Agile Finland r.y. is on a mission to grow the agile ecosystem in Finland. We aim to provide a great collaborative community, where people can create great content and share their learnings. We believe that agile is not a method, but a way of thinking about software development that can lead us to a bright and happy future. This new way of thinking is open to learning more about the ways we organise ourselves and do things in organisations small and large.

Agile Finland r.y. would like to acknowledge master’s theses of special merit related to the field of agile development, by awarding the prize of 1 000 € each to the three best theses published in 2022.

We hope that these awards will encourage master’s students towards choosing agile topics in their theses, and thus bring the agile field forward on both the scientific and the practical side. We also hope that this will be the start of a great annual tradition.

Award Categories

The awards will be given in three categories. Nominated theses compete in all three categories simultaneously, but each thesis can only receive one award.

Category 1: the Academic Award

The Academic Award will be given to a thesis with a high degree of novelty, potentially high levels of industry and academic impact, and performed using high academic standards, based on votes from all supervisors who have nominated a thesis. (Supervisors can’t vote for their own nominee.)

Category 2: the Industry Award

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The Industry Award will be given to the thesis with the highest practical or business impact, as chosen by an expert reviewer. For the 2022 award, the expert reviewer and sole judge will be Maarit Laanti, PhD.

Category 3: the Public Favourite Award

The Public Favourite Award will be given to the thesis that receives the largest number of votes from the members of Agile Finland r.y.

Eligibility

to be eligible for the 2022 awards, the following criteria must be fulfilled:

1. The thesis supports the mission of Agile Finland r.y., by being related to agile theory or a field of application. This includes but is not limited to agile processes and roles, leadership and organisation, strategy, infrastructure, culture and identity, organisational development, etc.
2. The thesis is published and publicly available.
3. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠The thesis has been accepted by a Finnish university in the calendar year of 2021.
4. The nomination is submitted to Agile Finland r.y. before May 6, 2022 by a thesis supervisor at a Finnish university.
   
   

Instructions

To apply, the nominating supervisor and the thesis author should send a free-form e-mail with the relevant attachments and links to thesisaward@agile.fi. We accept one nomination per supervisor per year, and the nomination can be submitted any time before the deadline.

The following information should be included:

1. The thesis, complete with cover page and abstract (either in PDF format, or as a link to an online thesis archive where it can be freely downloaded)
2. Contact information for both the nominating supervisor and the author
3. The thesis evaluation and any other qualitative statements about the thesis created as part of the university’s evaluation process
4. A short written statement (max. ½ page) motivating how this thesis interconnects with agile thinking and why you believe this thesis stands out among the rest
5. ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠A free-form layman’s summary of the thesis (max. ½ page), to be used when the thesis is presented for the Public Favourite Award
   
   

Please ensure that you receive an acknowledgement in reply.

Prize

The winner of each category will receive 1 000 € and a diploma in a formal ceremony at the next Scan Agile conference, the largest annual agile conference in the Nordics. (For taxation purposes, the prize will be considered as a stipend for studies or scientific research.)

The winners will also have an opportunity to make a presentation of the thesis in that conference.

May the best theses win!