Cost, quality and user satisfaction of software products: an empirical analysis

  • Authors:

  • M. S. Krishnan

  • Affiliations:

  • Carnegie Mellon University

  • Venue:
  • CASCON '93 Proceedings of the 1993 conference of the Centre for Advanced Studies on Collaborative research: software engineering - Volume 1
  • Year:
  • 1993

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Abstract

This paper describes an empirical study of the relationship between incurred cost and quality attributes in software development projects. Quality is measured by product failures in the field and user satisfaction is measured by customer feedback. We propose a conceptual model of software management that simultaneously considers development cost, quality and user satisfaction. The framework enables the identification of management strategies for new product enhancements and service support. The influence of quality attributes on development costs is assessed using a field dataset of 27 development projects of a leading software development company. Our results confirm that total cost of development and support of software products decreases as quality increases. Further, front-end investments in design and planning, especially for larger and complex projects, substantially reduce total cost.