  One factor of success in software development companies is their ability to
deliver good quality products, fast. For this, they need to improve their
software development practices. We work with a medium-sized company modernizing
its development practices. The company introduced several practices recommended
in agile development. If the benefits of these practices are well documented,
the impact of such changes on the developers is less well known. We follow this
modernization before and during the COVID-19 outbreak. This paper presents an
empirical study of the perceived benefit and drawback of these practices as
well as the impact of COVID-19 on the company's employees. One of the
conclusions, is the additional difficulties created by obsolete technologies to
adapt the technology itself and the development practices it encourages to
modern standards.
