Cultural Models and their Interplay in Global Software-Engineering Practice

Cultural dynamics play a significant role in the unfolding of the global software practice. Research in the other disciplines have utilized the idea of cultural models to help researchers investigate cultural influence in their respective fields. Cultural models are defined as the taken-for-granted, pre-supposed models of the world that are shared widely by members of a society and that help the members understand their world and influence their behavior in that world. Utilizing this cultural models idea, we conducted an ethnographically-informed investigation of a global software practice at a large vendor organization in India to uncover some cultural models embedded in the practice. This paper presents an ethnographic account of an escalation situation that occurred in the field. Using this situation as our unit of analysis, we uncovered three cultural models - Agreement, Flexibility, and Trust Cultural Models - that appear to have influenced the organization of the behaviors of the participant members. The findings illustrate how the internalized cultural models influenced the members' behaviors to make decision that conflicted the business prospects (e.g., Agreement Model), the different members internalized different understanding of the cultural elements (e.g., Trust Model), and the cultural models tacitly played the role of "cultural blind spots" (e.g., Flexibilty Model). Thus, the research demonstrates how the technical system of global software engineering is complexly intertwined with the cultural system of its members.