Program understanding: challenge for the 1990's
IBM Systems Journal
Software tasks: intellectual or clerical?
Information and Management
Inside a software design team: knowledge acquisition, sharing, and integration
Communications of the ACM
The role of knowledge in software development
Communications of the ACM
Diversity in information systems action research methods
European Journal of Information Systems
The organism and the mechanism of projects
Communications of the ACM - The Adaptive Web
Improvisation in Small Software Organizations
IEEE Software
Knowledge and Organization: A Social-Practice Perspective
Organization Science
Job Rotation as a Learning Mechanism
Management Science
Distribution of Knowledge, Group Network Structure, and Group Performance
Management Science
Theoretical reflections on agile development methodologies
Communications of the ACM - Emergency response information systems: emerging trends and technologies
Interpretation, interaction and reality construction in software engineering: An explanatory model
Information and Software Technology
Understanding Self-Organizing Teams in Agile Software Development
ASWEC '08 Proceedings of the 19th Australian Conference on Software Engineering
A teamwork model for understanding an agile team: A case study of a Scrum project
Information and Software Technology
Flexibility in research designs in empirical software engineering
EASE'08 Proceedings of the 12th international conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering
Challenges of shared decision-making: A multiple case study of agile software development
Information and Software Technology
Challenges of applying ethnography to study software practices
Proceedings of the ACM-IEEE international symposium on Empirical software engineering and measurement
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Context: Job rotation is a widely known approach to increase knowledge redundancy but empirical evidence regarding introduction and adoption in software development is scant. A lack of knowledge redundancy is a limiting factor for collaboration, flexibility, and coordination within teams and within the organization. Objective: The scientific objective of this investigation was to explore benefits and challenges with improving knowledge redundancy among developers participating in job rotation. There were two practical objectives; (a) to establish customer support as a legitimate organizational function that would shield developers from support enquiries, and (b) to contribute to improved flexibility in project staffing by enabling overlapping product experience among developers. Method: We used action research to integrate organizational change with scientific inquiry. During a period of eighteen weeks, nine developers rotated to customer support. We collected data throughout the period of collaboration; in meetings, from comprehensive interviews, and from customer support work logs. Results: Perceptions of reduced efficiency and unnecessary redundancy outweighed benefits of shielding and learning about different products. Although there were strong indications of increased knowledge redundancy, the benefits were not sufficient to justify job rotation. Job rotation was abandoned after the trial period. Conclusions: Job rotation can contribute to improved knowledge redundancy. Benefits of knowledge redundancy include innovation stemming from integration of different knowledge domains and improved appreciation of organizational concerns. However, knowledge redundancy incurs a collective cost that must be amortized and legitimized by the organization. An adoption process that accommodates open and trustful discussion among all involved stakeholders is therefore encouraged.