Abstract:
Offshore software development projects play a major role for the sustainability of Sri
Lankan IT industry drawing high revenues to the country's economy and providing
employment for youth. In a highly competitive global market, it is essential that Sri
Lankan offshore software development organizations produce high quality, cost
effective products and services meeting the expectations of overseas customers, in a
timely manner. However, knowledge gaps between client and vendor affect
negatively on software quality and client satisfaction. This characteristic of offshore
development is a challenge faced by offshore vendors all over the world. Interorganizational
knowledge transfer process, which will help to alleviate this problem to
some extent, was researched in previous studies (McLaughlin, et w 2008). However,
there is no empirical evidence in the area of offshore outsourcing software
development in the Sri Lankan context.
From the vendors' perspective, this study identified the factors, which impede the
process of business domain knowledge transferring from client to IT professionals of
Sri Lankan offshore software development vendors. The level of organizational
awareness on the significance of building business domain knowledge of IT
professionals and factors influencing building business knowledge of IT professionals
of vendor organizations were also evaluated. A conceptual framework segmented into
organizational and functional levels was used in this study to realise the objectives. A
survey among different stakeholders of offshore software development organizations
was carried out in 31 organizations in Sri Lanka.
Data indicated a high organizational awareness level on the significance of building
business domain knowledge of IT professionals. However, research findings revealed
factors such as Perceived Cost of Business Domain Knowledge Transfer, Client
Reluctance, Perceived Client Knowledge Deficiency and Inflexible Time Schedules
would make a negative impact on building business domain knowledge of IT
professionals. A project factor "Conceptual Novelty", has been found to be an enabler
for the organizations to initiate the building up process of the business domain
knowledge of IT professionals.
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