Effect of domain knowledge on elicitation effectiveness: an internally replicated controlled experiment

Context. Requirements elicitation is a highly communicative activity in which human interactions play a critical role. A number of analyst characteristics or skills may influence elicitation process effectiveness. Aim. Study the influence of analyst problem domain knowledge on elicitation effectiveness. Method. We executed a controlled experiment with post-graduate students. The experimental task was to elicit requirements using open interview and consolidate the elicited information immediately afterwards. We used four different problem domains about which students had different levels of knowledge. Two tasks were used in the experiment, whereas the other two were used in an internal replication of the experiment; that is, we repeated the experiment with the same subjects but with different domains. Results. Analyst problem domain knowledge has a small but statistically significant effect on the effectiveness of the requirements elicitation activity. The interviewee has a big positive and significant influence, as does general training in requirements activities and interview experience. Conclusion. During early contacts with the customer, a key factor is the interviewee; however, training in tasks related to requirements elicitation and knowledge of the problem domain helps requirements analysts to be more effectiv

The Impact of Domain Knowledge on the Effectiveness of Requirements Engineering Activities

One of the factors that seems to influence an individual’s effectiveness in requirements engineering activities is his or her knowledge of the problem being solved, i.e., domain knowledge. While in-depth domain knowledge enables a requirements engineer to understand the problem easier, he or she can fall for tacit assumptions of the domain and might overlook issues that are obvious to domain experts and thus remain unmentioned. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the impact of domain knowledge on different requirements engineering activities. The main research question this thesis attempts to answer is “How does one form the most effective team, consisting of some mix of domain ignorants and domain awares, for a requirements engineering activity involving knowledge about the domain of the computer-based system whose requirements are being determined by the team?” This thesis presents two controlled experiments and an industrial case study to test a number of hypotheses. The main hypothesis states that a requirements engineering team for a computer-based system in a particular domain, consisting of a mix of requirements analysts that are ignorant of the domain and requirements analysts that are aware of the domain, is more effective at requirement idea generation than a team consisting of only requirements analysts that are aware of the domain. The results of the controlled experiments, although not conclusive, provided some support for the positive effect of the mix on effectiveness of a requirements engineering team. The results also showed a significant effect of other independent variables, especially educational background. The data of the case study corroborated the results of the controlled experiments. The main conclusion that can be drawn from the findings of this thesis is that the presence in a requirements engineering team of a domain ignorant with a computer science or software engineering background improves the effectiveness of the team

Learning from mistakes: An empirical study of elicitation interviews performed by novices

© 2018 IEEE. [Context] Interviews are the most widely used elicitation technique in requirements engineering. However, conducting effective requirements elicitation interviews is challenging, due to the combination of technical and soft skills that requirements analysts often acquire after a long period of professional practice. Empirical evidence about training the novices on conducting effective requirements elicitation interviews is scarce. [Objectives] We present a list of most common mistakes that novices make in requirements elicitation interviews. The objective is to assist the educators in teaching interviewing skills to student analysts. [Re-search Method] We conducted an empirical study involving role-playing and authentic assessment with 110 students, teamed up in 28 groups, to conduct interviews with a customer. One re-searcher made observation notes during the interview while two researchers reviewed the recordings. We qualitatively analyzed the data to identify the themes and classify the mistakes. [Results and conclusion] We identified 34 unique mistakes classified into 7 high level themes. We also give examples of the mistakes made by the novices in each theme, to assist the educationists and trainers. Our research design is a novel combination of well-known pedagogical approaches described in sufficient details to make it re-peatable for future requirements engineering education and training research

Seeing the big PICTURE: A framework for improving the communication of requirements within the Business-IT relationship

The relationship between the business and IT departments in the context of the organisation has been characterised as highly divisive. Contributing problems appear to revolve around the failure to adequately communicate and understand the required information for the alignment of business and IT strategies and infrastructures. This study takes a communication-based view on the concept of alignment, in terms of the relationship between the retail business and IT within a major high street UK bank. A research framework (PICTURE) is used to provide insight into this relationship and guide the analysis of interviews with 29 individuals on mid-high management level for their thematic content. The paper highlights the lessons that can be derived from the study of the BIT relationship and how possible improvements could be made

Maps of Lessons Learnt in Requirements Engineering

Both researchers and practitioners have emphasized the importance of learning from past experiences and its consequential impact on project time, cost, and quality. However, from the survey we conducted of requirements engineering (RE) practitioners, over 70\% of the respondents stated that they seldom use RE lessons in the RE process, though 85\% of these would use such lessons if readily available. Our observation, however, is that RE lessons are scattered, mainly implicitly, in the literature and practice, which obviously, does not help the situation. We, therefore, present ``maps” of RE lessons which would highlight weak (dark) and strong (bright) areas of RE (and hence RE theories). Such maps would thus be: (a) a driver for research to ``light up” the darker areas of RE and (b) a guide for practice to benefit from the brighter areas. To achieve this goal, we populated the maps with over 200 RE lessons elicited from literature and practice using a systematic literature review and survey. The results show that approximately 80\% of the elicited lessons are implicit and that approximately 70\% of the lessons deal with the elicitation, analysis, and specification RE phases only. The RE Lesson Maps, elicited lessons, and the results from populating the maps provide novel scientific groundings for lessons learnt in RE as this topic has not yet been systematically studied in the field

Leadership competencies in the requirements phase of IS/IT development projects

Doutoramento em GestãoWhile the successful implementation of an Information Systems/Information Technology (IS/IT) project is widely recognised as being a key research topic, yet recent surveys continue to show significant failure rates. Inadequate requirements management together with inadequate project management have frequently been identified as the principal causes of failure. As a result, the requirements phase has been considered to be one of the most critical phases of the IS/IT project life cycle, especially in relation to software development projects, where new systems must be defined. Moreover, a review of the literature suggests that management leadership is considered to be one of the most important factors in team, project and organisational effectiveness. Management leadership is regarded as being a vital factor in achieving project success, namely in the field of IS/IT. Further research acknowledges that leadership effectiveness may depend on contingency factors, such as the project type, or the project life cycle phase. However, few studies have focussed on the impact of leadership along the software project life cycle, and the literature review found no study that focusses on any particular phase. This is surprising, as the literature suggests that each phase has specific characteristics which are distinguishable by the activities that must be performed. Thus, this research study aims to integrate all these elements within a framework, through a multiple case study using exploratory research. Therefore, this framework will identify which leadership competencies are considered to be relevant to the requirements phase of software development projects’ life cycle. Contingency factors are also be identified and discussed, as well as their impact on the set of identified competencies. Finally, the practical and theoretical contribution of the results are presented, as well as new insights into the requirements and leadership research streams.O estudo da gestão de projetos de Sistemas e Tecnologias de Informação (SI/TIs) é largamente reconhecido como um tópico de investigação atual e relevante. No entanto, estudos empíricos recentes continuam a demonstrar um elevado nível de falhas no processo. Algumas das principais causas mais frequentemente identificadas envolvem a gestão inadequada de requisitos, bem como práticas inadequadas ao nível da gestão global do projeto. Assim, não é surpreendente que a fase que envolve as atividades dos requisitos seja considerada como uma das mais criticas fases de todo o ciclo de vida dos projetos de SI/TI, nomeadamente dos projetos de desenvolvimento de software onde se define um novo sistema a implementar. Para além disso, a revisão da literatura sugere que a liderança é considerada como um dos fatores mais importantes para a obtenção de eficácia das equipas, dos projetos e ainda das organizações. A liderança da gestão é considerada como um fator vital na obtenção do sucesso do projeto, nomeadamente na área dos SI/TIs. Adicionalmente, a literatura reconhece que a eficácia da liderança depende de fatores contingenciais, tais como o tipo de projeto ou a fase do ciclo de vida a que se aplica. No entanto, apenas uma pequena parte desses estudos focam o impacto da liderança ao longo do ciclo de vida do projeto. Surpreendentemente, não foi encontrado nenhum estudo que foque alguma fase em particular, mesmo considerando que a literatura sugere que diferentes fases têm características e atividades que as distingue das demais. Assim, este projeto de investigação pretende explorar a integração de todos estes elementos num quadro de análise comum, através da execução de múltiplos casos de estudos. Este quadro de análise pretende identificar quais as competências de liderança relevantes para a execução da fase de requisitos do ciclo de vida de projetos de desenvolvimento de software. Também se pretende explorar os fatores contingenciais que influenciam o conjunto de competências encontradas, bem como compreender a forma como isso se processa. Finalmente, são apresentadas as contribuições teóricas e práticas, e ainda enumerados os tópicos de investigação futura decorrentes dos resultados obtidos

Uncertainty analysis in product service system: Bayesian network modelling for availability contract

There is an emerging trend of manufacturing companies offering combined products and services to customers as integrated solutions. Availability contracts are an apt instance of such offerings, where product use is guaranteed to customer and is enforced by incentive-penalty schemes. Uncertainties in such an industry setting, where all stakeholders are striving to achieve their respective performance goals and at the same time collaborating intensively, is increased. Understanding through-life uncertainties and their impact on cost is critical to ensure sustainability and profitability of the industries offering such solutions. In an effort to address this challenge, the aim of this research study is to provide an approach for the analysis of uncertainties in Product Service System (PSS) delivered in business-to-business application by specifying a procedure to identify, characterise and model uncertainties with an emphasis to provide decision support and prioritisation of key uncertainties affecting the performance outcomes. The thesis presents a literature review in research areas which are at the interface of topics such as uncertainty, PSS and availability contracts. From this seven requirements that are vital to enhance the understanding and quantification of uncertainties in Product Service System are drawn. These requirements are synthesised into a conceptual uncertainty framework. The framework prescribes four elements, which include identifying a set of uncertainties, discerning the relationships between uncertainties, tools and techniques to treat uncertainties and finally, results that could ease uncertainty management and analysis efforts. The conceptual uncertainty framework was applied to an industry case study in availability contracts, where each of the four elements was realised. This application phase of the research included the identification of uncertainties in PSS, development of a multi-layer uncertainty classification, deriving the structure of Bayesian Network and finally, evaluation and validation of the Bayesian Network. The findings suggest that understanding uncertainties from a system perspective is essential to capture the network aspect of PSS. This network comprises of several stakeholders, where there is increased flux of information and material flows and this could be effectively represented using Bayesian Networks

CAiSE Radar 2016

The CAiSE Radar is an experimental format, established for CAiSE 2016, to make CAiSE workshops livelier, exciting, stimulate discussions, and attract additional active participants by establishing an environment where not only well established and validated research is reported but research in infancy, new ideas, and potentially interesting research projects can be presented and discussed. So similarly to a radar, the idea is to enable researchers to look into the future of the field and identify upcoming trends early. The aim of such effort is on one hand to contribute to the building of research communities and promote the integration of young researchers into the community, and on the other hand to provide opportunities to discuss ideas early and to receive additional opinions on planned research