Who are Metrics Team’s Stakeholders, What Do They Expect, and How to Communicate with Them? Conducting Stakeholder Mapping with Focus on Communication in Agile Software Development Organization

Paper in proceeding, 2022

As an increasing number of organizations create metrics teams, conducting stakeholder mapping is pivotal for identifying and analyzing metrics stakeholders’ expectations for reducing the risks of miscommunication and project failure. Further, though team-stakeholder communication is essential for successful collaboration, few studies focus on it in software measurement context. This case study seeks to identify and analyze metrics team’s stakeholders, with a special focus on communication challenges in team-stakeholder contacts. Inspired by Bryson's Basic Stakeholder Analysis Techniques and Mitchell, Agle, and Wood's theoretical model for stakeholder identification, a stakeholder mapping exercise was conducted using interactive workshops and follow-up interviews with 16 metrics team members and their stakeholders. The results illustrate the complexity of identifying stakeholders in agile organizations, the importance of developing a metrics culture, and enhancing transparency in team-stakeholder communication. The study aims to contribute to the development of stakeholder theory and offers insights into communication in software engineering context.