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Human Resource Allocation and Scheduling for Software Project Management

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Software Project Management in a Changing World

Abstract

Software project management consists of a number of planning, organizing, staffing, directing and controlling activities. Human resources feature prominently in all of these activities and, as a consequence, they can affect and determine project management decisions. Therefore, in order to help guarantee the success of a software project, managers must take into consideration this type of resource when performing the aforementioned activities. This chapter specifically investigates human resources from a planning perspective and, in particular, focuses on the responsibilities of allocating developers and teams to project tasks, scheduling developers and teams, as well as forming development teams. These responsibilities are often challenging to undertake because they are accompanied by time, budget and quality constraints, which software project managers find difficult to balance correctly. The purpose of the chapter is to explore the most recent research work in the field of human resource allocation and scheduling, and to specifically examine the motivation behind each approach and the goals and benefits to real-world practitioners. In addition, the chapter investigates development team formation, which can be considered as an indirect method of allocating human resources to a software project. This perspective, in particular, sheds light on current and future trends, which lean towards incorporating human-centric aspects of software development in planning activities.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, University of Cyprus, Lefkosia, Cyprus

    Constantinos Stylianou

  2. Department of Electrical Engineering/Computer Engineering and Informatics, Cyprus University of Technology, 31 Archbishop Kyprianou Avenue, 50329, Lemesos, 3036, Cyprus

    Andreas S. Andreou

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  1. Constantinos Stylianou
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Correspondence to Andreas S. Andreou .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada

    Günther Ruhe

  2. Blekinge Institute of Technology, Karlskrona, Sweden

    Claes Wohlin

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Stylianou, C., Andreou, A.S. (2014). Human Resource Allocation and Scheduling for Software Project Management. In: Ruhe, G., Wohlin, C. (eds) Software Project Management in a Changing World. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-55035-5_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-55035-5_4

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