Currently, being deployed by organizations to develop high-quality software at a low cost, global software development (GSD) faces many challenges that make development activities more complex. These GSD challenges are mainly concerned with requirements to change management (RCM). RCM plays a key role in the successful execution of software projects. The objective of this paper is to identify the best practices of the RCM process by adopting a systematic literature review (SLR) and validate them using questionnaire survey with industry experts. A total of 46 best practices were identified through SLR and validated with industry experts. We have further classified the identified practices in the domain of client and vendor GSD organizations with the aim to provide a clear understanding of the RCM best practices in the context of both types of GSD organizations (client, vendor). Moreover, we have conducted a comparison analysis between SLR and questionnaire survey data and found a moderate positive correlation in the ranks of both data sets (r s = 0.522, p=0.003). In addition, the criticality of the identified best practices was assessed using the criteria of a practice having frequency ≥50%. The findings of this paper provide a framework that could help the GSD organizations to address the problems related to RCM in GSD environment.INDEX TERMS Global software development (GSD), requirements change management (RCM), best practices, systematic literature review (SLR), empirical investigation, client, vendor.
The software organizations rapidly adopting global software development (GSD) to gain the economic and strategic benefits. Besides, GSD faces many challenges that mainly concerned with the requirements change management (RCM). This study aims to identify and empirically validate the factors that can negatively influence the RCM process in GSD. To this end, literature review and questionnaire survey were conducted for the investigation and validation of RCM challenges. A total of 31 RCM challenges were identified. We have further classified the identified challenges in organization types, organization size and based on experts' opinions with the aim to provide a clear understanding of the RCM process and its challenges to the practitioners. Based on these identified challenges, we believe that this study can provide a framework for tackling problems associated with RCM activities in GSD environment, which is significant to success and progression of GSD organizations.INDEX TERMS Requirements change management, challenges, and empirical investigations.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.