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BY
CÉSAR FRANÇA, DAVID CARNEIRO, FABIO Q. B. DA SILVA
SBES’2012
Towards an Explanatory Theory of
Motivation in Software Engineering: A Qualitative Case Study of a
Small Software Company
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Foreword
What is this research about?
How the motivation of software engineers in the workplace is affected by contextual and individual factors?
Presentation agenda
• BackgroundWhy is it relevant?
What is already known?
• Research DesignMethods
• ResultsFindings
• ConclusionsNext ste
2
motivation of software engineersHow
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Part I – RelevanceWhy is it Relevant?
3
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Software engineering is a
socio-technical activity
“in practice, it is difficult to disentangle the way people do
things from the methods, techniques, and computing
technologies they use”
4
Guinan et al., 1998
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Generalized world scarcity of
Skilled Professionals
“Competition for skilled humanresources, Turnover & Knowledge
losses”
5
Burn et. al (1991)
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Software Engineering is a
unique professional field
“Information Systems people may be a distinctive group from
the average population
(…) IS personnel had higher growth need (GNS) and lower
social needs (SNS) than the general population”
6
Couger and Zawacki (1980)
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The Agile Manifesto says:
“Build projects around motivated individuals”
So, “how to meet software engineers’
motivational needs” ?
7
Beecham et al (2007)
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Open Source Initiatives
have gained more and more attention
What drives those people to spendconsiderable time and effort in OSS
projects “for free” ?
8
Hertel , Niedner, Herrman (2003)
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9
Current research effort on Motivation in Software Engineering around the Globe
DA SILVA; FRANÇA 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012...
REHMAN; MAHMOOD, A., 2011; REHMAN et al., 2011
BHATTI et al., 2008MCHUGH et al., 2011
YU; MING, 2009
BEECHAM et al., 2006, 2007, 2008; HALL et al., 2008, 2009; SACH; PETRE, 2012;
SACH et al., 2010; SACH; SHARP; PETRE, 2011a; SHARP; HALL, 2009; SHARP et al., 2009;
SHARP, 2007; SHARP et al., 2007
KHALIL, O. E. M. et al., 1997
IFINEDO, 2005WALLGREN 2008, 2011WALLGREN; HANSE 2007, 2010, 2011
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What is known about the
Software Engineer Motivation?
Has achieved important results
on clarifying some factors that
may affect software engineer’s motivation
10
Rewards and incentives
Development needs addressed
Variety of work
Career path
Empowerment/responsibility
Good management
Sense of belonging
Work/life balance
Working in successful company
Employee participation Feedback
Recognition
Equity
Technically challenging work
Job security
Identify with the task
Autonomy
Appropriate working conditions
Task significance
Team quality
Creativity/Innovation
Fun (playing)
Professionalism
Good relationship with users/customers
Risk
Stress
Poor communication Lack of promotion
Unrealistic goals
Problem solving
Team working
Development practices
Change
Challenge
Science
But there still may be a complex interplay among motivational factors at
the task, organization, and individual levels
Beecham, S., Baddoo, N., Hall, T., Robinson, H., & Sharp, H. (2008). Motivation in Software Engineering: A systematic literature review. Information and Software Technology,
50(9-10), 860–878. doi:10.1016/j.infsof.2007.09.004
França, A. C. C., Gouveia, T. B., Santos, P. C. F., Santana, C., & da Silva, F. Q. B. (2011). Motivation in software engineering: a systematic review update. International
Conference on Evaluation & Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE) (pp. 154–163). IET. doi:10.1049/ic.2011.0019
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Research Gaps
• Motivation is context-dependent
• Limited practical applicability
• Disconnected and conflicting body ofknowledge
• The “job” is the main motivator
11
Sharp et. al, 2009
Sach, Sharp, Petre 2011a
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Part II – Research DesignResearch Methods
12
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Qualitative Research
13
“the principal advantage of using qualitative methods is that they force the researcher to delve into the complexity of the problem rather than abstract it
away”
Seaman, 2008, p. 36
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Case Study(ies)
“an empirical inquiry that investigates a
contemporary phenomenon in depth
and within its real life context”
Yin, 2008
14
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Case Study Strategy
15
Motivation is context dependent
“qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense
of, or interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them.”
(Merriam, 2009)
Merriam, S. B. (2009). Qualitative Research: A Guide to Design and Implementation (2nd Editio., p. 304). Jossey-Bass.
(Yin, 2009)
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Case Study Strategy
16
Motivation is context dependent
“qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense
of, or interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them.”
(Merriam, 2009)
Merriam, S. B. (2009). Qualitative Research: A Guide to Design and Implementation (2nd Editio., p. 304). Jossey-Bass.
(Yin, 2009)
GovernmentOrganization Private
Not-for-profitSoftware R&D
Institute
IT Departmentof a PublicUniversity
Small Private Software Company
“Maximum Variation Sampling” method
(Strauss and Corbin, 2007) Open Source Community
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Software Engineer
Unit of Analysis
Maximum variation sampling:• Age• Background and education• Years of experience• Years of employment• Etc.
Data collection strategy
17
Project Managers
Software Engineers
Directors
Semi-structuredInterview
Semi-structuredInterview
Semi-structuredInterview
DiaryStudies
Documental Analysis
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Data collection strategy
Semi-Structured Interviews
Question Types:
• Background
• Opinion
• Sensory
• Experience
Diary data
18
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Data collection strategy
Semi-Structured Interviews
Question Types:
• Background
• Opinion
• Sensory
• Experience
Diary data
19
Valid evidence
(Opinion | Sensory) supported by (Experience, Diary
or Documents)
(Hypothetical) (Factual)
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Part III – Results
20
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Context Description
Small & Young software company• 5 years old
• 5 entrepreneurs / Flat structure
• 27 [young] people
• Agile-like software development
Products & Technology• .NET, Java, LUA, …
• 1 main Product
• Software on-demand
Collected Data• 14 people (interviews) / 6 people (diary studies)
• 1 month
• 8h 57min of interviews
• 10 relevant events
Core Mission
“support the development of people and
organizations with software tools, by means
of technical excellence and innovation”
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What factors affect software engineers’ motivation?
22
Task
Team
Organization
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What factors affect software engineers’ motivation?
23
Task
Team
Organization
over half of the participants (08/14) were
undergraduate students.
Employment time seemed to be a mediator for the
relevance of learning experiences
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What factors affect software engineers’ motivation?
24
Task
Team
Organization
Accounted to the unexpected requirements changes!
Short timeslots provided effective performance feedback.
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What factors affect software engineers’ motivation?
25
Task
Team
Organization
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What factors affect software engineers’ motivation?
26
Task
Team
Organization
Learning again!
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What factors affect software engineers’ motivation?
27
Task
Team
Organization
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Signs of motivated behavior
June 28, 2013 EASE 201228
How they feel / behave
How they contribute tothe project success
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Part IV – Conclusions
29
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The Central Story of
Motivation
“the goal commitment of engineers create the conditions for higher
Job Performance”
30
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The Central Story of
Motivation
An effective learning job environmentbenefits the goal commitment of the
software engineers.
But employment time acted as a barrier for learning experiences, given the
low variety of work in latter phases of the projects
31
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The Central Story of
Motivation
“A learning environment protects the engineers’ self-efficacy through self-esteem
and self-confidence mechanisms of overcoming individual failures.”
32
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The Central Story of
Motivation
Team cohesion creates a very reciprocal work environment, filled with mutual help, shared experiences, and self-responsibility.
Responsibility is enhanced by the high employee participation, conditioned by the
small teams and the direct participation of the high management in the productive teams
33
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The Central Story of
Motivation
34
A motivational environment is notenough to prevent the intention to leave, if the growth needs of the software engineers
have not been fulfilled
(because of external opportunities for career progression.)
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Discussion
General observations Main contributions
35
• We present a theory that explains the complex interplay among motivational factors at the task, organization, and individual levels
• Complement previous descriptive models, such as the MOCC
• Multi-case replicable design
• While some factors seem to be manageable, others are stronglyinherent to the context.
• How to apply our findings to improve the motivational aspects of the organization?
• Generalization to other contexts should not be carried out directly. However, our findings can be reinterpreted in other contexts, provided factors are carefully translated.
Future Work• Cross-case analysis of the 5 case studies
• Compare and integrate with other case studies (using meta-ethnography)
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THANK YOU!
Towards an Explanatory Theory of
Motivation in Software Engineering: A Qualitative Case Study of a
Small Software Company
BY
CÉSAR FRANÇA, DAVID CARNEIRO, FABIO Q. B. DA SILVA
SBES’2012
Illustrations from images.google.com & freedigitalphotos.net
Towards an Explanatory Theory of Motivation in Software Engineering: A Qualitative Case Study of a Small Software Company by A. César C. França, David E. S. Carneiro, Fabio Q. B. da Silva is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at XXVI Simpósio Brasileiro de Engenharia de Software, Natal, 2012.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://www.haseresearch.com
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