WikiWinWin: a Wiki-based collaboration framework for rapid requirements negotiations

2014-12-09A major challenge in the development of software intensive systems is to define requirements to satisfy the different needs of its multiple inter-dependent stakeholders. Without win-win requirements, software projects often suffer unsatisfactory outcomes. As evidenced in multiple empirical and industry studies, developing the wrong functionalities and developing the wrong user interface are among the top software risk items; making incorrect assumptions of different classes of users and the incompatible needs among these users have led to many product disasters. These top factors challenging project success clearly indicate that projects that lack stakeholder involvement and convergence perform poorly. Despite numerous software requirements methods and tools have been established, achieving WinWin outcome in practice remains a major challenge driven by multi-culture, multi-discipline stakeholders collaborating in a rapidly changing global environment. ❧ In this dissertation, I describe a Wiki-based collaboration framework (WikiWinWin) for supporting interdisciplinary stakeholders in participating requirements negotiation. The key elements of WikiWinWin are Win-Win negotiation model and equilibrium, Wiki technology, shaping practice, and stakeholder/ value dependability framework. The evaluation results of WikiWinWin from 46 software engineering projects over a three-year period at the University of Southern California indicate that more effective requirements negotiation in using WikiWinWin correlates with better project outcomes. The study identified a number of success usage factors and complementary techniques to Win-Win requirements negotiation. In addition, the study obtained quantitative information about different classes of system stakeholders’ dependability priorities to extend the top-level dependability framework. The resulting stakeholder/ value priorities lists have been valuable for subsequent project teams developing similar software to identify and negotiate more complete win-win requirements