Global Software Development Organizations Research Articles

A Conceptual Framework Based on PLS-SEM Approach for Sustainable Customer Relationship Management in Enterprise Software Development: Insights from Developers

Due to its significant relevance in outsourcing, the global software industry, such as enterprise software development organizations, accepted the implementation of global software development (GSD). Customers play a pivotal role in any industry, and effective customer relationship management (CRM) is instrumental in ensuring client satisfaction while developing software projects. However, software organizations operating globally often need more insight into their customers’ perspectives. These challenges give rise to a major combination for the success of the GSD projects. Organizations working globally face the key challenge of the implementation of CRM. The main objective of this paper is to investigate and understand the challenges faced by global software development organizations when implementing customer relationship management (CRM) in their enterprise software projects. This paper aims to assess how these CRM implementation challenges impact the value of enterprise software products in the context of global software development (GSD). To achieve this objective, the study employs the partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) approach and conducts a systematic literature review (SLR) to identify relevant challenges. Additionally, this paper presents a conceptual framework based on the identified challenges and validates it through surveys and qualitative research with software outsourcing companies in Pakistan. The research provides valuable insights from the perspective of software developers and aims to offer practical guidance for the successful application of CRM in outsourcing.

Requirement elicitation model for global software development vendors

AbstractRequirements elicitation is critical phase of software development that involve direct communication of clients and vendors. In global software development (GSD), importance of requirements elicitation becomes more critical due to geographical distance. The aim of this research is to design and implement requirement elicitation model (REM) where GSD organization can evaluate their organizations and can classify their level of implementation where organization lies. Systematic literature review (SLR) was conducted for the identification of critical success factors (CSFs) from a sample of 70 research articles. Furthermore, the identified CSFs are organized into five levels based on Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) and Software Outsourcing Vendors' Readiness Model (SOVRM). A second SLR was conducted for identifying all possible practices for the implementation of CSFs. To validate the findings of SLR and to find more practices in the view of industrial practitioners for the identified CSFs, a questionnaire survey was conducted in the GSD organizations in which 35 experts, from different countries, contributed. For REM evaluation, we have conducted two case studies. The outcome analysis after conducting case studies confirms that our assessment framework is easier to understand, apply, and successfully critic the strengths and weaknesses of organizations during requirements elicitation in GSD.

Evaluation of requirement engineering best practices for secure software development in GSD: An ISM analysis

AbstractTechnological advancement makes the world a global village. Security is an evergreen and everlasting area, because of the continuous threat from Hackers and Crackers. The immense use of software systems has modernized human society in every aspect. Thus, it is crucial to devise new processes, techniques, and tools to support teams in the development of secure code from the early stages of the software development process, while potentially reducing the costs and shortening the time to market. Considering the significance of software security, it is important to consider the security practices from the early phase of the software development life cycle (SDLC), that is, requirements engineering (RE). Hence, this study aims to identify and categorize RE practices important to apply for secure software development (SSD) in a geographically distributed development environment. To study the RE practices concerning SSD, we conducted a questionnaire survey with industrial experts in the global software development (GSD) context.Furthermore, the interpretive structure modeling (ISM) approach was applied to evaluate the relationship between the RE security practice core categories. This paper identifies 70 practices and classifies them into 11 fundamental dimensions (categories) to assist GSD organizations in specifying the requirements for SSD. The ISM results show that the “Awareness of Secure Requirement Engineering (SRE)” category has the most decisive influence on the other 10 core categories of the identified RE security practices. With the help of empirical evidence and the ISM approach, this work attempts to identify potential security practices and to give a set of secure RE practices that can be used to improve the security of the software development process.

Genetic algorithm based probabilistic model for agile project success in global software development

Software development organizations implement agile methods in global software development (GSD) to leverage benefits in terms of low development cost, continuous project delivery, and high-quality product. Despite the benefits, using the agile process in the GSD organizations is not a straightforward task due to inhibit additional risk factors that could lead agile projects to failure. GSD organizations are continuously improving their process management activities to improve the rate of agile project success. Project success could be improved if the project manager or organization management has preliminary information about the derailment of the project features. This work aims to investigate the most influential agile project features in determining the project outcomes and develop a cost-effective, and effort-based prediction model to improve the probability of successful completion in the globally distributed environment. To do so, a nature-inspired optimization algorithm i.e., genetic algorithm (GA), has been employed to achieve these goals. In the proposed model, GA considers the probability of success with respect to cost to determine probable project outcomes. An efficacy measure is formulated as a fitness function in GA which maximizes the success of agile project outcomes relative to cost. The optimization model has been tested with two different prediction models i.e., Naive Bayes classifier (NBC) and logistic regression (LR). We performed the experiment on data gathered through the survey administered from the globally distributed agile projects. The results demonstrate that prediction models calculate the efficacy for best solutions as 0.531 and 0.5850 for NBC and LR, respectively. Moreover, the ranking of each project feature based on their relative cost identified using NBC and LR have more similarities. The t test results are significant, i.e., t = 6.068, p = 0.001 < 0.005, which indicates that no significant differences have been observed between the ranking assigned by two different methods ( NBC and LR). The results reveal that the developed prediction model based on identified eight agile project features that the GSD organization management and agile team need to focus more on to facilitate cost-effective successful implementation of agile projects.

SRCMIMM: the software requirements change management and implementation maturity model in the domain of global software development industry

The software industry has widely adopted global software development (GSD) to gain economic benefits. Organizations that engage in GSD face various challenges, the majority being associated with requirements change management (RCM). The key motive of this study is to develop a requirement change management and implementation maturity model (SRCMIMM) for the GSD industry that could help the practitioners to assess and manage their RCM activities. A systematic literature review and questionnaire survey approach are used to identify and validate the critical success factors (CSFs), critical challenges (CCHs), and the related best practices of the RCM process. The investigated CSFs and CCHs are classified into five maturity levels based on the concepts of the existing maturity models in other domains, practitioners’ feedback, and academic research. Every maturity level comprises different CSFs and CCHs that can help assess and manage a firm's RCM capability. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed model, four case studies are conducted in different GSD firms. The SRCMIMM has been developed to assist GSD organizations in improving their RCM process in efficiency and effectiveness.

Prioritization of global software requirements' engineering barriers: An analytical hierarchy process

Software industry is adopting global software development (GSD) due to its potential to produce quality products at a lower cost. However, the GSD firms face many challenges that make development activities more complicated, especially related to the requirements engineering (RE) process. The objectives of this article are to investigate and prioritize the barriers faced by the GSD organizations during the RE process. First, we identified 17 barriers related to the RE process in the GSD projects. Next, the identified barriers were further validated with real-world GSD practitioners using a questionnaire survey. Finally, we applied the analytical hierarchy process to prioritize the investigated barriers with respect to their significance for the RE process in the GSD domain. The results show that coordination is the most significant barrier category for the RE process in GSD projects. Lack of standard and procedure for RE in GSD, lack of synchronized communication infrastructure, and lack of mutual understanding between the overseas RE teams are also high-ranked barriers for the RE process in GSD. The authors believe that the findings of this study will assist practitioners and researchers in developing effective strategies and plans for the successful implementation of the RE process in the GSD context.

Green-Agile Maturity Model: An Evaluation Framework for Global Software Development Vendors

Agile methods are extensively adapted by software development organizations due to the competitive benefits it offers. In recent years global software development (GSD) projects practice agile methods as prominent methods to deliver the software in increments with utmost user satisfaction and affordable cost. Beside the use of agile methods, the software industry has also considered the green aspect of software, to be in line with the demands of the organizations and the world technological ecosystem. The green and sustainable feature of software should focus both the energy and resource efficiency key factors. This phenomenon of embedding the green flavor in software has emerged a new research area, green software engineering, that promises the development of eco-friendly software with minimum energy and use of less computing resources, to trim down the adverse effects on both society and environment. The principal objective of this research study is to design and develop a multi-level Green-Agile Maturity Model (GAMM) to assess the GSD vendors’ agile maturity in terms of green software development. The model has been built in four phases. In phase I and II, systematic literature review (SLR) was performed to identify the success factors and risk factors that either supports or hinders the green and sustainable software development respectively by practicing the agile methods in GSD. The results have been validated from 106 relevant experts, dealing with agile and green software projects, through questionnaire survey. The experts’ demographic represents 25 different countries. We also identified the industry practices through SLR and survey, to address our identified critical factors. Phase III of this research deals with development of the GAMM by categorizing the identified factors into seven Green-Agile maturity levels. A similar approach has been used in other models such as Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI), Implementation Maturity Model (IMM) and Software Outsourcing Vendors Readiness Model (SOVRM). In phase IV of this research, five case studies were conducted at GSD organizations, to evaluate the structure and efficacy of the GAMM, while as a major contribution, this paper presents our developed model, the GAMM, which aims to assess the green-agile maturity of the GSD vendors in terms of green and sustainable software development.

Organization Type and Size Based Identification of Requirements Change Management Challenges in Global Software Development

Global Software Development (GSD) is adopted by organizations to develop quality software at relatively low cost. Requirement Change Management (RCM) plays a key role in overall success of a GSD project. The objective of this study is to identify the challenges of RCM process by adopting systematic literature review (SLR) and validate them by employing questionnaire survey approach in real world practices. A total of 25 challenges were identified through SLR and empirical study. We have further classified the identified challenges into client and vendor organizations with an aim to understand RCM challenges in the context of both types of GSD organizations. The identified challenges were also categorized into three core types of the organization size (small, medium, large), that highlights the significance of each challenge for specific organizational size. The results indicate that there is a moderate correlation between the ranking of these challenges in the literature and the survey results. The finding of this study has the potential to help the GSD organizations in addressing the problems related with RCM in GSD projects.

Requirements Change Management Challenges of Global Software Development: An Empirical Investigation

The software organizations rapidly adopting global software development (GSD) to gain the economic and strategic benefits. Besides, GSD faces many challenges that mainly concerned with the requirements change management (RCM). This study aims to identify and empirically validate the factors that can negatively influence the RCM process in GSD. To this end, literature review and questionnaire survey were conducted for the investigation and validation of RCM challenges. A total of 31 RCM challenges were identified. We have further classified the identified challenges in organization types, organization size and based on experts' opinions with the aim to provide a clear understanding of the RCM process and its challenges to the practitioners. Based on these identified challenges, we believe that this study can provide a framework for tackling problems associated with RCM activities in GSD environment, which is significant to success and progression of GSD organizations.

Software architecture design in global software development: An empirical study

In Global Software Development (GSD), the additional complexity caused by global distance requires processes to ease collaboration difficulties, reduce communication overhead, and improve control. How development tasks are broken down, shared and prioritized is key to project success.While the related literature provides some support for architects involved in GSD, guidelines are far from complete. This paper presents a GSD Architectural Practice Framework reflecting the views of software architects, all of whom are working in a distributed setting. In-depth interviews with architects from seven different GSD organizations revealed a complex set of challenges and practices.We found that designing software for distributed teams requires careful selection of practices that support understanding and adherence to defined architectural plans across sites. Teams used Scrum which aided communication, and Continuous Integration which helped solve synchronization issues. However, teams deviated from the design, causing conflicts. Furthermore, there needs to be a balance between the self-organizing Scrum team methodology and the need to impose architectural design decisions across distributed sites.The research presented provides an enhanced understanding of architectural practices in GSD companies. Our GSD Architectural Practice Framework gives practitioners a cohesive set of warnings, which for the most part, are matched by recommendations.

Investigation of the requirements change management challenges in the domain of global software development

AbstractThe phenomenon of global software development (GSD) has been adopted by a majority of the software development firms to achieve the significant benefits it offers. However, there are many challenges faced by the GSD organizations, which are mainly related to requirements change management (RCM). The key objective of this study is to identify the challenges of RCM process in GSD domain. The systematic literature review (SLR) approach has been used to investigate the challenges of RCM activities, and a total of 30 challenges were identified. We have further classified the identified challenges in the domain of client and vendor GSD organizations, aiming to provide a clear understanding of the RCM process and its challenges in the context of both types of GSD organizations. The identified challenges were also categorized into three core types according to the organization size (small, medium sized, or large), which highlights the significance of each challenge for a specific organizational size. In addition, the criticality of the identified challenges was assessed using the criteria of challenges having a frequency greater than or equal to 50%. According to the findings of this study, a framework is provided that could help GSD organizations address the problems related to RCM in a GSD environment.

Success factors influencing requirements change management process in global software development

Abstract Planning and managing requirements changes in Global Software Development (GSD) is a challenging task. While requirements change has received much attention from researchers, Requirements Change Management (RCM) process is still an emerging area in GSD. The objective of this paper is to identify the success factors of RCM in the GSD environment. We applied the Systematic Literature Review (SLR) approach and identified 23 success factors that influence RCM in GSD projects. The findings of the SLR indicate that change impact analysis, change understanding, management support, RCM process awareness, standard for RCM, progress measure, updated requirements and minimize project failure risk are key factors that influence RCM in a GSD project. We present a comparison of success factors identified in client and vendor organizations. Moreover, we present a framework to classify the identified success factors for RCM process implementation. We believe GSD organizations can use the framework to better manage requirements change in GSD projects.

Towards the Guidelines for Requirements Change Management in Global Software Development: Client-Vendor Perspective

Currently, being deployed by organizations to develop high-quality software at a low cost, global software development (GSD) faces many challenges that make development activities more complex. These GSD challenges are mainly concerned with requirements to change management (RCM). RCM plays a key role in the successful execution of software projects. The objective of this paper is to identify the best practices of the RCM process by adopting a systematic literature review (SLR) and validate them using questionnaire survey with industry experts. A total of 46 best practices were identified through SLR and validated with industry experts. We have further classified the identified practices in the domain of client and vendor GSD organizations with the aim to provide a clear understanding of the RCM best practices in the context of both types of GSD organizations (client, vendor). Moreover, we have conducted a comparison analysis between SLR and questionnaire survey data and found a moderate positive correlation in the ranks of both data sets (rs = 0.522, p=0.003). In addition, the criticality of the identified best practices was assessed using the criteria of a practice having frequency ≥50%. The findings of this paper provide a framework that could help the GSD organizations to address the problems related to RCM in GSD environment.

Investigation of Knowledge Sharing Behavior in Global Software Development Organizations Using Social Cognitive Theory

Software development is a cooperative process, which relies upon the integration of knowledge spread across various domains. The shift from the industrial economy toward a decentralized knowledge-based economy has given knowledge more value and importance for organizations, which operate globally. Management of knowledge sharing activities becomes challenging and complex, specifically when operating in a globally distributed organization. The impact of “personal factors” and “environmental factors” on software developers with regard to knowledge sharing behavior in global software development organizations is an important subject, which is still not well discussed. The social cognitive theory has been utilized in the formation of the conceptual model with a focus on knowledge sharing behavior. This paper examines the impact of key factors, including “time zone difference,” “geographic distance,” “linguistic distance,” “trust,” “motivation,” and “social interaction” on knowledge sharing behavior. Self-administrative postal and online questionnaire were used as the medium of data collection. It was found that “social interaction” had the strongest impact on knowledge sharing behavior.

Systematic Literature Review of Knowledge Sharing Barriers and Facilitators in Global Software Development Organizations Using Concept Maps

Knowledge is the most important resource in software development. The success of software development relies on knowledge sharing between software developers working across the globe. Global software development has brought many benefits to the software industry; however, at the same, time knowledge sharing across diverse team members is one of the main concerns of global software development organizations. This paper provides a systematic literature review of 42 studies on knowledge sharing barriers and facilitators from 2010 to 2017 and classifies them into five main categories: Individual, Organizational, Technological, Cultural, and Geographical. In order to synthesize and represent the complexity of the knowledge sharing factors in a more manageable and visual manner, this paper proposes concept maps for each category. The identified factors can be strategically used as the guidelines in the global software development organizations to boost the culture of knowledge sharing.

An Empirical Study to Investigate the Impact of Communication Issues in GSD in Pakistan’s IT Industry

Global software development (GSD) practice has been increasingly emerging in the recent few decades in the field of business and software industry. On the one hand, many software development organizations get the benefits of GSD, including but not limited to reduced cost, cheap labor, round the clock working and skilled professionals. On the other hand, these organizations have to face several challenges because of GSD. These challenges pose serious threats to the stability of the GSD projects. Communication between distributed team members is one of the most crucial challenges in GSD. Therefore, the current study aims to identify the communication risk in GSD and also evaluate the impact of these communication risks in GSD environment. A Systematic Literature Review (SLR) has been performed to identify all the communication-related issues in GSD. After that, a conceptual framework has been proposed for evaluating the impact of those issues on communication risk in GSD. An empirical evaluation has been performed on data collected from the software organizations of Pakistan working in GSD based environment. The finding of our study demonstrates that geographical distance, socio- temporal distance, socio-culture distance, team member's attitude, team issues, organizational & architectural issue and customer issue have a significant direct impact on communication risk in GSD. The study also shows that there is a significant correlation between findings of SLR and empirical investigation (r = 0.460, P = 0.005). Further, we believe that the results of our research can help to tackle the issues related to communication in GSD. Therefore, it will help to improve the performance of the development activities of GSD organizations.

GSEPIM: A roadmap for software process assessment and improvement in the domain of global software development

AbstractSoftware development firms have begun adopting the practice of global software development (GSD). The main reason for the shift toward globalization is the various benefits received by software development firms. However, there are several issues faced by GSD organizations, particularly those associated with software process improvement (SPI). It has been noticed that a formal process improvement approach could assist in successfully executing development activities in GSD. The core objective of this research work is to develop a global software engineering process improvement model (GSEPIM) to assess and improve software process activities in a GSD environment. The proposed model will be developed based on existing models in other domains, an empirical study conducted with GSD practitioners, and an understanding of critical success factors and challenges of SPI. In this study, the first step in the development of GSEPIM is completed by identifying the challenges of SPI in GSD and presenting a solution in the form of a robust framework.

Assessing the Determinants of Adopting Component-Based Development in a Global Context: A Client-Vendor Analysis

Component-based software (CBS) development is an attractive proposition to globally distributed software development organizations because of its potential to integrate reusable components in new products. Several organizations have adopted CBS development practices to support their global development processes, a phenomenon referred to as globally distributed CBS development. Many factors influence an organization’s decision to adopt globally distributed CBS development practices. The objective of this paper is to systematically assess the determinants that influence the adoption of CBS development practices in global software development organizations. We develop a conceptual research model based on the diffusion of innovation theory and the technology-organization-environment framework. Data collected from 115 participants are used to test the conceptual model. The findings from our study indicate that relative advantage, complexity, technology competence, and top management support are the key determinants for organizations to adopt globally distributed CBS development practices. The assessment of both the direct and total effects of the determinants offers insight into the organization’s decision to adopt globally distributed CBS development practices.

Understanding software process improvement in global software development

Presently, most of the software development organizations are adopting the phenomena of Global Software Development (GSD), mainly because of the significant return on investment it produces. However, GSD is a complex phenomenon and there are many challenges associated with it, especially that related to Software Process Improvement (SPI). The aim of this work is to identify humans' related success factors and barriers that could impact the SPI process in GSD organizations and proposed a theoretical framework of the factors in relation to SPI implementation. We have adopted the Systematic Literature Review (SLR) method in order to investigate the success factors and barriers. Using the SLR approach, total ten success factors and eight barriers were identified. The paper also reported the Critical Success Factors (CSFs) and Critical Barriers (CBs) for SPI implementation following the criteria of the factors having a frequency ≥ 50% as critical. Our results reveal that five out of ten factors are critical for SPI program. Moreover, total three barriers were ranked as the most critical barriers. Based on the analysis of the identified factors, we have presented a theoretical framework that has highlighted an association between the identified factors and the implementation of the SPI program in GSD environment.

Systematic literature review and empirical investigation of barriers to process improvement in global software development: Client–vendor perspective

ContextIncreasingly, software development organizations are adopting global software development (GSD) strategies, mainly because of the significant return on investment they produce. However, there are many challenges associated with GSD, particularly with regards to software process improvement (SPI). SPI can play a significant role in the successful execution of GSD projects. ObjectiveThe aim of the present study was to identify barriers that can negatively affect SPI initiatives in GSD organizations from both client and vendor perspectives. MethodA systematic literature review (SLR) and survey questionnaire were used to identify and validate the barriers. ResultsTwenty-two barriers to successful SPI programs were identified. Results illustrate that the barriers identified using SLR and survey approaches have more similarities However, there were significant differences between the ranking of these barriers in the SLR and survey approaches, as indicated by the results of t-tests (for instance, t = 2.28, p = 0.011 < 0.05). Our findings demonstrate that there is a moderate positive correlation between the ranks obtained from the SLR and the empirical study (rs (22)= 0.567, p = 0.006). ConclusionsThe identified barriers can assist both client and vendor GSD organizations during initiation of an SPI program. Client-vendor classification was used to provide a broad picture of SPI programs, and their respective barriers. The top-ranked barriers can be used as a guide for GSD organizations prior to the initiation of an SPI program. We believe that the results of this study can be useful in tackling the problems associated with the implementation of SPI, which is vital to the success and progression of GSD organizations.