SPIIMM: Toward a Model for Software Process Improvement Implementation and Management in Global Software Development.
Abstract
Software development organizations are globalizing their activities by adopting the phenomenon of global software development (GSD), mainly due to the significant return on investment it offers. Various challenges are associated with the software process improvement (SPI). The aim of this paper is to develop a software process improvement implementation and management model (SPIIMM) that can assist GSD organizations in assessing and improving their SPI activities. A thorough systematic literature review (SLR) study was performed to identify the critical success factors (CSFs), critical barriers (CBs), and the relevant practices of SPI. An empirical study of the industry was conducted with 111 SPI experts using a survey questionnaire to verify the outcomes of the SLR. The final CSFs and CBs were categorized into five maturity levels based on the implementation maturity model, the software outsourcing vendor readiness model, and capability maturity model integration. Each maturity level consisted of different CSFs and CBs to assess and improve the SPI-related maturity level of an organization. Three case studies were conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed model. The results revealed that SPIIMM can provide a robust framework to assess and improve SPI activities in GSD organizations. INDEX TERMS Software process improvement, global software development, success factors, barriers, practices, systematic literature review. I. INTRODUCTION Global software development (GSD) is a phenomenon in which software development activities are conducted across geographical, cultural, and temporal boundaries [1]. This geographically distributed approach to software development has been around since the 1970s, before the term GSD was coined. Through ‘‘contract programming'' a small module of a software system would be contracted out to a third party [2]. A majority of software development organizations took to contract programming, due to a lack of resources, low budgets, limited time available for development activities, and rising costs [3]. The current GSD trend was introduced in the 1990s by software firms in the U.S. [4]. The continued improvement in informa