UMAM-Q: An instrument to assess the intention to use software development methodologies

The Software Engineering discipline has devoted much effort to the definition of new methods and paradigms that, even if empirically proven to provide certain gains in terms of process productivity and product quality, are difficult to transfer to industry. We claim that this fact is largely due to methodologists not taking into account the - largely subjective - set of variables that influence innovation adoption, together with its tailoring and operationalization to the particulars of software methodologies: we lack reliable and valid measurement instruments that allow for the early detection of methodologies weaknesses with respect to their ability to catch among practitioners. This paper reports on the development of one such instrument designed to measure the various perceptions that an individual may have with respect to adopting a software development methodology innovation. Our questionnaire is aimed at allowing methodologists not only to compare their methodologies with respect to others - in terms of variables such as ease of use, usefulness or compatibility - but also to avoid well-known mistakes such as forcing - as opposed to convincing - method adoption in organizations.