A Systematic Approach to Optimise Management in Global Sourcing Relationships

Despite a large number of studies, global IT sourcing projects are, in practice, performed ad-hoc and rely mostly on the manager’s experience. Outsourcing software development presents extra challenges because development is performed in an inter-organisational network. Although organisations collaborate by transferring knowledge from the customer to the vendor (e.g., requirements) and from the vendor to the client (e.g., product and status reports), each has its own interests and needs; which often conflict. Tacit requirements, conflicting interests and knowledge-domain gaps contribute to generate final solutions that cost more in terms of resources than what was originally planned or that do not help customers to meet their ambitions. In this work we propose eStudio, our semi-automatic quantitative-data based framework to provide guidance to reason about obstacles in, for instance, knowledge co-ordination

IT Project Management from a Systems Thinking Perspective: A Position Paper

We proposes a Systems Thinking approach to the study of IT project management and show how this approach helps project managers in controlling their projects. To illustrate our proposal, we present an example model of the dynamics of IT out-sourcing projects. The example model explains these dynamics in terms of feedback loops consisting of causal relations re-ported in the literature. The model provides insight in how coordination, trust, information exchange and possibilities for op-portunistic behaviour influence each other and together influence delivery quality, which in turn influences trust. The integra-tion of these insights provided by applying the Systems Thinking perspective helps project managers to reason about how their choices influence project outcome. The Systems Thinking perspective can serve as an additional tool in the academic study of IT project management. Applying the Systems Thinking perspective also calls for additional research in which this perspective is itself the object of study

Looking for Reasons behind Success in Dealing with Requirements Change

During development, requirements of software systems are subject to change. Unfortunately, managing changing requirements can take a lot of time and effort. Yet some companies show a better management of changes in requirements than others. Why? What is it that makes some projects deal with changing requirements better than others? We pursue the long term goal of understanding the mechanisms used to successfully deal with change in requirements. In this paper we gather knowledge about the state-of-the-art and the state-of-practice. We studied eight software development projects in four different companies --large and small, inclined toward structured and toward agile principles of development--, interviewing their project managers and analyzing their answers. Our findings include a list of practical (rather than theoretical) factors affecting the ability to cope with small changes in requirements. Results suggest a central role of size as a factor determining the flexibility showed either by the organization or by the software development team. We report the research method used and validate our results via expert interviews, who could relate to our findings

eCustoms Case Study: Mechanisms behind Co-operation Planning

Members of existing e-commerce trading networks constantly assess their network to identify opportunities for increased co-operation and integration of e-commerce IT systems. Failing to identify the mechanisms involved in co-operation compromises correct investment decisions. In this paper, we use Systems Thinking as a reasoning model that helps decision makers to uncover such mechanisms. We use Systems Thinking to analyse a real-world case called eCustoms, an inter-organisational network of customs organisations. The resulting model explains the mechanism of planning co-operation in terms of a feedback loop that comprises political support, operational potential, and information flow. This mechanism also explains why it is important to select potential partners for closer co-operation as early as possible, the importance of willingness to participate, and the gain or loss of decision power that joining a network implies

Structured Review of the Evidence for Effects of Code Duplication on Software Quality

This report presents the detailed steps and results of a structured review of code clone literature. The aim of the review is to investigate the evidence for the claim that code duplication has a negative effect on code changeability. This report contains only the details of the review for which there is not enough place to include them in the companion paper published at a conference (Hordijk, Ponisio et al. 2009 - Harmfulness of Code Duplication - A Structured Review of the Evidence)

Discovering Strategies to Improve Business Value in Outsourcing Projects

This paper deals with the problem of leveraging client business value in a software development outsourcing relationship. We have observed software development projects from two different Dutch IT outsourcing companies and studied the approach they apply in their (successful) projects. The results show that they create a role dedicated to facilitate communication. This arrangement has the potential to put team members in a better position to communicate, facilitating the transfer of information supporting the rationale behind design decisions. Teams are thus better equipped to anticipate change and to react faster in solving everyday problems. This paper describes our observations and the practical implications we expect, such as the improvement of re-buy intention on the client's side

Harmfulness of Code Duplication - A Structured Review of the Evidence

Duplication of code has long been thought to decrease changeability of systems, but recently doubts have been expressed whether this is true in general. This is a problem for researchers because it makes the value of research aimed against clones uncertain, and for practitioners as they cannot be sure whether their effort in reducing duplication is well-spent. In this paper we try to shed light on this is-sue by collecting empirical evidence in favor and against the nega-tive effects of duplication on changeability. We go beyond the flat yes/no-question of harmfulness and present an explanatory model to show the mechanisms through which duplication is suspected to affect quality. We aggregate the evidence for each of the causal links in the model. This sheds light on the current state of duplication re-search and helps practitioners choose between the available mitiga-tion strategies

Structured Review of Code Clone Literature

This report presents the results of a structured review of code clone literature. The aim of the review is to assemble a conceptual model of clone-related concepts which helps us to reason about clones. This conceptual model unifies clone concepts from a wide range of literature, so that findings about clones can be compared with each other

La Historia Reciente como desafío en el nuevo diseño curricular para Profesorados de Historia de la Provincia de Santa Fe.

En el marco del proceso de reforma curricular para los Profesorados de Historia de la Provincia de Santa Fe se creo un espacio destinado a la reflexión y la propuesta que quedó plasmado en la realización de las Jornadas Interinstitucionales 2015.Frente al cuestionamiento del borrador bajado por la anterior dirección de cambio curricular, dicho espacio apuntó a consensuar los cambios que las/los docentes consideraban pertinentes en el nuevo diseño curricular. Este trabajo abordará una de las temáticas abordadas en el encuentro: la necesidad de incorporar la Historia Reciente (HR) al nuevo diseño curricular de la Formación Docente. El interés por introducir la enseñanza del pasado cercano y sus modos de abordaje responde a las dificultades que se le presentan a las/los docentes a la hora de enseñar y transmitir HR tanto argentina como latinoamericana. Uno de los problemas incumbe a la carencia de formación en dicho campo lo que se traduce en la falta de herramientas teórico-metodológicas que posibilitan el abordaje del pasado reciente. Frente a esto, advertimos el lugar creciente que esta temporalidad tiene en las curriculas de educación secundaria así como la significación que hoy adquierenlos vehículos de memoria: fechas conmemorativas y sitios de memoria. Por tanto, entendemosnecesaria en la formación de formadores la enseñanza de conceptos, periodizaciones y diferentes escalas de análisis (nacional/regional/local) que posibiliten pensar el pasado reciente, atendiendo a su complejidad