Improving Software Release Planning / A Systematic Approach to Handling Complexity in Software Requirements Selection

Selecting software requirements for subsequent releases of market-driven products is critical to product success but remains an intricate problem that is not fully un- derstood. Although numerous prioritization and optimization techniques have been proposed in the literature —including AHP, MoSCoW, the 100-dollar test, and more advanced models such as integer linear programming— their adoption in practice remains limited or selective. The output of such techniques is often unsatisfactory, due to missing inputs such as estimated implementation effort, stakeholder value, and clearly defined selection criteria. In this study, all factors that hinder the selection of software requirements are referred to as ‘complicating factors’. There is too little understanding of these factors. Increasing insight into these factors is one of the objectives of this study. In this thesis, a two-phase study was carried out. First, a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) identified 33 potential complicating factors. These factors were subsequently organized into a shallow hierarchy to enhance under- standing. The factors were subsequently validated through a multiple-case study involving several organizations and domain experts, producing a structured overview —enriched with the insights of case-study participants and domain experts— referred to as the Complicating Factor Framework. Second, an approach was developed to support organizations in improving how they address the factors that complicate the selection of software requirements. The purpose of this approach is not to enhance existing prioritization techniques directly. However, by mitigating the effects of some of these complicating factors, it is expected that such techniques may become more effective in practice. The approach explicitly uses the developed Complicating Factor Framework and is grounded in CIMO logic and was subsequently evaluated in an industrial setting with respect to Perceived usefulness (PU) and Perceived ease of use (PEOU), using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). The evaluation confirmed that organizations perceive the approach as both useful and usable for iteratively assessing and addressing complicating factors in their release planning process. The main contributions of this thesis are: (1) providing a clear, literature-grounded overview of complicating factors and (2) demonstrating a pragmatic, cyclical inter- vention that practitioners and researchers can apply and refine or extend in future work. These contributions advance both theory and practice in market-driven release planning.