{"id":220,"date":"2018-09-08T07:11:23","date_gmt":"2018-09-08T07:11:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/?p=220"},"modified":"2019-04-10T00:16:53","modified_gmt":"2019-04-10T00:16:53","slug":"wallace-et-al-2004-understanding-software-project-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wallace-et-al-2004-understanding-software-project-risk\/","title":{"rendered":"Wallace et al. 2004: Understanding Software Project Risk"},"content":{"rendered":"<h4 dir=\"ltr\">Citation<\/h4>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">\n<div class=\"csl-bib-body\">\n<div class=\"csl-entry\">Wallace, L., Keil, M., &amp; Rai, A. (2004). Understanding software project risk: a cluster analysis. <i>Information &amp; Management<\/i>, <i>42<\/i>(1), 115\u2013125. <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.im.2003.12.007\">https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.im.2003.12.007<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\">Notes<\/h4>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The work includes citations for several studies that generated lists of risk factors:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>S. Alter, M. Ginzberg. (1978). Managing uncertainty in MIS implementation. <em>Sloan Management Review 20<\/em>(1), pp. 23\u201331.<\/li>\n<li>F.J. Heemstra, R.J. Kusters. (1996). Dealing with risk: A practical approach. <em>Journal of Information Technology 11<\/em>(4), pp. 333\u2013346.<\/li>\n<li>T. Moynihan. (1997). How experienced project managers assess risk. <em>IEEE Software 14<\/em>(3), pp. 35\u201341.<\/li>\n<li>R. Schmidt, K. Lyytinen, M. Keil, P. Cule. (2001). Identifying software project risks: an international Delphi study. <em>Journal of Management Information Systems 17<\/em>(4), pp. 5\u201336.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Moynihan was already on my to-do list, as was Schmidt et al.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Hazel Taylor cited Heemstra &amp; Kusters (1996) as well as Alter &amp; Ginzberg (1978).<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Page 117 includes a table describing six dimensions of risk.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Under the team dimension, the author includes \u201cinsufficient knowledge among team members\u201d and &#8220;motivation&#8221; in the description. Among the full set, these two seem related to my work. We see that skills are often the primary focus of team risk. Motivation may be related to identity, though it&#8217;s more likely the authors were considering pay, recognition, and advancement as motivators rather than identification with the product.<\/p>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1536387908542_6250\" dir=\"ltr\">Under the requirements dimension the author notes<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">frequently changing requirements are not the only possible requirements-related problem associated with system<br \/>\ndevelopment projects. Incorrect, unclear, inadequate, ambiguous or unusable requirements may also increase the problems, or risks, associated with a software development project.<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">Feature creep isn&#8217;t <em>specifically<\/em> mentioned (frequently changing requirements may not be creep by my operationalization, since swapping in new requirements for old isn&#8217;t creep if no new work or other expense is involved) though it&#8217;s certainly one possibility when requirements change. The authors also don&#8217;t specifically mention over-requirement.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1536387908542_6251\" dir=\"ltr\">Under the user dimension, the author notes<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">The lack of user involvement during system development is one of the most often cited risk factors in the literature. If the attitudes of users towards a new system are unfavorable, then it is likely that they will not cooperate during a development effort, leading to an increased risk of project failure.&#8221;<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">Other authors have noted that user focus is easier in a smaller projects with fewer users, and are more difficult with commercial software with large user populations. I have yet to find an author that specifically attempts to mention users as part of the development team (they&#8217;re always split) nor any form of risk or benefit for to having members of your development team consider themselves part of the target user base.<\/div>\n<div id=\"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1536387908542_6257\" dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">The paper has other material suitable for game-related project management studies, but is out of scope for my current work.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the course of their work, the authors describe six dimensions of risk in IT projects. Three of these have factors that pertain to my work on identity in the development process. <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wallace-et-al-2004-understanding-software-project-risk\/\">Read More &#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-project-management"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":321,"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220\/revisions\/321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcschmalz.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}