Organizing and managing software engineering team projects

Abstract

Industrial software development today requires a fundamental education in computer science as well as the ability to work productively and collaboratively in a team environment. Employers will therefore favor graduates who have mastered computer science and software engineering concepts and can apply them while developing a software system. To produce computer science graduates possessing the skills necessary to succeed in the workplace, team-oriented software engineering courses with real projects (and with real clients) are increasingly emphasized. It is, however, difficult to successfully present a software engineering course that covers software engineering concepts and offers opportunities to apply them during a project in a team environment. The difficulties lie in project selection, team formation, team and project organization, process management, and, finally, grading. The objective of this article is to discuss these difficulties and provide suggestions for alleviating or avoiding them. © 1996, Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.