Culture and Cloud Transformation Services (CCX)

The research undertaken within a Greek IT organisation specialising in service provisioning to the Greek banking sector discusses the various aspects of a number of identified environment factors within five distinct IT projects which affect the requirements analysis phase. Project Management (PMBOK ® Guide 4 th ed.), IT Service Management (ITIL ® v3) and Business Analysis (BABOK ® Guide 2.0) framework practices applied to the various IT projects are highlighted in regard to improved activity execution. Project issue management, stakeholder management, time management, resources management, communication management and risk management aspects are presented. These are then linked to the identified environment factors so as to indicate the adaptability of an IT support team to changing environment factors in IT project environments and how the fulfilment of these factors can significantly contribute to effective requirements analysis and enhance the requirements management cycle.

The research undertaken within a Greek IT organisation specialising in service provisioning to the Greek banking sector discusses the various aspects of a number of identified environment factors within five distinct IT projects which affect the requirements analysis phase. Project Management (PMBOK ® Guide 4 th ed.), IT Service Management (ITIL ® v3) and Business Analysis (BABOK ® Guide 2.0) framework practices applied to the various IT projects are highlighted in regard to improved activity execution. Project issue management, stakeholder management, time management, resources management, communication management and risk management aspects are presented. These are then linked to the identified environment factors so as to indicate the adaptability of an IT support team to changing environment factors in IT project environments and how the fulfilment of these factors can significantly contribute to effective requirements analysis and enhance the requirements management cycle.

Our research focuses in software-intensive organizations and highlights the challenges that surface as a result of the transitioning process of highly-structured to DevOps practices and principles adoption. The approach collected data via a series of thirty (30) interviews, with practitioners from the EMEA region (), working in nine (9) different industry domains and ten (10) different countries. A set of agile, lean and DevOps practices and principles were identified, which organizations select as part of DevOps-oriented adoption. The most frequently adopted ITIL ® service management practices, contributing to DevOps practice and principle adoption success, indicate that DevOps-oriented organizations benefit from the existence of change management, release and deployment management, service level management, incident management and service catalog management. We also uncover that the DevOps adoption leadership role is required in a DevOps team setting and that it should, initially, be an individual role.

The contribution emphasizes research undertaken in highly structured software-intensive organisations and the transitional challenges associated to agile, lean and DevOps practices andprinciples adoption journeys. The approach undertaken to gain insights to research questions resulted in data collected, through a series of interviews, by thirtypractitioners from EMEA region (Czech Republic, Estonia, Italy, Georgia, Greece, The Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, UAE, UK) working in ninedifferent industry domains. A set of agile, lean and DevOps practices and principles that organisations are choosing to include in their adoption journeys towardsDevOps-oriented structures is identified. The most frequently adopted practices of structured service management that can contribute to the success of DevOps practices adoption are also identified. Results indicate that software product development andoperations roles in DevOps-oriented organisationscan benefit from specific leadership s...

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Risk Management has been at the heart of every kind of project; from its simplest form to its most complex structure. Best practice in project management dictates that the creation and maintenance of a Risk Register is a must-have in order to monitor and control risks throughout the endeavour of achieving project targets. The absence of Risk Management can signal the presence of uncontrolled changes which might affect a project’s success or even the organisation’s coherence. A number of global project management frameworks and methodologies have accounted for Risk Management strategies irrespective of project deliverables. This paper aims to provide a comparative overview of contemporary project management frameworks specifically for Risk Management focusing also in services management provision.

The introduction of a citizen’s Receipts Card in Greece has led to increased controversy between the public and local government authorities in regard to the benefits attempted to be gained from such an initiative. One of the main aims of the Receipts Card has been the rapid adoption of paperless transactions at Points-of-Sale (POS). This paper attempts to address the events that have led to certain adoption trends for the Receipts Card in the Greek POS market during the period of September 2011 until January 2012. In addition, pertinent risks to the Receipts Card scheme are highlighted through an investigation conducted on POS communications for software updates. Graphical depictions of POS software adoption rates of five banking institutions are compared with a prime focus to explore the causation of the adoption trends identified in Greek markets. The research also explores countervailing causative variables to trends identified.

DevOps practices and principles adoption is no longer restricted to technology-specific skills. Many studies indicate that successful DevOps adoption is part of continuous corporate transformation at all levels, and that includes cultural and behavioural patterns, process-driven perspective and toolchain readiness for usage. Our research method involves the analysis and evaluation of 30 interviews with participants from the private and public sectors in the EMEA region. Analysis and evaluation of a survey completed by 250 participants (73% from Europe) and 76% who have held previous leadership positions is also included. A mixed methods approach was used. Thirty (30) participants from consultancy firms and service provider organisations generated coded themes to expand our understanding of relevant factors. From the 250 survey participants, 81% had 10+ years of professional experience and two-thirds were currently practicing DevOps. The aim of our research was to unveil leadership-specific observations on characteristics and factors that would indicate certain reasoning behind challenges faced by organisations while transitioning to DevOps. Our results show that top leadership factors identified are: communication and collaboration, customer-centric mindset, having a technical background, and being an active listener. The least important factors identified were: gaining a relevant certification, design thinking, previous experience on transformation projects, and talent seeking.