Geographical Distance Issues and their Mitigation Strategies in GSD: A Systematic Literature Review towards Conceptual Framework

Global Software Development (GSD) practice has been increasingly emerging in the software industry in the last few decades because of its incentives. However, GSD is not a simple process organization also have to face several challenges. Communication between dispersed teams is the most critical risk in GSD. Communication risk is further divided into geographical, temporal, and cultural distance risks. Among these risks, geographical distance risks are critical, and they produce significant problems in GSD projects. Thus, it leads the project toward failure. The main objective of this research is to identify geographical distance risks and their mitigation strategies to alleviate the identified risks through a systematic literature review. A total of 8 geographical distance risks and best practices used to mitigate these risks were identified from the literature.