Teknisk skuld inom IT-projekt : Ett adaptivt tillvägagångsätt för strategisk och förebyggande skuldhantering i praktiken

The complex nature of technical debt and its implications has led to failures within IT-projects in aspects of exceeded budgets, failure to meet project objectives and to deliver a qualitative final product according to client specifications. The reasons IT-projects are struggling to succeed are many. Technical debt contributes in both a negative and positive aspect of project development and project management, and can, in certain cases, be held accountable for IT-project failures. Haeckel’s adaptive loop has been applied within the study, in two different aspects; technical debt and strategic debt, in relation to its planning, implementation and management. Bannerman’s multi-domain project success framework has been applied in accordance to Haeckel’s adaptive loop in the evaluation of the second loop, strategic debt. Respondents were chosen based on their previous knowledge and experience within the study area of interest, to participate in interviews. The collected data was analyzed through the perspective of Haeckel’s adaptive loop and followed with transliteration and extraction of themes and keywords. The objective of this study, is to present an analytical approach on how to manage technical debt within IT-projects, from both a technical and strategic point of view. Our proposed approach will contribute to a greater understanding of technical debt in terms of planning, strategy and implementation within IT-projects through collected data, based on real project situations and problems.