Authors: John Noll, Sarah Beecham , and I ta Richardson Pr e se - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
Global software Development and Collaboration: Barriers and Solutions Authors: John Noll, Sarah Beecham , and I ta Richardson Pr e se nte r : Kasahun Abdisa IT Doc tor al pr ogr am Addis Ababa University e-mail:
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and Solutions”
John Noll, Sarah Beecham , and I ta Richardson
e-mail: kasabd97@gmail.com
Overview Introduction Purpose of the paper Research questions Context Research Method Result of the study Limitation of the study Conclusion Future Direction
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Global Software Development (GSD): is the
GSD has various advantages to organizations Currently, it is common for developers to
However, this collaboration is accompanied by
collaboration barriers experienced by stakeholders of that
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To clearly understand potential barriers to
to pin point specific practices that show how
To contributes to the GSD body of knowledge
by refining empirical findings in identifying the best ways to address the problems in
GSD
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Current global economy demands software
Distributed environment is characterized by
geographic, temporal, cultural and linguistic difference
Limited developers physical interaction Limited shared understanding among the developers
The existing CMMI process models can not address this GSD
challenges
Four practices associated with GSD collaboration;
These are collaboratively :
boundaries among interfacing locations.
exchange of inputs, outputs, or work products.
teams the commitment lists and work plans that are related to the work product or team interfaces.
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highly skilled software engineers in low cost
Bringing software development close to
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What barriers prevent software development
And, what solutions address these barriers to
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The study was conducted within the context of virtual teams
and virtual organization
When we talk about virtual organizations we refer to Virtual
team Virtual Team s VS Traditional Team
Traditional team
group of individuals who are collocated and interdependent in their
tasks
Coordinate activity and share responsibility to achieve goal
Virtual teams
Same as traditional team But operate across different
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I m plem entation of a virtual team strategy
The center of the strategy is “cost-based decision”
Aims at linking technical skills and experience of staff located in a high-cost centre with engineers in a low-cost location.
short-term strategy
used simply as a knowledge transfer exercise(training, experience
sharing)
long-term objective
sustained support will be required for team members at all locations
Factors that dictate choice of remote site
access to local knowledge
or proximity to the customer base
Virtual team
geographically distributed teams with task interdependence .
Distributed team
geographically distributed teams but with no task interdependence
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successful software project management is a function of: effective planning, organizing, staffing, leading, controlling
coordinating and day-to-day management of the project
Is constrained by factors like
available resources(financial and technological) management personnel and technical capabilities
Project management becomes more complex in GSD due to Management of virtual team across the site coordinating their task
language, culture
project coordination , control and visibility problems
GSD challenges cannot be dealt with structured process models like CMMI
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Introduced to provide process guidance to organizations embarking
has two specific goals:
“Define Global Project Management” and
“Define Management Between Locations.”
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The study employed Systematic review using
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Identify the need for a systematic literature review
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Carry out a search for relevant studies
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Formulate review research question(s)
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Assess and record the quality of included studies
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Classify data needed to answer the research question(s)
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Extract data from each included study
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Summarize and synthesize study results (meta-analysis)
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Interpret results to determine their applicability
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Write-up study as a report
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I tem s Description Need for the review
No comprehensive survey so far in software engineering literature that address the research questions
Research Questions
RQ1: What are the barriers that prevent software development teams from collaborating in a global environment? RQ2: What solutions are there to addressing the barriers to collaboration, as identified in the literature?
Search
String: “Global Software Development” AND “Collaboration” Boolean search
Source : …
IEEEXplore bibliographic database
Result: 32 references returned ; 6 non relevant; hence 26 final list
Docum ent Selection
The follow ing inclusion and exclusion criteria used to filter paper for analysis
proceedings
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I tem s Description Data Extraction, Meta-analysis, and Interpretation
Each paper is examined to extract :
conclusions
Results
Analysis of 26 papers revealed various barriers to GSD and various solutions to overcome
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Analyzed 26 selected papers and spotted both barriers and
solution to GSD
The study reported Eight basic barrier category to the four
collaboration practices enumerated in GTM as follows:
geographic distance temporal distance (different time zones ) differences in language and culture
fear and trust
problems stemming from organizational structure, process issues
infrastructure barrier
product architecture barrier.
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Barrier Description
Geographic Distance
No informal contact No personal relationships no “awareness” of remote teams participating on Global project Affect shared understanding about issues like requirements Also increases organizational complexity
Temporal Distance
different time zones Result in fewer hours of work day for synchronous meeting delay in response to asynchronous communication Result in mean delay of 2.5 times that of collocated[ 21]
Culture and Language
Teams not confident in language prefer instant message than interacting directly with users over phone or others Instant message: No visual (auditory)interaction to understand each Limit teams idea expression Feel being dominated Shift to asynchronous Language interpretation problem(eg polite) due to culture affects interpretation of requirements(domain context)
Fear and Trust
lack of informal face-to-face Result in no personal relationship Leads to lack of trust fearful of their job security Mistrust of management motives a negative impression of the remote team’s competence when something misses or is late
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Barrier Description Organization, Process, and Managem ent
Lack of informal communication about process changes change management might be applied differently at some sites I ncompatible process at different sites
I nfrastructure
I nstant failure of infrastructures are consequential E.g. disruption of telephone,internet,video conference weak knowledge management infrastructure problem I ncompatible data repositories (risk of data loss when data moves from one source to the other)
Product Architecture
Architecture that changes frequently and not communicated Lead to system integration problem at the end Some times ownership competition may happen among teams(for high visible systems)
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The survey also proposed solutions to the identified barriers Classified into the following solution areas as:
address language and cultural differences; promoting trust and overcoming fear; improving communication infrastructure; management interventions; Organizational structures; addressing distributed development process
appropriate product architecture
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Barrier Solution Culture and Language
native speakers should help in reviewing docs written by non native speakers of shared language I nvest in shared organizational culture (shared vision, process) Encourage understanding of different cultures Mixing Cultural ambassadors from site to site
I nfrastructure
Choose synchronous communication for issues that need discussion for agreement Consider culture, language and cognitive learning skills when choosing communication
Managem ent
Should make strategic decision in GSD Should workout the Cost benefit analysis Barriers are risks hence demands management to make careful balance of decisions in GSD
Organization
Should reduce communication complexities among sites Choose responsibility in the way it reduce communication b/ n sites Assign tasks that demand few communication with main development t activity Make the sites near to independent if possible Choose site in the same time zone to solve temporal issue
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Barrier Solution Fear and Trust arrange face-to-face meetings Built personal relationship Share what various teams are doing to the
Product Architecture Implement modular product structure Identify functionality that can be developed at single site Try stable architecture as it enhances clear task allocation, responsibility and integration Process All sites should follow shared and agreed on process Also use specific process to handle temporal delays Eg process that respond immediately to specific enquiries Introduce process that frequently iterate and get updated
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This paper started the discussion by pin pointing four
practice that are the core of the GSD
Each of these practice is highly dependent on communication
among the sites :
For shared understanding among the teams
to achieve goal
Establish trust
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Issues that arise in relation to these four practice in the paper
are
Geographic and temporal distance
Cultural differences
Temporal distance
Problems associated with these issues in GSD will result in
Delays
lack of trust
lack of shared understanding
I ncompatible process
Which ultimately impact the actual and perceived
performance of the GSD activities
The researchers are not sure whether some of
The papers included for this study are case study
but depended on one or two case study for their finding
The way the search key constructed might have
Used only one library(IEEEXplore) as a metadata
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This study used GTM collaboration as a basic of
The paper posed two research questions from the
Employed SLR to answer Research question and
For the first research question “RQ1: What are the barriers that prevent software development teams from collaborating in a global environment?” Identified eight categories of barriers
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For the second research question
Seven categories of answers indentified They are solution to the first identified barriers
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The study recommends to apply the” global
The researcher hints that
“understanding open source projects’ organizational, process,
and infrastructure will be useful to develop mature Process Model to solve conventional GSD”
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