MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATIONAL ISSUES

Introduction
Management in maintenance can be viewed

in terms of

Managing change in the software system Managing personnel.

required qualities motivational factors improving productivity different approaches that can be used to organise maintenance tasks.

Management Responsibilities
Devising a means of managing maintenance

personnel, to:

increase their productivity ensure job satisfaction improve system quality

By the way:

choice of personnel motivation make a suitable team structure education and training

Management Responsibilities
Selecting a suitable way of organizing

maintenance tasks, to:

increase productivity control maintenance effort and cost deliver a high quality system

Dependent on:

the organizational modes employed for maintenance tasks.

Enhancing Maintenance Productivity

There are several ways to maximize

productivity:

Choosing the right people for the job Motivating Maintenance Personnel

Rewards Supervision ...

Communication: given the necessary information and resources to do the job well
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Maintenance Teams
The structure of the maintenance team is an

important factor in determining the level of productivity. Team changing will be bad for productivity. Two types of team are:

The egoless programming team The chief programmer team The chief programmer team differs from egoless programming in the lack of a comparable level of democracy.
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Maintenance Teams
Base on the time, two types of maintenance team: the short-term (temporary) team the long-term (permanent) team

Personnel Education and Training

Education and training in software

maintenance is a traditionally neglected area

Personnel Education and Training

Strategies

University education Conferences and workshops Experience Service training

Organizational Modes
There is a choice between combining

development and maintenance activities or having a separate department?

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Organizational Modes
Separate Maintenance Department Its strengths are:

There is clear accountability. Allows development staff to concentrate on development of new software systems. Facilitates and motivates acceptance testing just after development. Encourages high quality end-user service.

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Organizational Modes
Separate Maintenance Department Its weaknesses are: There is a danger of de-motivation due to status differences The developers tend to lose system knowledge after the system is installed. There is a high cost involved in the coordination of development and maintenance when needed. There may be duplication of communication channels.
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Summary
A major software maintenance management

responsibility is control of personnel issues. Software maintenance productivity may be enhanced by choosing the right people, motivating them and giving them adequate resources to do the job. A good maintenance team is a very important and valuable asset to an organisation. The need for education and training is paramount and education strategies are gradually changing to become more appropriate to maintenance issues.

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Discussion
High calibre personnel would rather do software development work than software maintenance work. Explain why this is so and how, if you were a maintenance manager, you would try to attract high calibre people to work in your department. 2. You are a maintenance manager with the task of persuading top management to increase the budget for the maintenance department. In drawing up your report, what are the points you would emphasise in trying to achieve your aim?
1.

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