Impact of task priority on software supply chain: a simulation approach
South Asian Journal of Business Studies
ISSN: 2398-628X
Article publication date: 25 August 2020
Issue publication date: 19 October 2021
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to improve the understanding of the role of the bottlenecks in the dynamic software development supply chains. The paper examines the effects of the task priorities in the software development and investigates the possible strategies to manage them effectively.
Design/methodology/approach
In this paper, a software development supply chain has been simulated. This includes modeling of the various sizes of software requirement, different priorities, variations in development times, quality defects, etc. The model assumes a fixed set of resources of various skills. The model is studied for the bottlenecks, throughput, work in progress (WIP), etc. under various work preemption scenarios.
Findings
The results indicate that job priorities impact the bottleneck formulation, throughput and WIP of the software development. The work interruption policies to accommodate priority jobs adversely impact the throughput. Selective introduction of interruptions by leaving the bottlenecks from interruptions helps balancing the throughput and priorities.
Research limitations/implications
The impact of the learning curve and knowledge acquisition time needed by the resources to restart the interrupted work has not been considered in this paper, which can be a future area of research.
Practical implications
The paper helps the practicing managers evaluate the dynamics of the bottlenecks with various task management approaches and comprehend the possible tradeoffs between priority and throughout.
Originality/value
The paper looks at software development from a perspective of workflow dynamics. This is a pioneer effort, as it utilizes simulation and modeling approach in understanding the software supply chains better.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This papers forms a part of special section “Management in the Era of Disruption: Insights from India”, guest edited by Vishal Gupta, Naresh Khatri and Karthik Dhandapani.The authors are grateful to the anonymous referees and the editorial team of this journal for their useful suggestions to improve the quality of the article. The authors gratefully acknowledge the motivation, feedback and help provided by Prof K. N. Singh and Dr. Yash Daulatani.
Citation
Kumar, M., Vaidya, O.S. and Srivastava, R.K. (2021), "Impact of task priority on software supply chain: a simulation approach", South Asian Journal of Business Studies, Vol. 10 No. 3, pp. 326-341. https://doi.org/10.1108/SAJBS-03-2020-0069
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2020, Emerald Publishing Limited