-tasks supporting regular Sprint
meetings with feedback and self-assessment reports is
recommended. Finally, a blended approach to implement the
aforementioned concepts with available software applications
is addressed. The proposed framework is designed to be
compatible with online education requirements during the
CoVid19 pandemic restrictions. Furthermore, with some
modifications, the general idea of the Agile approach could
also be applied to purely theoretical projects. Students'
progress has been enhanced through the application of the
proposed approach; Nevertheless, the proposal is still in its
infancy and requires further investigation.
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