Useful Little Things

I met with Dr. Umphress today and we agreed he will become my permanent advisor.  My next steps are to prepare a dissertation proposal, to be presented Spring 2011.  It would normally be sooner, but I have one last class to complete before the Graduate School allows me to defend my proposal.

In the immediate future, I need to identify the most fertile areas for research potential.  The foundational goal of setting up this research is to support and grow microISVs.  With that in mind, I will focus on the pain points of microISVs.  In other words, the areas in which microISV operators commonly struggle; the areas that would benefit from further exploration and formal research.

Many of these pain points are addressed or alluded to in the Business of Software FAQ and the Business of Software forum discussions.  From these sources, I can infer common topical areas (marketing, sales, accounting, etc.) that typically provide a challenge to new or existing microISV operators.  From this springboard, I will dive into other sources, such as Eric Sink’s book on the Business of Software and Bob Walsh’s book Micro-ISV: From Vision to Reality.  Lastly, I’ll scan the ACM and IEEE databases for previously published papers on entrepreneurial software companies (since the term microISV doesn’t exist there… yet).

From these sources — and my own experiences — will evolve a list of topics or subject areas in which microISV pain points will likely be found.  However, this list will be largely academic, if you’ll pardon the pun.  What we need next is to validate the list against real-world microISVs, both new and established.  The most obvious avenue for validation is a survey of microISV operators, since direct observation is out of the question.

Therefore, as part of my research, I will establish an annual microISV Pain Point Survey.  Operators of new and existing microISVs will be invited to partake in the survey, and the resulting data from the survey will offered back to the microISV community.

I believe this will fulfill a series of goals.  First, this will help guide my dissertation topic into fruitful areas.  Second, it will give back to the microISV community more than I take away.  Third, it will be instrumental in setting the long-term goals of the microISV research center.  Lastly, it will measure changes in the focus and attitudes of microISV operators from year-to-year.

Some initial thoughts on topical areas:

• General topics (marketing, accounting, sales, billing, payment providers, SEO, etc)
• Intellectual Property Issues (data ownership, anti-piracy, app signing, provisioning, recisioning, etc.)
• Software Process (methodology or lack of, testing, quality)

Next steps: Assemble committee; perform literature survey.