A Strategy for Treat with Socio-cultural Aspects in Software
Distributed Development
Paulo Henrique Soares, Elisa Hatsue Moriya Huzita and Tania Fátima Calvi Tait
Maringa State University, 5790 Colombo Avenue, Maringá, Brazil
Keywords: Software Distributed Development, Socio-cultural Aspects.
Abstract: Distributed development of software (DDS) has been gaining ground among companies that develop, as
they saw the DDS a great opportunity to reduce project costs. However, due to the distribution of teams,
there are some problems that do not exist in traditional development co-located, such as differences in time
zones, different languages, lack of team spirit, inadequate infrastructure, among other challenges often
generated by socio-cultural differences between the participants. This article is just the presentation of these
challenges, evaluating their effects on the development process as well as presenting a strategy to minimize
them, so do not compromise the outcome of the project.
1 INTRODUCTION
Given the numerous challenges in the SDD, this
paper presents an analysis of the main problems
generated by socio-cultural aspects in the Software
Distributed Development , as well as a strategy,
elaborated based on techniques and tools of
quality control widely used by conventional
engineering, allowing the development team to
minimize the effects that these problems cause in the
project.
Thus the article is divided into six sections.
Section 2 presents the literature review. Section 3
makes the presentation of the main problems caused
by socio-cultural factors. Section 4 presents a
strategy to minimize these problems. Finally, section
5 presents the evaluation of the strategy, section 6,
the final considerations and 7, the references.
2 SOFTWARE DISTRIBUTED
DEVELOPMENT
The SDD consists in distributing teams that are in
different locations, cities, states and even countries,
and make these teams work towards the same
purpose, namely the construction of a software. This
type of development has grown considerably in the
last decade, motivated by the advancement of
communication technologies and project
management, and has been characterized by
collaboration and cooperation between departments
and groups of developers physically distant (Meyer,
2006). As a result, organizations aim to gain
competitive advantages associated with increased
revenues, savings in development and improving the
quality of the final product.
3 CHALLENGES IMPOSED BY
SOCIO-CULTURAL ASPECTS
IN SDD
In projects of software distributed development,
especially those in a global scale, there may be
groups with differences in behavior between people
due to their different cultures. This can lead to
complications in work planning, decision-making
process, in the style of argumentation, the flow of
conversation, inconsistent work practices, among
others (Olson and Olson, 2003). In countries with
continental extensions, such as Brazil, Russia,
China, United States, among others, cultural
differences can occur even with people from the
same country due to regional customs (Enam, 2006).
Considering that many managers do not consider the
socio-cultural differences that often exist in
environments of SDD, and thus, end up running the
risk of causing complications in the entire project,
the purpose of this section will just address the main
156
Soares P., Huzita E. and Tait T..
A Strategy for Treat with Socio-cultural Aspects in Software Distributed Development.
DOI: 10.5220/0003994701560159
In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (ICEIS-2012), pages 156-159
ISBN: 978-989-8565-11-2
Copyright
c
2012 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)
problems generated by this diversity:
Language: When the SDD involve more than one
country, the language differences may cause
difficulties to the communication.
Religion: Doctrines and religious holidays may
cause delays on the projetc, beyond the possibility of
create friction with the other participants.
Infra-structure: Status of roads, electricity grid
precarious, lines of communication with failures,
lack of airports and ports for client and staff, in
short, the lack of basic framework for the proper
functioning business. Besides the lack of internal
infrastructure of the company itself, not giving good
working conditions for employees.
Behavior: Some habits and customs common in
one country may not be frowned upon by other
regions, causing differences between participants
and even delays in the project.
Economical Factors: Restrictions on foreign
capital, high inflation rates, non-convertible local
currency, etc.
Political Factors: Risk of internal and external
conflicts, authoritarian government that is constantly
changing the laws according to their interest, etc.
Competition: Technological and cultural
competition, may cause differences and technical
problems in the project due to incompatibility of
technology.
Education: Technical training of the workforce,
number of companies that offer training and
updating, especially in information technology,
where technological change is constant.
Prejudice: Some cultures may feel superior to
others, creating conflict and compromising the
project.
Decision Making: In certain cultures the decision-
making power is centralized, while in others,
decisions are taken in groups.
Legislation: Different laws (commercial, civil,
labor and tax).
Organizational Culture: Habits, working
methods, attitudes, way of acting and thinking
shared by all members of the organization and that
differentiates it from others.
4 STRATEGY FOR DEALING
WITH SOCIO-CULTURAL
ASPECTS OF SDD
The main problems caused by socio-cultural factors
in DDS have been raised in the previous section;
however, it is likely that each unit of development
have distinct regional and culture characteristics,
which makes the use of generalized solutions. In this
way, a more effective alternative to minimize these
problems is the use of a strategy consisting of a
series of steps that encompass from the identification
of challenges, to analyze and present solutions.
Therefore, it is precisely such a strategy that
addresses the socio-cultural organizations that work
with software distributed development, which will
be presented in this section.
To make the strategy more reliable and more
efficient in its results, a method of problem solving
was used as the basis for its preparation, this is
already widely used for engineering in different
situations, known as QC Story. To Rossato (1996),
this method is structured in a way that helps the
administrator to solve the problems, putting the
matter in a proper process of identification, analysis
and planning of adversity. This way, every step of
the QC Story, featuring a series of generic actions,
may be adapted to specifically address problems
caused by differences in socio-cultural aspects of
SDD, forming at the end of the method, a strategy
that can be used by managers in any project of
distributed development.
4.1 Fundamentals of Strategy
The first step is to define the person responsible for
deploying and managing the proposed strategy, so
that it can effectively bring the expected results.
Because it is the project management issues, and
with a complicating factor, which is the central
distribution of software development, the general
manager will be the one responsible, in turn, he or
Figure 1: Flowchart of the proposed strategy.
AStrategyforTreatwithSocio-culturalAspectsinSoftwareDistributedDevelopment
157
she must rely on the help of local project managers,
who will be their disseminators and coordinators
spread in each of the local development. The
strategy consists primarily of eight steps, as
illustrated in figure 1.
Each of the steps that make up the strategy are
detailed below.
4.1.1 Step Identification of Problems
To start and survey of the problems, the ideal is to
conduct a meeting between the general manager and
managers of local projects. In the impossibility of
this be made in person, it can be done virtually, and
it is then that each manager can outline the socio-
cultural problems of their respective units. Two
methods can be used to assist in the survey, they are:
Brainstorming e Checklists.
4.1.2 Step of Observation
To make easyer the execution of the next steps,
beyond the historical data, Kume (1995) sugests the
use of one of the seven quality tools, denominated
stratification, that is basicaly to divide one
determinated group in several subgoups based in
factors specifically apropriated. In this case, we will
stratify the socio-cultural issues already raised in
three distinct groups:
Group 1 – The problems generated by the people
involved in the project (language, religion, habits,
competition, qualifications, prejudice)
Group 2 – The problems generated by structure
and way of work of the company (Decision Making,
Organizational Culture, infra structure (internal)).
Group 3 – The problems generated by external
factors of the company (infra-structure (external),
education (University and technical courses, etc),
economical factors, political factors and legislation).
4.1.3 Problem Analysis Stage
The major objective of the analysis phase is by
means of the data collected in the stage of
observation, find out which of the problems raised
above can actually harm the process of software
development, and point out the root causes, other
words, the factors that generate each these problems,
so that in the preparation of a plan of action (next
step), we can handle and point out the best possible
solutions.
In the case of SDD, each of the core development
has its particular problems, which will require an
individual analysis of the manager because an
adversity that can be severe and seriously
compromise the work in a particular location may
not exist or not be as significant in the other.
4.1.4 Step of Preparation of the Action Plan
Before preparing the plan of action, which is the
main purpose of this step with the purpose to prevent
the problems are resolved temporarily, and
carelessness on the first turn damaging the project,
an important point must be raised. For Campos
(1999), the only way to resolve an adversity in a
definitive way is by treating their underlying causes
and not only the effects like many managers do,
because these effects will reappear if the factors that
generate them are still present in the process. For
these reasons, it is important that the analysis phase
has already been completed before the start of the
preparation of action plan so that it is possible to lift
the fundamental causes of each problem identified at
the beginning of the strategy.
In seeking to minimize the socio-cultural
problems existing in the SDD, are shown some
actions that can be taken:
Language: Standardization of language,
preference in hiring employees who are fluent in the
languages involved, courses and training of foreign
language within the company and hiring a liaison.
Religion: Instructions on the religious customs of
the other members, respect for all religions of those
involved in the project, raise awareness teams in
order to avoid arguments and religious affairs and
hiring a liaison.
Education: Ongoing training and refresher courses
for developers, In-house training, taught by more
experienced employees of the company.
Behavior: Exchange of officials, meetings and
gatherings whenever possible and hiring a liaison.
Competition: Awareness of teamwork, valuing
employees who work collaboratively, meeting to
discuss conflicting issues and avoid considered rival
teams working on the same project.
Prejudice: Warnings and punishments for
employees with prejudicial attitudes, lectures and
security awareness training and valuation of staff
who have good relationships within the team.
Decision Making: Meetings with project
stakeholders so that they expose their point of view
and avoid unilateral decisions without prior
discussion.
Organizational Culture: Provide training to the
manager to deal with the different organizational
cultures involved and standardization of labor.
Infra-structure (Internal): To provide
appropriate working conditions for employees,
create a list of problems related to infrastructure and
ICEIS2012-14thInternationalConferenceonEnterpriseInformationSystems
158
arrange them according to their importance and
standardize the infrastructure for all development
sites.
4.1.5 Step of Execution of the Plan of Action
The main purpose of this step is to put into practice
the action plan prepared in the previous step, and to
ensure that the strategy work out as planned, some
measuresshould be taken. According to Campos
(1999), the first step to start the execution of the
method is to provide training for all involved in the
project, including by making use of handouts and
documents that detail all the proposed practice. It is
extremely important that before the beginning of the
plan, all those involved understand and agree with
the measures contained in the strategy, and if any
specific action generate much disagreement among
the staff, it must be reviewed by management.
4.1.6 Step of Verification
At this stage, the manager should analyze and
compare the results obtained using data collected
before and after the implementation of the action
plan prepared in the previous steps, certifying the
effectiveness of the strategy and the degree of
reduction of the problems (Campos, 1999).
Verification can be done several timesduring the
project, and it is up to the manager to define when it
is necessary such activity.
4.1.7 Step for Standardization
From the moment that the plan of action is well
adjusted to the functional structure of the company,
and really is blocking problems, it is necessary not
only make it ameasure, but a pattern of
organization's work to prevent problems reappear
(Campos, 1999). Therefore this is the goal of the
standardization step, take all measures proposed by
the usual strategy in the daily work of everyone
involved in the development project.
4.1.8 Step Completion
The stage of completion is mainly aimed to a
recapitulation of the whole strategy, raising the
items that had results above and below expectations,
schedule delays, extra costs, remaining problems,
among other relevant data that were observedduring
the execution of the strategy. After the assessment of
this information, the manager can now begin to
design improvements for future projects, aimed at
increasing efficiency of the method.
5 CONCLUSIONS
During the investigations performed for the
preparation of this workhas not been found any
strategy or methodology designed specifically to
address the socio-cultural aspects in the process of
software development, especially when it is
distributed. This fact is due mainly to the concern
that managers have with the technical factors of the
project, often leaving in the background other
important aspects which, although they are not
technical, they can damage or even cripple the
development work.
REFERENCES
Campos, Vicente Falconi; “TQC – Controle da Qualidade
Total”. Editora Indg Techs – 8º Edição, 1999.
Carmel, E. “Global Software Teams – Collaborating
Across Borders and Time Zones”. Prentice Hall. 1999.
Kume, I. “Métodos estatísticos para a melhoria da
qualidade”. São Paulo, Editora Gente, 1995.
Meyer, B. The unspoken revolution in software
engineering. IEEE Computer, 2006. “Global Software
Development at ICSE 2003", Oregon, EUA, 2003.
Olson, J. S. e Olson, G. M. “Culture Surprise in Remote
Software Development Teams”, Queue Focus:
Distributed Development, v.1, 2003.
Rossato, Ivete de Fátima. “Uma Metodologia Para a
Análise e Solução de Problemas” Dissertação de
Mestrado. UFSC, 1996.
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