Changing our view on design evaluation meetings methodology: a study of software technical review meetings

TL;DR

This study challenges the traditional view of design evaluation meetings (DEMs) by revealing their active role in design activities, argumentation, and cognitive synchronization, highlighting the importance of design rationale in software technical reviews.

Contribution

The paper demonstrates that DEMs involve significant design activities and argumentation, emphasizing the role of design rationale and cognitive synchronization, which were previously underestimated.

Findings

Design activities are integral to DEMs through argumentation.

Cognitive synchronization is crucial for effective evaluation.

Explicit design rationale enhances the evaluation process.

Abstract

By contrast to design meetings, design evaluation meetings (DEMs) have generally been considered as situations in which, according to DEMs methodologies, design activities are quite marginal. In a study of DEMs in software development, i.e. in technical review meetings following a particular review methodology, we showed: (i) the occurrence of design activities as part of an argumentation process; (ii) the relative importance of cognitive synchronisation as a prerequisite for evaluation; (iii) the important role played in evaluation by argumentation that makes explicit the underlying design rationale (DR). On the basis of our results, we discuss the potential for using DR methodologies in this kind of meetings.