Zijad Pita

Coexistence of agile and SCM practices: an exploratory study of Australian agile software development organizations

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of Phase 1 of the research and to identify Australian agile software development organizations having such coexistence of agile and software configuration management (SCM) practices. This study employed “organization size” variable to study the phenomenon and used theory of Lean Thinking as a lens to analyse implementation variations of agile and SCM practices. Design/methodology/approach – For this study, the research design was comprised of three phases. In Phase 1, a quantitative study using an online survey was performed to answer RQ using various statistical techniques. In Phase 2, an initial conceptual model based on a literature review was developed, and then a qualitative study was performed using one longitudinal case study. In Phase 3, another online survey was performed using various parametric statistical techniques to validate and generalize the findings of Phase 1 and 2 and the proposed SLAM traceability model. The scope of this ...

A Maturity Model of Strategic Information Systems Planning SISP: An Empirical Evaluation Using the Analytic Network Process

In this paper Strategic Information Systems Planning SISP maturity models are empirically validated in Australian environment. A research instrument used to determine the degree of SISP maturity in Australian organisations is described. While empirical testing of a five-stage SISP model has only confirmed the existence of three levels of SISP maturity, statistical methods confirmed the adequacy of the establishment of the SISP assessment model as a third-order system. The study also opens the way for SISP thinking beyond the conventional approaches by introducing the Analytic Network Process and the Analytic Hierarchy Process methods to reduce complexity of SISP measurement in a natural and structural way. By using these methods, it was possible to obtain a single overall measure of SISP maturity, thus overcoming a problem of result synthesis measured by different scales.

Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP): An Empirical Evaluation of Adoption of Formal Approaches to SISP in Australian Organizations

This study examines the use of formal Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) approaches and methodologies in Australia. The authors analyze the relationships between SISP success, SISP objectives, company size/type and SISP approaches and methodologies. The authors find that the most popular methodologies are not the most successful. Emerging methodologies, such as Fuzzy Cognitive Maps and Information Engineering, could be considered for improving the success of SISP. They also find that a combination of SISP approaches is more successful than the implementation of any one approach. This can be interpreted that the boundary lines that distinguish theoretical approaches are blurred and that SISP theory needs a new way of thinking to stay relevant for practice. In addition, many findings of significant importance to SISP practitioners, in the context of various industries, are presented.

Towards Holistic Traceability Solution: From Systematic Literature Review to Proposed Traceability Model

The purpose of traceability is to ensure persistent alignment of product knowledge between stakeholders, artifacts, and traceability objects. On the other hand, process knowledge is equally important to ensure a systematic software development process with accurate specification and verifiable quality attributes. Previous studies lacks in presenting a consolidated view from product and process knowledge perspectives. This study has taken a systematic literature review approach to evaluate sixty one previously published papers on traceability in leading journals and conferences. Based on the findings, the authors propose to extend the definition of an existing traceability meta-model to combine both product and process knowledge perspectives. The scope of this paper is to define the extension of the traceability meta-model without violating any of its statements. This study aims to contribute by taking steps towards defining a holistic model of traceability that will provide practical guidelines to IT practitioners in general and to process engineers in particular.