how the architecture decision methods deal with group decision making

Università degli Studi dell’Aquila

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Suitability of Software Architecture Decision Making Methods

for Group DecisionsSmrithi Rekha V.Amrita Vishwa, Vidyapeetham, [email protected]

Henry Muccini, Ph.D. University of L’Aquila, Italy [email protected]

@muccinihenry, henrymuccini.com

Presented @ ECSA 2014, Vienna, Austria

mailto:[email protected]

Preamble2

Multiple stakeholders are involved

Each with different concerns and goals

Decision Making

Tech. Stakeholders

Customers

…

…Business

Final User

Architects

42010:2011

Architecting = group decision-making process

Group Decision Making3

Three decades of research on group decision making in the business domain

GDM Research Perspectives

Processes and Methods Impact of factors like size, diversity, roles, tasks

Challenges

Comparative Studies: Various methods, Individual vs Group Issues: Groupthink, Group

Shift

Conflict Resolution

Process Enhancement

Pros and Cons

GDM has been studied from multiple perspectives that includes Psychology,

Organizational Behavior, Operations Research and Economics

In previous work @WICSA2014 4

how ◄practitioners► make group decisions in architecting software systems

how ◄state-of-the-practice► GDM in SA relates to ◄state-of-the-art► GDM techniques

◄challenges►companies face when making architecture-related group decisions

RQ1

RQ2

RQ3

how alternatives are evaluated

GDM methods used in practice Issues experienced in GDM

Challenges

GDML tool usage

how practitioners arrive at a consensus

drivers and decision patterns

In previous work @WICSA20145

how ◄practitioners► make group decisions in architecting software systems

how ◄state of the practice► GDM in SA relates to ◄state-of-the-art► GDM techniques

◄challenges►companies face when making architecture-related group decisions

RQ1

RQ2

RQ3

how alternatives are evaluated

GDM methods used in practice

how practitioners arrive at a consensus

drivers and decision patterns

Issues experienced in GDM

Challenges

GDML tool usage

This work: WHAT

We analyze if and how existing Architecture Design Decision (ADD) method support

Group Decision Making (GDM)

RQ1) how to evaluate the architecture design decision methods’ suitability for group decision making?

RQ2) how adequate existing architecture design decision methods are for group decision making?

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This work: WHY > 85% of the decisions made by software architects

are made by groups [1], [3] To understand how and if current ADD explicitly

manage GDM factors that may impact the decision making process

to facilitate a more democratic and robust method of SA decision-making where preferences, priorities, objectives etc., are included to make optimal decisions

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Method8

Define an Evaluation Framework

Select ADD methods

Apply the framework to the ADD methods

1

2

3

RQ1) how to evaluate the architecture design decision methods’ suitability for group decision making?

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1. Evaluation framework definition (1/3)

1. Evaluation framework definition (1/3)10

General Group Problem-Solving (GGPS), 1993 [6] (generic model of GDM)

impacts

impacts

impacts


Thomas L. Saaty and Luis G. Vargas, 2006 [5]


Problem Identification

Development of alternatives

Preference Indication

Prioritizing Group Members

Provision for conflict resolution

Group Decision Rules

Information Exchange and Recall

Revisiting Information

2. ADD methods selection[10] Falessi, et al. Decision-making techniques for software architecture design: A comparative survey. ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR) 43(4) (2011)

[16] Tofan, et al. Past and future of software architectural decisions a systematic mapping study. IST 56(8) (2014)

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Only decision-making (DM) processes/methodsDecision methods covering broad aspects of DMCoverage of different SA DMDealing with conflicting multiple objectives

We included

Output: 22 DM processes/method [17-38]

3. Evaluation framework applied to ADD methods

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Few methods present an explicit problem identification step.

At best, the process starts with identification of alternatives

A good problem identification step -> better problem space analysis ->

high quality GDM practice [5]


15









Very few methods allowfor a group to discuss and

evolve alternatives.

Multi-criteria decision-making methods must allow for the generation and filtering of

alternatives through a processof discussion and deliberation which ensures more participation

of group members [5].


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The selected methods allow for preference indication

but it is mostly individuals who rank the alternatives.

They do notseem to allow multiple stakeholders to indicate

preferences.


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(almost) none of the methodsaccount for hierarchy or

expertise differences among stakeholders.


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no method accounts forconflict management strategies.

The sources of conflict,levels of conflict and appropriate

conflict resolution styles could be applied to the SA

decision-making methods.

Collaborative style of conflict resolution is the most popular [1],

so, it shall be supported


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Very few allow for multiple stakeholder

preference and hence they alone discuss decision-rules.

(The more rigorousand scientific the decision-rule is, the better the quality of decisions made

[5], [14])


20









Two of the chosen methods seem to indicate

the presence of visual representation of information.

(Information recall has been foundto be key in making the knowledge

pool more rich)


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Only two methods are iterative in nature.

The more numberof times the group is able to

exchange information, uncover unshared information

and revisit the alternatives, the higher the quality of decisions.

Reflections

Lack of support in current architecture design decisions methods of GDM

Why: current methods may inherit and expand over state-of-the art work

(e.g., QOC) that where mostly focusing on capturing concerns, alternatives, and criteria.

need to first carefully understand how the ADD process works for individuals

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Future Work

Extend the study to ADD tools as well

Enhance one (or more) ADD methods to meet GDM requirements

Empirical studies to evaluate whether those enhancements are effective

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Related Work24

[10] Falessi, D., Cantone, G., Kazman, R., Kruchten, P.: Decision-making techniques for software architecture design: A comparative survey. ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR) 43(4) (2011)[16] Tofan, D., Galster, M., Avgeriou, P., Schuitema,W.: Past and future of software architectural decisions a systematic mapping study. IST 56(8) (2014)

For selecting ADD methods

[39] Tang, A., Avgeriou, P., Jansen, A., Capilla, R., Ali Babar, M. A comparative study of architecture knowledge management tools. JSS 83(3) (2010)

AK tools comparison

[2] Miesbauer, C.,Weinreich, R.: Classification of design decisions an expert survey in practice. In Drira, K., ed.: Software Architecture. Volume 7957 of LNCS. Springer Berlin Heidelberg (2013)

[3] Tofan, D., Galster, M., Avgeriou, P.: Difficulty of architectural decisions a survey with professional architects. In Drira, K., ed.: Software Architecture. Volume 7957 of LNCS. Springer Berlin Heidelberg (2013)

Surveys on ADD

Contacts

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Suitability of Software Architecture Decision Making Methods for Group Decisions @ ECSA2014