Social issues in the collection and use of software metric data position paper: metrics: promise vs. implementation

Ten years ago claims where made that the collection and use of software metric data would greatly improve the software development process and increase software quality. Today, after years of trying to establish metric programs, we have learned a great deal about the cultural and technical changes necessary to establish a metric program. The author's position is that social issues are the major difficulty in initiating a metric program. People fear reporting "numbers" to management. The author believes that social difficulties can be overcome with education and successful use of metric data.