Kawaljeet Singh

Agile knowledge management: a survey of Indian perceptions

This paper is a pivot step to find out the level of KM adoption of Indian software organizations which are using agile practices for software development. After reviewing the literature it was found although many practitioners believe that KM practices are embodied in agile methodologies but it is not documented efficiently. Survey was used to take perception of agile organizations. KM practices are grouped into seven factors and respondents are taken from Indian software industry. Organizations are divided into different demographics: size, core area, type. Different statistical tests are used to conclude outputs of the questionnaire. It is found that Indian software industry working with agile practices lacks in providing any formal head for KM positioning. Learning and sharing through discussion forms is the most used practices among all respondents of organizations, whereas least accepted practice is dependent upon documents for transfer of knowledge. Indian organizations also lack in appointing a formal head who can provide guidelines for agile practice.

Agile in global software engineering: an exploratory experience

It has always been argued that the two practices (distribution + agile) are actually incompatible. Introduction of agile methodologies in distributed field raises new challenges for development infrastructures to support collaboration and knowledge sharing in software development. Agile in a distributed setting does not mean step–by–step implementation of a particular agile methodology. It means collaboration among distributed teams to collate processes that follow agile principles and put together a methodology that works for them. This paper finds out different parameters for applicability of agile in distributed environment. Consequent upon the extensive literature review, a set of 43 factors were finalised. Factor analysis is used to factorising the minimising factors. After analysing eight broad factors are identified. The empirical analysis validates some long–held beliefs, it also provides some surprises. The findings agree with many of the 12 principles of agile practices laid down in the agile manifesto. The other three auxiliary factors identified also support several manifesto practices. On the other hand, the study findings fail to support several common assumptions about agile success factors.

Software Process Improvement through Experience Management: An Empirical Analysis of Critical Success Factors

Software product quality is immensely dependent upon the software engineering process. Software engineers have always been experimenting with models like CMM, IDEAL, SPICE and QIP in an endeavor to improve upon their software processes. Recently a new area of software process improvement through experience management has got attention of the software engineering community and developers are experimenting with experience management to improve software process. Though literature emphasizes the various benefits of experience management for software process improvement but there are no empirical studies as to suggest what the critical factors of success are for EM based SPI. This paper explores the critical factors of success for an EM based SPI program and perform an empirical investigation of these factors.

Simulation: An Effective Marketing Tool

Simulation- the study and use of models of complex relationships- is one of the most valuable techniques in the management sciences, and has been greatly advanced in the last decade by the use of high-speed computers. Following the extensive development of simulations of military systems and the advent of high-speed computers, there has been, in recent years, a growing interest in applying simulation techniques to business problems including marketing problems. This paper presents a literature review of application of computer simulation in marketing and demonstrates the advantages of simulation as an effective marketing tool. The design of computer simulation for the industrial buying process which focuses on the buyers and their response to various marketing strategies, is described as a generalized-microanalytic-interactive-simulation. Also, the role of simulation in marketing game is discussed.

Is Technology Universal Panacea for Knowledge and Experience Management? Answers from Indian IT Sector

The field of knowledge and experience management has witnessed rapid changes mainly as a result of the dramatic progress in the domain of information technology and partly because of the Internet revolution. Accumulation and sharing of experiences is facilitated with efficiency as internet-enabled technologies allow movement of information at unimaginable speed. It has also made the storage of experiences in varied forms like Experience Bases possible. Moreover, learning has accrued over time in the area of social and structural mechanisms, such as through mentoring and retreats that enable effective experience sharing. This in turn has enabled the development of KM/EM applications that best leverage these improved mechanisms by deploying sophisticated technologies. Therefore, it will not be an exaggeration to state that technology has provided a major impetus for enabling the implementation of KM/ EM processes in organizational settings. The present paper discusses the role and the relevance of latest technology in the field of knowledge and experience management and uncovers the state of technology-mediated KM/ EM in Indian IT sector through a survey.

Experience Base Approach to Software Process Improvement: Comparative Analysis and Design of Improved Model

Most of the modelling approaches presently used in software engineering concentrate on some specific aspect of software development and ignore other relevant aspects. For instance, process modelling approaches do not address product quality and methods for modelling product quality do not consider process modelling. Moreover, the modelling of software engineering reusable objects or technologies has yet not been addressed in the field. Dearth of integrated modelling approaches for various aspects of software projects leads to the present state of affairs where software engineers can not view the interdependencies among software development process, product attributes, software experience and the software development context. The EBM model proposed in this paper integrates these several concepts that have so far been considered independently and hence contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of software engineering as an applied discipline.

Experience Based Software Process Improvement: Have We Found the Silver Bullet?

Software product quality is colossally dependent upon the software development process. Software engineers have always been experimenting with various models in an endeavor to improve upon their software processes. Recently a new area of software process improvement through experience management has got attention of the software engineering community and developers are experimenting with experience management to improve software process. Though literature is abound with studies of problems faced by software organizations and strategies adopted by these firms but there is dearth of literature suggesting how experience and its management can support SPI efforts in an organization. This paper explores the role of experience management in mitigating the effects of software crisis and investigates the current state of EM in Indian software engineering environment.

OLAP Approach to Visualizations and Digital ATLAS for NRIs Directory Database

Nowadays, dashboards are being utilized for a variety of applications including predictive analytics on several problems; manage lifecycle models; visualizing trends of progression in businesses and many more. These dashboards offer a range of visualizations to the end user, in order to make the data management task easier. It is similar to the car dashboard that is fully loaded with complete features’ set that is handy and very much convenient to the user. With the recent advancements of techniques in this area, these dashboards not only offers data management utilities, but also provides effective business intelligence functionalities. NRIs Directory Database is the finest accessible prospect in the present era, to trace NRIs on globe for enhancing businesses of the homelands on foreign lands. In addition to this, these directories are useful for NRIs to locate their peers (homeland mates or persons belonging to similar domains, in several countries). However, these traditional directories are providing limited usability to these prospective users. In order to enhance the utility of these directories, this paper implements the novel approach “OLAP” for designing dashboards and digital ATLAS for NRIs (Non—Resident Indians) directory database. OLAP (On Line Analytical Processing) approach applies the operations such as slicer, roll up, roll down and pivoting (on the selected Key Performance Indictors) for designing dashboards and Digital ATLAS. These dashboards further generates the progression of significant Diaspora profiles for analyzing their performance (whether it is improving or thinning) over the years since their migration to host countries.

Implementing Multidimensional Analytics in NRIs Directory Databases

NRIs Directory/Database is the best available opportunity in today’s world, to locate the NRIs on globe. This directory can be utilized by several organizations to expand their businesses overseas. It can also be used by NRIs to locate persons common to their homeland or persons having same work area, situated at various geographical locations. Having these directories leads the users to crack right business deals, direct and speedy communications with potential businesses, individuals related to common domains or common homelands. Presently, several NRI directories are available both online and offline directories, e.g., International NRIs Directory—Indians Abroad and Punjabi Impact, NIIR Project Consultancy Services, E-mail Database Store that offers NRI E-mail Database Pack, and many others. In general, these directories contain the profiles of prominent Indian Diaspora residing overseas, their personal contact details, Indian/Punjabi newspapers, Sikh organizations, business contact numbers, business e-mail ids, and many other details pertaining to their work areas in different countries. However, there are several problems associated with these traditional directories. This paper addresses the problems of handling large amounts of data stored in traditional NRIs directories and further proposes the cube technique to overcome these problems and enhance the utilities of these directories.

Utility of OLAP and Digital ATLAS to Enhance Cross-Border Connectivity among Punjabi Sikh NRIs

Data analytics is one of the prominent research areas and finds its application in various domains. By expending this concept, this paper presents a case study of Punjabi Sikh NRIs that are one of the largest Diasporas in the world today. Diaspora has acted as a great reservoir for financial, political, and moral support for their homelands. Therefore, Diaspora has become a prominent part of human enquiry and research. However, with the invention and proliferation of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), Diaspora people/communities connect effectively with the people of their community living in different countries. The proposed paper discusses the two main techniques, e.g., Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) and digital ATLAS, which can be used for the purpose of enhancing cross-border connectivity among Diasporas. These techniques provide a two-segment support. The first segment (OLAP) assists the development of a framework of database of profiles of the Diasporas of a particular community. These profiles include the prominent figures working in the mainstream political associations, in the fields of education, defense, entertainment, technology and economics, and various organizations of a few countries such as UK, Malaysia, USA, Canada, and Australia. The second segment (Digital ATLAS) facilitates the development of a digital ATLAS composed of detailed statistical profiles of the Diaspora community. This digital ATLAS draws upon the available official data in various locations of the countries, using visualizations and dashboards. The implementation details of five phases considered for these techniques have been elaborated in this paper.