Global Manager: A Serious Game to Raise Awareness of the Challenges of Being a Project Manager in Global Software Development

Autor/inn/en	Vizcaíno, Aurora; García, Félix O.; Menéndez, Víctor Hugo; Manjavacas, Antonio; Márquez, Rubén; Molina, Marta
Titel	Global Manager: A Serious Game to Raise Awareness of the Challenges of Being a Project Manager in Global Software Development
Quelle	In: ACM Transactions on Computing Education, 23 (2023) 2, Artikel 30 (31 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Zusatzinformation	ORCID (Vizcaíno, Aurora) ORCID (García, Félix O.) ORCID (Menéndez, Víctor Hugo) ORCID (Manjavacas, Antonio) ORCID (Márquez, Rubén) ORCID (Molina, Marta)
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
Schlagwörter	Educational Games; Game Based Learning; Program Administration; Administrators; Computer Software; Soft Skills; Skill Development; Global Approach + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Educational game; Lernspiel; Kompetenzentwicklung; Qualifikationsentwicklung; Globales Denken
Abstract	Project managers tend to confront multiple challenges in Global Software Development (GSD), including misunderstandings about the project requirements, complex estimations of costs, risks, and efforts, along with increases in task allocation and a lack of coordination. "Soft skills" play a fundamental role in solving these challenges, as they are the human or social abilities that facilitate the resolution of conflicts and involve dealing with people and managing projects in their most social and creative dimension. However, developing the soft skills that allow project managers to lead in an effective manner is not an easy task, especially in global or distributed environments, where coordination and control problems are commonplace. One suitable mechanism with which to develop these soft skills is that of serious games, which focus on learning by doing and allow users to simulate real scenarios. The authors of this article are aware of the usefulness of this type of teaching method and have, therefore, developed the serious game described herein. This serious game is denominated as Global Manager and is focused on helping both students and novice project managers to become aware of the factors that may affect GSD projects. Global Manager was evaluated by means of a quasi-experiment based on a pretest-posttest design, which was used to assess whether the game can increase the players' awareness and knowledge of the factors that a project manager should consider in GSD projects. The results obtained after evaluating the game were quite satisfactory, as the game taught the players to differentiate between global and distributed software projects and to experience situations that may and do occur in these settings. Furthermore, Global Manager helped improve players' perceptions of the importance of different influencing factors in GSD. (As Provided).
Anmerkungen	Association for Computing Machinery. 2 Penn Plaza Suite 701, New York, NY 10121. Tel: 800-342-6626; Tel: 212-626-0500; Fax: 212-944-1318; e-mail: acmhelp@acm.org; Web site: http://toce.acm.org/
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01