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A Model to Evaluate Variables Impacting the Productivity of Software Maintenance Projects

Author

Listed:
  • Rajiv D. Banker

    (Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455)

  • Srikant M. Datar

    (Graduate School of Business, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305 and School of Business Administration, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213)

  • Chris F. Kemerer

    (Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139)

Abstract

The cost of maintaining application software has been rapidly escalating, and is currently estimated to comprise from 50--80% of corporate information systems department budgets. In this research we develop an estimable production frontier model of software maintenance, using a new methodology that allows the simultaneous estimation of both the production frontier and the effects of several productivity factors. Our model allows deviations on both sides of the estimated frontier to reflect the impact of both production inefficiencies and random effects such as measurement errors. The model is then estimated using an empirical dataset of 65 software maintenance projects from a large commercial bank. The insights obtained from the estimation results are found to be quite consistent for reasonable variations in the specification of the model. Estimates of the marginal impacts of all of the included productivity factors are obtained to aid managers in improving productivity in software maintenance.

Suggested Citation

  • Rajiv D. Banker & Srikant M. Datar & Chris F. Kemerer, 1991. "A Model to Evaluate Variables Impacting the Productivity of Software Maintenance Projects," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 37(1), pages 1-18, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:37:y:1991:i:1:p:1-18
    DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.37.1.1
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    Citations

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    Cited by:

    1. Rajiv D. Banker & Gordon B. Davis & Sandra A. Slaughter, 1998. "Software Development Practices, Software Complexity, and Software Maintenance Performance: A Field Study," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 44(4), pages 433-450, April.
    2. Banker, Rajiv & Natarajan, Ram & Zhang, Daqun, 2019. "Two-stage estimation of the impact of contextual variables in stochastic frontier production function models using Data Envelopment Analysis: Second stage OLS versus bootstrap approaches," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 278(2), pages 368-384.
    3. Pendharkar, Parag C., 2006. "Scale economies and production function estimation for object-oriented software component and source code documentation size," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 172(3), pages 1040-1050, August.
    4. Chandra, Pankaj & Cooper, William W. & Li, Shanling & Rahman, Atiqur, 1998. "Using DEA To evaluate 29 Canadian textile companies -- Considering returns to scale," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 129-141, January.
    5. Timo Kuosmanen & Andrew L. Johnson, 2010. "Data Envelopment Analysis as Nonparametric Least-Squares Regression," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 58(1), pages 149-160, February.
    6. Likoebe M. Maruping & Viswanath Venkatesh & Ritu Agarwal, 2009. "A Control Theory Perspective on Agile Methodology Use and Changing User Requirements," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 20(3), pages 377-399, September.
    7. Rajiv D. Banker, 1992. "Selection of efficiency evaluation models," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 9(1), pages 343-355, September.
    8. Olesen, Ole B. & Petersen, Niels Christian, 2016. "Stochastic Data Envelopment Analysis—A review," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 251(1), pages 2-21.
    9. Jradi, Samah & Ruggiero, John, 2019. "Stochastic data envelopment analysis: A quantile regression approach to estimate the production frontier," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 278(2), pages 385-393.
    10. Katrina Maxwell & Luk Van Wassenhove & Soumitra Dutta, 1999. "Performance Evaluation of General and Company Specific Models in Software Development Effort Estimation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 45(6), pages 787-803, June.
    11. Kwon, Oh Sang & Yun, Won-Cheol & Hwan An, Dong, 2005. "Market value for thermal energy of cogeneration:: using shadow price estimation applied to cogeneration systems in Korea," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 33(14), pages 1789-1795, September.
    12. Arne Katzmarzik, 2011. "Product Differentiation for Software-as-a-Service Providers," Business & Information Systems Engineering: The International Journal of WIRTSCHAFTSINFORMATIK, Springer;Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. (GI), vol. 3(1), pages 19-31, February.
    13. Rajiv D. Banker & Sandra A. Slaughter, 2000. "The Moderating Effects of Structure on Volatility and Complexity in Software Enhancement," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 11(3), pages 219-240, September.
    14. Sriram Narayanan & Sridhar Balasubramanian & Jayashankar M. Swaminathan, 2009. "A Matter of Balance: Specialization, Task Variety, and Individual Learning in a Software Maintenance Environment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(11), pages 1861-1876, November.
    15. Kuosmanen, Timo & Zhou, Xun, 2021. "Shadow prices and marginal abatement costs: Convex quantile regression approach," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 289(2), pages 666-675.
    16. Raufu Oluwatoyin Raheem, 2016. "Workflow Development Effort Estimation as Applied to Web Human Resource Management," Global Journal of Flexible Systems Management, Springer;Global Institute of Flexible Systems Management, vol. 17(1), pages 77-100, March.
    17. Kuosmanen, Timo & Zhou, Xun & Dai, Sheng, 2020. "How much climate policy has cost for OECD countries?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    18. Dai, Sheng & Kuosmanen, Timo & Zhou, Xun, 2023. "Generalized quantile and expectile properties for shape constrained nonparametric estimation," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 310(2), pages 914-927.
    19. Rajiv D. Banker & Robert J. Kauffman, 2004. "50th Anniversary Article: The Evolution of Research on Information Systems: A Fiftieth-Year Survey of the Literature in Management Science," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(3), pages 281-298, March.
    20. Anandasivam Gopal & Konduru Sivaramakrishnan, 2008. "Research Note ---On Vendor Preferences for Contract Types in Offshore Software Projects: The Case of Fixed Price vs. Time and Materials Contracts," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 19(2), pages 202-220, June.
    21. Narayan Ramasubbu & Chris F. Kemerer, 2016. "Technical Debt and the Reliability of Enterprise Software Systems: A Competing Risks Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 62(5), pages 1487-1510, May.
    22. M. S. Krishnan & Tridas Mukhopadhyay & Charles H. Kriebel, 2004. "A Decision Model for Software Maintenance," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 15(4), pages 396-412, December.
    23. Chung, William, 2011. "Review of building energy-use performance benchmarking methodologies," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 88(5), pages 1470-1479, May.

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