Software development project rejection: A quantitative Q-factor analysis to measure cognitive learning styles of medical doctors and programmers

The origins of software development project failure are studied using a Q-sort survey for large medical organizations, both public and private, with the specific focus towards the learning ability of both medical doctors and software programmers. User ability and user learning style of the medical professionals were compared to the user ability and learning style of software program developers and logic process for writing software. For this study only one potential source of software development project failure was investigated: poor understanding of the user learning ability and style during the overall program development. The main research question focused on the self-perceived differences in software skills, abilities, and experience between medical professionals and software programmers. The second research question probed to see if a Q-sort survey could detect different cognitive learning abilities regarding software programs by medical professionals as differing from the views of software programmers. Lastly, the measurable differences in learning style for new software between medical professionals and software programmers that can be used to improve the success rates of software development project were measured. Subjects from the medical profession comprise the research population as well as professionals in the area of software development. A Q-sort analysis research tool was used to compare the two populations and determined that statistically different viewpoints regarding software applications exist between medical professionals and software developers. This information may assist software development project managers in producing software that has a decreased chance of being rejected by the medical professionals for which the programs have been developed.