Title: From local to global – path towards multicultural software engineering

Authors: Hannu Jaakkola; Jaak Henno; Petri Linna

Addresses: Tampere University of Technology (Pori), P.O. Box 300, Pori, FI-28101, Finland. ' Tampere University of Technology (Pori), P.O. Box 300, Pori, FI-28101, Finland. ' Tampere University of Technology (Pori), P.O. Box 300, Pori, FI-28101, Finland

Abstract: One of the trends in software engineering is globalisation. Software development is expert work made in closely collaborating teams. The most natural way to do this kind of work is to implement it in local teams. Distribution of expert work increases the grade of difficulty; an additional grade of difficulty appears if the organisational parts represent different cultural backgrounds. The organisations that are distributed and multicultural must be adaptive. Adaptation can be done in two ways: either to adapt the people to the organisation or to adapt the processes of the organisation to take into account the differences. There is also a lot of knowledge available concerning the differences between cultures. The aim of this paper is to analyse multicultural information and communication technology (ICT) companies. The viewpoints discussed cover the global organisation as an adaptive and learning network and the maturity of the global organisation.

Keywords: software engineering; global software development; distributed work; adaptive organisations; learning organisations; maturity models; globalisation; computer software; collaborating teams; collaboration; local teams; expert work; work distribution; difficulty grades; organisational parts; different cultures; cultural backgrounds; multicultural companies; cultural differences; ICT; information technology; communications technology; adaptive networks; learning networks; cross-cultural strategies; knowledge; computers.

DOI: 10.1504/IJKL.2011.043888

International Journal of Knowledge and Learning, 2011 Vol.7 No.1/2, pp.5 - 24

Published online: 31 Jan 2015 *

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