Knowledge of IT Project Success and Failure Factors

2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 56-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walid Al-Ahmad
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Development Process ◽  
Project Success ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
It Projects ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Software Developers ◽  
The Common ◽  
Development And Management ◽  
Failure Factors

Traditionally, project success/failure is considered only after the project is completed or cancelled. Integrating project success and failure factors knowledge and software engineering activities would result in a situation where project success/failure is considered as part of the development process, leading to more successful software projects. This article aims to identify the common issues responsible for IT projects’ success/failure to develop a deeper understanding of these root causes. Knowledge about success can be used to understand failure and vice versa. Therefore, generic taxonomies of the root causes are developed for that purpose. Knowledge of these taxonomies is integrated into software development and management activities to help software developers and project managers complete projects successfully.

Adaptive and Dynamic Hybrid Model for Software Project Management: A Review on its Clarity and Usage to Improve Project Success

2019 ◽  
Vol 892 ◽  
pp. 38-45
Author(s):  
Marzanah A. Jabar ◽  
Norhayati Mohd. Ali ◽  
Yusmadi Yah Jusoh ◽  
Salfarina Abdullah ◽  
S. Mohanarajah
Keyword(s):  
Project Management ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Project Success ◽  
Software Project ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Software Developers ◽  
Effective Role ◽  
Software Development Methodologies ◽  
Dynamic Hybrid ◽  
Current Research Interest

Software developers have shown a lot of interest in using agile approaches and methods to manage projects. The Agile Manifesto in 2001 provided a good basis to use this as it formulated its 4 values and 12 principles. Adaptability was a common feature in the Agile Manifesto to make agility happen and there appears a need to combine dynamism to ensure agility takes a more concrete and effective role. Whilst the term adaptability is discussed more often than dynamism by most researchers, the clarity in its meaning needs improvement as the terms are used interchangeably. This paper proposes a useful clarity on its differences and how it should be used. In addition, this approach would also facilitate the current research interest in mixing and combining software development methodologies to create hybrid versions as pure methods (traditional and agile) have not worked well in most software projects.

scholarly journals Software Developers’ Work Habits and Expertise: Empirical Studies on Sketching, Code Plagiarism, and Expertise Development

2020 ◽  
pp. 47-60
Author(s):  
Sebastian Baltes
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Specific Work ◽  
Expertise Development ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Software Developers ◽  
Quantitative Research Methods ◽  
Stack Overflow ◽  
Daily Work ◽  
Work Habits ◽  
Novel Theory

AbstractAnalyzing and understanding software developers’ work habits and resulting needs is an essential prerequisite to improve software development practice. In our research, we utilize different qualitative and quantitative research methods to empirically investigate three underexplored aspects of software development: First, we analyze how software developers use sketches and diagrams in their daily work and derive requirements for better tool support. Then, we explore to what degree developers copy code from the popular online platform Stack Overflow without adhering to license requirements and motivate why this behavior may lead to legal issues for affected open source software projects. Finally, we describe a novel theory of software development expertise and identify factors fostering or hindering the formation of such expertise. Besides, we report on methodological implications of our research and present the open dataset SOTorrent, which supports researchers in analyzing the origin, evolution, and usage of content on Stack Overflow. The common goal for all studies we conducted was to better understand software developers’ work practices. Our findings support researchers and practitioners in making data-informed decisions when developing new tools or improving processes related to either the specific work habits we studied or expertise development in general.

Software Project Managers under the Team Software Process

2012 ◽  
pp. 115-126
Author(s):  
Marcos Ruano-Mayoral ◽  
Ricardo Colomo-Palacios ◽  
Ángel García-Crespo ◽  
Juan Miguel Gómez-Berbís
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Software Process ◽  
Development Project ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
Project Manager ◽  
Software Project ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Software Development Project ◽  
Team Software Process ◽  
Definition Of

Despite the clear relevance of the Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) market in world economics and the evident lack of success of software projects, organizations devote little effort to the development and maturity of the software project manager profession. This work analyzes the figure of project manager from the perspective of the Team Software Process (TSP), and it considers the required skills, attitudes and knowledge for a software development project. The basis for the study is the analysis of relevant references from the literature for their subsequent categorization into different competency concepts. The results of the analysis are compared with the contributions which the Guide to the SWEBOK® and the PMBOK® Guide models provide of the profiles of the project manager. The results indicate that the literature relating to the Team Software Process is focused on the definitions of skills and attitudes, and to a lesser extent on knowledge components. The lack of the definition of the components which comprise competency constitutes a challenge for software development organizations that use TSP, whose project managers should confront the task with full capacities, and without the help of established and recognized competencies. The current work attempts to establish the competencies for project managers identified in the literature, in the environment of the use of TSP for software development, using a study based on content analysis.

Outsourced IT Projects from the Vendor Perspective

2010 ◽  
pp. 1759-1781
Author(s):  
Hazel Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Agency Theory ◽  
Project Success ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
It Projects ◽  
Project Outcome ◽  
Customer Dissatisfaction ◽  
Potential Damage

As outsourced and multinational IT projects become more common, managing risks for these projects is increasingly important. The research reported here examines key risks identified by Hong Kong vendor project managers working on both local and international package implementation projects. In addition to the typical risks that threaten project outcome success, respondents noted location-specific risks on their multinational projects. They also distinguished threats to the satisfactory process of the project, and threats to their own firms from competitors and from potential damage to their reputation arising from customer dissatisfaction with either the outcomes or the process of the project. Using an agency theory perspective, this broader focus is examined in the light of differing definitions of project success for clients and outsource providers.

Practical Experience in Customization for a Software Development Process for Small Companies Based on RUP Process and MSF

2011 ◽  
pp. 71-93 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valerio Fernandes del Maschi ◽  
Luciano S. Souza ◽  
Mauro de Mesquita Spínola ◽  
Wilson Vendramel ◽  
Ivanir Costa ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Software Engineering ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Development Process ◽  
Practical Experience ◽  
Software Development Process ◽  
Small Companies ◽  
Engineering Process ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Software Engineering Process ◽  
Unified Process

The quality in software projects is related the deliveries that are adjusted to the use, and that they take care of to the objectives. In this way, Brazilian organizations of software development, especially the small and medium ones, need to demonstrate to future customers whom an initial understand of the business problem has enough. This chapter has as objective to demonstrate methodology, strategy, main phases and procedures adopted beyond the gotten ones of a small organization of development of software in the implantation of a Customized Software Engineering Process and of a Tool of Support to the Process in the period of 2004 to 2006 on the basis of rational unified process (RUP) and in the Microsoft solutions framework (MSF).

The Software Engineering Discipline

2006 ◽  
pp. 59-97
Author(s):  
Daniel M. Brandon
Keyword(s):  
Project Management ◽  
Software Engineering ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Success Factors ◽  
Project Success ◽  
It Project Management ◽  
It Projects ◽  
Engineering Discipline

Software engineering is vital for the proper planning of IT projects, although it is not a formal part of project management. The software engineering embedded in the acquired products will significantly affect long-term project success factors, even for IT projects that primarily involve software acquisition and integration instead of software development,. In this chapter I review software engineering and its relation to IT project management.

Empirical comparison of traditional plan-based and agile methodologies

2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 400-453 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur Ahimbisibwe ◽  
Urs Daellenbach ◽  
Robert Y. Cavana
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Project Success ◽  
Time Budget ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
Development Projects ◽  
Potential Threat ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Agile Methodologies ◽  
Project Objectives ◽  
Practical Implications

Purpose Aligning the project management methodology (PMM) to a particular project is considered to be essential for project success. Many outsourced software projects fail to deliver on time, budget or do not give value to the client due to inappropriate choice of a PMM. Despite the increasing range of available choices, project managers frequently fail to seriously consider their alternatives. They tend to narrowly tailor project categorization systems and categorization criterion is often not logically linked with project objectives. The purpose of this paper is to develop and test a contingency fit model comparing the differences between critical success factors (CSFs) for outsourced software development projects in the current context of traditional plan-based and agile methodologies. Design/methodology/approach A theoretical model and 54 hypotheses were developed from a literature review. An online Qualtrics survey was used to collect data to test the proposed model. The survey was administered to a large sample of senior software project managers and practitioners who were involved in international outsourced software development projects across the globe with 984 valid responses. Findings Results indicate that various CSFs differ significantly across agile and traditional plan-based methodologies, and in different ways for various project success measures. Research limitations/implications This study is cross-sectional in nature and data for all variables were obtained from the same sources, meaning that common method bias remains a potential threat. Further refinement of the instrument using different sources of data for variables and future replication using longitudinal approach is highly recommended. Practical implications Practical implications of these results suggest project managers should tailor PMMs according to various organizational, team, customer and project factors to reduce project failure rates. Originality/value Unlike previous studies this paper develops and empirically validates a contingency fit model comparing the differences between CSFs for outsourced software development projects in the context of PMMs.

scholarly journals Software development: do good manners matter?

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Destefanis ◽  
Marco Ortu ◽  
Steve Counsell ◽  
Michele Marchesi ◽  
Roberto Tonelli
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Development Process ◽  
Communication Process ◽  
Software Project ◽  
Software Development Process ◽  
Key Factors ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Complex Process ◽  
Time Required

A successful software project is the result of a complex process involving, above all, people. Developers are the key factors for the success of a software development process, not merely as executors of tasks, but as protagonists and core of the whole development process. This paper investigates social aspects among developers working on software projects developed with the support of Agile tools. We studied 22 open source software projects developed using the Agile board of the JIRA repository. All comments committed by developers involved in the projects were analyzed and we explored whether the politeness of comments affected the number of developers involved and the time required to fix any given issue. Our results showed that the level of politeness in the communication process among developers does have an effect on the time required to fix issues and, in the majority of the analysed projects, it had a positive correlation with attractiveness of the project to both active and potential developers. The more polite developers were, the less time it took to fix an issue. In the majority of the analysed cases, the more developers wanted to be part of a project, the more they were willing to continue working on the project over time.

scholarly journals Requirements Engineering: An Industrial Survey in the Gulf Cooperation Council Countries

2021 ◽  
pp. 107-129
Author(s):  
A. Alzayed ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Requirements Engineering ◽  
United Arab Emirates ◽  
Gulf Cooperation Council ◽  
Project Managers ◽  
The State ◽  
Successful Implementation ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Gcc Countries ◽  
Software Practitioners

Requirements engineering (RE), the process of defining the requirements of a system, is critical to the successful implementation of software projects. Although many studies have been globally conducted on the different facets of RE in software engineering, studies explicitly focusing on the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have been scarce. GCC-specific RE research studies are needed because of the unique cultural characteristics and common work ethics in GCC countries. Besides, the investigation of the state of RE practices in the countries of the GCC is crucial as the globalization of software development becomes imminent. This study compares the state of RE practices within the six countries of the GCC, namely, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Oman, using six RE factors. To understand commonalities and differences in the RE practices and methods, 163 software practitioners in GCC countries are surveyed in this study. The results show that the RE practices are relatively similar among the six countries, with subtle differences. Initiating software-related projects with unclear requirements and undefined project scopes are the two major limitations of the RE practices among the survey participants. The results of this study contribute to providing project managers and system analysts, who are working globally and within the GCC countries, with valuable decision-making tools to help them consider the identified RE techniques, methods, and challenges and their related risks early in their software development projects

scholarly journals Software development: do good manners matter?

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Destefanis ◽  
Marco Ortu ◽  
Steve Counsell ◽  
Michele Marchesi ◽  
Roberto Tonelli
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Open Source Software ◽  
Development Process ◽  
Communication Process ◽  
Software Project ◽  
Software Development Process ◽  
Key Factors ◽  
Software Projects ◽  
Complex Process ◽  
Time Required

A successful software project is the result of a complex process involving, above all, people. Developers are the key factors for the success of a software development process, not merely as executors of tasks, but as protagonists and core of the whole development process. This paper investigates social aspects among developers working on software projects developed with the support of Agile tools. We studied 22 open source software projects developed using the Agile board of the JIRA repository. All comments committed by developers involved in the projects were analyzed and we explored whether the politeness of comments affected the number of developers involved and the time required to fix any given issue. Our results showed that the level of politeness in the communication process among developers does have an effect on the time required to fix issues and, in the majority of the analysed projects, it had a positive correlation with attractiveness of the project to both active and potential developers. The more polite developers were, the less time it took to fix an issue. In the majority of the analysed cases, the more developers wanted to be part of a project, the more they were willing to continue working on the project over time.

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