Knowledge sharing management in software outsourcing projects A Systematic Literature Review

Offshore software development outsourcing (OSDO) is an important paradigm in global software development. OSDO is a well known business strategy adopted by many organisations in developed countries by outsourcing their software development work to low-wages countries to get high quality software development at low cost. However, outsourcing is not a risk free business. Vendor organisations need to address a number of factors for successful outcomes of the outsourcing relationships. Knowledge sharing management (KSM)is one of the key area in outsourcing projects that is to be addressed by vendor organisations for successful outcomes. Systematic Literature Review (SLR) is based on a structured protocol, and is therefore, different from ordinary literature review. SLR provides in-depth, more thorough and comparatively unbiased results than ordinary literature review.Our findings reveal a number of critical success factors (CSFs), for vendor organisations in addressing the KSM activities. These CSFs are: face-to-face meetings, appropriate trainings, mutual trust, adoption of innovative technologies, language and cultural awareness and proper documentation.