Abstract. Waterfall development is still a widely used way of working in software development companies. Many problems have been reported related to the model. Commonly accepted problems are for example to cope with change and that defects all too often are detected too late in the software development process. However, many of the problems mentioned in literature are based on beliefs and experiences, and not on empirical evidence. To address this research gap, we compare the problems in literature with the results of a case study at Ericsson AB in Sweden, investigating issues in the waterfall model. The case study aims at validating or contradicting the beliefs of what the problems are in waterfall development through empirical research.

Background: Action research is a well-established research methodology. It is following a post-positivist research philosophy grounded in critical thinking. The methodology is driven by practical problems, emphasis participatory research, and develops practically useful solutions in an iterative manner. Objective: Two objectives are to be achieved: (1) Understanding the state of the art with respect to action research usage in the software engineering literature, and (2) reflecting and providing recommendations of how to foster industry-academia collaboration through action research. Method: Based on our experience with two action research studies in close collaboration with Ericsson lessons learned and guidelines are presented. Results: In both cases presented action research led to multiple refinements in the interventions implemented. Furthermore, the close collaboration and co-production with the industry was essential to identify and describe the required refinements to provide an in-depth understanding. In comparison with previous studies, we required multiple iterations while previous software engineering studies reported mostly one iteration, or were not explicit regarding the number of iterations studied. Conclusion: We conclude that action research is a powerful tool for industry-academia collaboration. The success of the method highly depends on the researchers and practitioners working in a team. Future studies need to improve the reporting with respect to describing the type of action research used, the iterations, the model of collaboration, and the rationales for changes in each iteration.

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