Faraway, so close: Code ownership over innovative work in the global software industry

Abstract

This study investigates the factors that influence the accomplishment and allocation of innovative work among distributed settings in the international software industry. Over the past 15 years, several major software development centers have emerged in various countries. The study uses ethnographic methods of participant observation in a dispersed team of software developers working across two locations—the West Coast of the US and Bangalore, India—and additional interviews with managers in companies active in offshore software development. The collaboration between remote developers is impeded by the difficulty of achieving the creative engagement needed for work on an innovative project. Group engagement is difficult to achieve and to maintain because of two main reasons. First, the numerous barriers separating the sites create a thick opacity that impedes the knowledge of work processes at the remote site. Work in the distributed setting is affected by the scarcity of the human interface, and by the absence of boundary objects that structure intense and interactive work episodes. As a result, the development of work routines and the emergence of processes—contagion, spontaneity, and reciprocity—that sustain engagement across sites are prevented. Furthermore, the status differential between the sites leads to the underutilization of available boundary objects and boundary spanners. Second, the code ownership in which engagement is rooted—responsibility over work outcomes, entailing both coding and design tasks—is jealously guarded by existing centers. The difficulty of obtaining code ownership over innovative work limits the new centers\u27 ability to grow their capabilities and hence improve their status. The study shows that it is the emotional basis to creativity that forms the micro-foundations to the dispersion of creative work. It is the difficulty of engaging in a common activity across the multiple boundaries of geography and status that explains the fact that innovativeness thrives in proximate settings. These findings have important implications for understanding the forces that sustain agglomeration in innovation, and permit the development of capabilities in new innovative centers in the world economy