Success Factors in Leveraging Freelance Marketplaces in Software Development Projects

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to explore project success factors and freelance marketplace characteristics that are critical to the success of software development projects on freelance marketplaces, while identifying important metrics to measure the success of software development projects on freelance marketplaces. This exploratory study is done from the point of view of the software development services buyer. Three methodologies were developed for the purpose of this research. First, a methodology for the definition of the freelance marketplace concept and the delimitation of the field of study was followed. Second, a methodology for sourcing opinions from blogs and self-published articles was created to mine information to complement the scant specialized literature on the subject of freelance marketplace characteristics and freelance marketplace project success factors. Third, a survey methodology was used as the main data collection instrument. The findings suggest that freelance marketplaces play the role of enabler of project success factors. The most important success factors are focused on product quality, project efficiency factors, cost control factors, and qualifications of the buyer. The most important metric to measure the success of software development projects on freelance marketplaces was quality in use.