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Knowledge Management in Software Development

Paul Adler, University of Southern California

Description

Semester:

  • Winter 2003

Speakers:

Paul Adler, Management and Organization Department, Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California

Lecture Time:

Fri, January 24, 2003 @ 1:30 pm to 3:00 pm

Lecture Location:

Room 4212, School of Education

Speaker Webpage(s):

https://marshallapps.usc.edu/portal/subapps/digitalmeasures/faculty.jsp?surveyId=48716
http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~padler/index.html

Introduced By:

No introduction available.

Abstract

This paper uses cultural-historical activity theory to interpret the effects of bureaucratic standardization and formalization on software development work. I focus on the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model. Under a more “mature” process, developers lose much of their traditional autonomy in deciding the methods of work, since these methods are largely standardized and formalized. Paralleling broader concerns about bureaucracy, some observers fear that process maturity will be experienced as coercive and burdensome, with negative consequences for staff motivation and development effectiveness. To explore whether these fears are well-founded, I studied four units of a large software consulting firm. I find that the fears are largely misplaced. It is true that process maturity replaced autonomy with a broad, tight web of interdependencies, and that sometimes these interdependencies were experienced as oppressive dependence. However, for most of my interviewees, interdependence took a more collaborative form. Most developers expressed a professional concern for the effectiveness of development, and embraced process maturity as an efficacious collective discipline. Compared to the traditional, individualistic, “hacker” mode of software production, process maturity made for a more “socialized” production process. The organization form associated with high maturity fit the “enabling bureaucracy” model described by Adler (//). The subjective experience of work took the form of more interdependent self-construals and more directly socialized identities.

Recording & Additional Notes

No recordings available.

Introducer: Ryan Quinn, Management & Organizations