Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers: A focus group study

Maya Daneva; Chong Wang; Andrea Herrmann; Nelly Condori-Fernandez

Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers: A focus group study

Maya Daneva
, Chong Wang
, Andrea Herrmann
, Nelly Condori-Fernandez

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution › Academic › peer-review

2 Citations (Scopus)

181 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

[Context/Motivation] Research on the professional occupation of Requirements Engineering (RE) in Europe and Latin America indicated soft skills are the very important when companies search for specialists to employ. A very long list of soft skills came out as a result of prior research, with proficiency in English being the Number One skill.

[Question/problem] To what extent however are these skills deemed critical in doing RE, and also in making hiring decisions in RE, and why? Which skills are to be ranked higher in regard to hiring decision, and which - lower? We want to compare results based on analyses of job ads with practitioners' perceptions in real-life organizations.

[Principal ideas/results] This live study proposal includes two focus groups with REFSQ practitioners from industry, to understand the soft skills perceived by practitioners as the most important. Each focus group is planned to include 6 to 8 persons. Then, we will use coding as the data analysis technique.

[Expected Contribution] The study is confirmatory in nature. It is expected to reveal an overlap and possible discrepancies between published analyses of job ads, and real-life experiences of practitioners in organizations.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	REFSQ-JP 2018
Subtitle of host publication	REFSQ 2018 Joint Proceedings of the Co-Located Events
Editors	Klaus Schmid
Place of Publication	Aachen
Publisher	CEUR
Number of pages	10
Publication status	Published - 20 Mar 2018
Event	24th International Working Conference on Requirements Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality, REFSQ 2018 - Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands Duration: 19 Mar 2018 → 22 Mar 2018 Conference number: 24 https://refsq.org/2018/welcome/

Publication series

Name	CEUR workshop proceedings
Publisher	RWTH Aachen
Volume	2075
ISSN (Print)	1613-0073

Conference

Conference	24th International Working Conference on Requirements Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality, REFSQ 2018
Abbreviated title	REFSQ 2018
Country/Territory	Netherlands
City	Utrecht
Period	19/03/18 → 22/03/18
Internet address	https://refsq.org/2018/welcome/

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 4 Quality Education

Keywords

Confirmatory study
Job ads
RE career
RE job market
Requirements engineer
Requirements engineering practice

Access to Document

Daneva2018understandingFinal published version, 423 KB

http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2075/

Cite this

@inproceedings{b111e39f0c924d839cc693473b12c6ff,

title = "Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers: A focus group study",

abstract = "[Context/Motivation] Research on the professional occupation of Requirements Engineering (RE) in Europe and Latin America indicated soft skills are the very important when companies search for specialists to employ. A very long list of soft skills came out as a result of prior research, with proficiency in English being the Number One skill.[Question/problem] To what extent however are these skills deemed critical in doing RE, and also in making hiring decisions in RE, and why? Which skills are to be ranked higher in regard to hiring decision, and which - lower? We want to compare results based on analyses of job ads with practitioners' perceptions in real-life organizations.[Principal ideas/results] This live study proposal includes two focus groups with REFSQ practitioners from industry, to understand the soft skills perceived by practitioners as the most important. Each focus group is planned to include 6 to 8 persons. Then, we will use coding as the data analysis technique.[Expected Contribution] The study is confirmatory in nature. It is expected to reveal an overlap and possible discrepancies between published analyses of job ads, and real-life experiences of practitioners in organizations.",

keywords = "Confirmatory study, Job ads, RE career, RE job market, Requirements engineer, Requirements engineering practice",

author = "Maya Daneva and Chong Wang and Andrea Herrmann and Nelly Condori-Fernandez",

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month = mar,

day = "20",

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series = "CEUR workshop proceedings",

publisher = "CEUR",

editor = "Klaus Schmid",

booktitle = "REFSQ-JP 2018",

address = "Germany",

note = "24th International Working Conference on Requirements Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality, REFSQ 2018, REFSQ 2018 ; Conference date: 19-03-2018 Through 22-03-2018",

url = "https://refsq.org/2018/welcome/",

}

Daneva, M, Wang, C, Herrmann, A & Condori-Fernandez, N 2018, Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers: A focus group study. in K Schmid (ed.), REFSQ-JP 2018: REFSQ 2018 Joint Proceedings of the Co-Located Events. CEUR workshop proceedings, vol. 2075, CEUR, Aachen, 24th International Working Conference on Requirements Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality, REFSQ 2018, Utrecht, Netherlands, 19/03/18. <http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2075/>

Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers: A focus group study. / Daneva, Maya; Wang, Chong; Herrmann, Andrea et al.
REFSQ-JP 2018: REFSQ 2018 Joint Proceedings of the Co-Located Events. ed. / Klaus Schmid. Aachen: CEUR, 2018. (CEUR workshop proceedings; Vol. 2075).

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution › Academic › peer-review

TY - GEN

T1 - Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers

T2 - 24th International Working Conference on Requirements Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality, REFSQ 2018

AU - Daneva, Maya

AU - Wang, Chong

AU - Herrmann, Andrea

AU - Condori-Fernandez, Nelly

N1 - Conference code: 24

PY - 2018/3/20

Y1 - 2018/3/20

N2 - [Context/Motivation] Research on the professional occupation of Requirements Engineering (RE) in Europe and Latin America indicated soft skills are the very important when companies search for specialists to employ. A very long list of soft skills came out as a result of prior research, with proficiency in English being the Number One skill.[Question/problem] To what extent however are these skills deemed critical in doing RE, and also in making hiring decisions in RE, and why? Which skills are to be ranked higher in regard to hiring decision, and which - lower? We want to compare results based on analyses of job ads with practitioners' perceptions in real-life organizations.[Principal ideas/results] This live study proposal includes two focus groups with REFSQ practitioners from industry, to understand the soft skills perceived by practitioners as the most important. Each focus group is planned to include 6 to 8 persons. Then, we will use coding as the data analysis technique.[Expected Contribution] The study is confirmatory in nature. It is expected to reveal an overlap and possible discrepancies between published analyses of job ads, and real-life experiences of practitioners in organizations.

AB - [Context/Motivation] Research on the professional occupation of Requirements Engineering (RE) in Europe and Latin America indicated soft skills are the very important when companies search for specialists to employ. A very long list of soft skills came out as a result of prior research, with proficiency in English being the Number One skill.[Question/problem] To what extent however are these skills deemed critical in doing RE, and also in making hiring decisions in RE, and why? Which skills are to be ranked higher in regard to hiring decision, and which - lower? We want to compare results based on analyses of job ads with practitioners' perceptions in real-life organizations.[Principal ideas/results] This live study proposal includes two focus groups with REFSQ practitioners from industry, to understand the soft skills perceived by practitioners as the most important. Each focus group is planned to include 6 to 8 persons. Then, we will use coding as the data analysis technique.[Expected Contribution] The study is confirmatory in nature. It is expected to reveal an overlap and possible discrepancies between published analyses of job ads, and real-life experiences of practitioners in organizations.

KW - Confirmatory study

KW - Job ads

KW - RE career

KW - RE job market

KW - Requirements engineer

KW - Requirements engineering practice

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85045469065

M3 - Conference contribution

AN - SCOPUS:85045469065

T3 - CEUR workshop proceedings

BT - REFSQ-JP 2018

A2 - Schmid, Klaus

PB - CEUR

CY - Aachen

Y2 - 19 March 2018 through 22 March 2018

ER -

Understanding the soft skills that industry wants from requirements engineers: A focus group study

Abstract

Publication series

Conference

UN SDGs

Keywords

Access to Document

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Cite this