Review of Effort Distribution in IT Companies

Effort distribution, be it by phase or activity, is an important aspect of SDLC. Yet it is often overlooked in the process of cost estimation. Poor effort allocation is one of the root causes of rework owing to early activities being insufficiently resourced. This paper presents various phase effort distribution patterns and variation sources. The analysis results of these patterns show some consistency in effects of size of software and team size on code and test phase distribution variations, and some considerable deviations in design, requirements, and transition phases, compared with recommendations in the COCOMO model. Software size, in turn, depends on the smallmedium, medium-large companies having different schemes. Finally, the major findings of this paper discusses about threats to validity and presents general guidelines in directing effort distribution across the various software development methods, time duration of the phases of SDLC and the team strength. Based on the above factors, effort distribution can be estimated.