Qualitative software engineering research -- reflections and guidelines

Researchers are increasingly recognizing the importance of human aspects in software development and since qualitative methods are used to, in-depth, explore human behavior, we believe that studies using such techniques will become more common. Existing qualitative software engineering guidelines do not cover the full breadth of qualitative methods and knowledge on using them found in the social sciences. The aim of this study was thus to extend the software engineering research community's current body of knowledge regarding available qualitative methods and provide recommendations and guidelines for their use. With the support of an epistemological argument and a literature review, we suggest that future research would benefit from (1) utilizing a broader set of research methods, (2) more strongly emphasizing reflexivity, and (3) employing qualitative guidelines and quality criteria. We present an overview of three qualitative methods commonly used in social sciences but rarely seen in software engineering research, namely interpretative phenomenological analysis, narrative analysis, and discourse analysis. Furthermore, we discuss the meaning of reflexivity in relation to the software engineering context and suggest means of fostering it. Our paper will help software engineering researchers better select and then guide the application of a broader set of qualitative research methods.Comment: 30 page

What an Agile Leader Does: The Group Dynamics Perspective

When large industrial organizations change to (or start with) an agile approach to operations, managers and some employees are supposed to be “agile leaders” often without being given a clear definition of what that comprises when building agile teams. An inductive thematic analysis was used to investigate what 15 appointed leaders actually do and perceive as challenges regarding group dynamics working with an agile approach. Team maturity, Team design, and Culture and mindset were all categories of challenges related to group dynamics that the practitioners face and manage in their work-life that are not explicitly mentioned in the more process-focused agile transformation frameworks. The results suggest that leader mitigation of these three aspects of group dynamics is essential to the success of an agile transformation

Behavioral Software Engineering - Organizational Change Refocused

Background The development of software is not only a technical endeavor; it is significantly affected by the behaviors of the people involved. Since social scientists have been studying humans for over a century, it is likely that insights they have developed could be used to increase software development effectiveness. There are, nevertheless, indications that software engineering researchers seldom use theories developed and proven within the social sciences. Overall, software engineering research that emphasizes human aspects is still limited compared to studies with technology or process focus.Objective Given the importance of human aspects in software development, we argue that knowledge from the social sciences should be used more extensively to improve software engineering research. Therefore, the primary objective of our research was to advance software engineering by more profoundly considering humans and their behavior. For in-depth insights into such interdisciplinary research efforts, we chose to explore a specific phenomenon: organizational change. Our secondary objective was thus to create understanding to help improve software companies’ organizational change efforts.Method To address our research objectives, we used a variety of research designs and data collection methods, including literature reviews, surveys, interviews, focus groups, and quantitative analysis of project data. This diversity allowed us to examine phenomena from different perspectives.Results We provide directions for future research on behavioral aspects of software engineering by outlining the behavioral software engineering (BSE) research area, reviewing contemporary research, and identifying industrial needs. Moreover, our findings suggest that software engineers form their attitudes toward change collectively and according to their teams’ social norms, which are governed by their distinct professional identity. Our results also indicate that misalignment of organizational values between groups adversely affects change efforts and overall performance.Conclusions Our research concludes that in order to effectively manage organizational change efforts, software companies must strengthen their organizational identity and reduce misalignment of organizational values. By providing such concrete advice on how to improve organizational change, our research confirms the usefulness of and need for additional BSE research to create novel and in-depth insights into software engineering phenomena

Human factors related challenges in software engineering - An industrial perspective

\ua9 2015 IEEE. It is increasingly recognised that successful Software Engineering not only depends on technical or process issues, but requires attention to human factors. Researchers include such aspects which has led to both new theories and refined methods. However, it is not clear if professionals in the software industry agree that human factors are critical and what the related challenges and possibilities are. The purpose of the present study is to address this discrepancy. Using a qualitative research method, we elicited information about how and why human factors affect Software Engineering projects, which challenges are of special interest and the context in which they arise. Thematic analysis of data from interviews with nine senior software professionals in multiple Swedish software companies of differing size identified four main challenging areas. As supported by existing research, customer relations and communications were highlighted as important, but so too is the need for more holistic and multi-dimensional solutions and the importance of human factors in software organisational change. In addition, quantitative results indicate that the professionals see the organisational and group aspects as more important than the individual aspect. Our results can help to focus future research on matters that software practitioners consider important