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Dimensions of Consistency in GSD: Social Factors, Structures and Interactions

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Product-Focused Software Process Improvement (PROFES 2020)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 12562))

Abstract

Global software development (GSD) implies a distributed development organization, where coordination is needed to efficiently achieve development objectives. So far, socio-technical congruence has examined coordination needs and activities through software code dependencies. However, GSD requires coordination beyond software artifacts. In this paper, we present an interview-based study of software practitioners from companies engaged in GSD. The study examines how different dimensions of interactions are interrelated, and how they affect software development. Our study suggests that, in addition to the relationship between organizational and technical system structure, GSD performance is affected by consistency in communication, operational procedures, and social structures. These can only partially be impacted through formal procedures, and we suggest that distributing coordination work by empowering developers could lead to increased performance.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The transcripts were coded in full by the first author. The codes “practice” and “challenge” were predetermined; other codes were freely generated during the coding process. The coding process has been reported elsewhere in detail [28].

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Tampere University, Tampere, Finland

    Outi Sievi-Korte & Kari Systä

  2. Aalto University, Espoo, Finland

    Fabian Fagerholm

  3. University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland

    Tommi Mikkonen

Authors
  1. Outi Sievi-Korte
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  2. Fabian Fagerholm
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  3. Kari Systä
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  4. Tommi Mikkonen
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Correspondence to Outi Sievi-Korte .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Torino, Italy

    Maurizio Morisio

  2. Polytechnic University of Turin, Turin, Torino, Italy

    Marco Torchiano

  3. Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering, Kaiserslautern, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

    Andreas Jedlitschka

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Sievi-Korte, O., Fagerholm, F., Systä, K., Mikkonen, T. (2020). Dimensions of Consistency in GSD: Social Factors, Structures and Interactions. In: Morisio, M., Torchiano, M., Jedlitschka, A. (eds) Product-Focused Software Process Improvement. PROFES 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12562. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-64148-1_20

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-64148-1_20

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