Development of an explanatory model of cycles within development processes by integrating process and context perspective

Dynamic changes and variations play a decisive role in innovation processes. By addressing the aspect of cycles that is reoccurring temporal or structural patterns within development processes as well as in their context, this research contributes to an enhanced understanding of complex dynamic interdependencies. Therefore, two development projects are analyzed and a series of interviews with industry is conducted, aiming at deriving examples of cycles from process execution. These examples are classified according to existing approaches for describing development processes and their context. Based on this, a definition of relevance of cycles is proposed and an explanatory model of cycles and interdependencies within the development process as well as in its context is presented. Finally, the modeling approach is reviewed concerning its benefits and its applicability.