Monday, June 10, 2013

PhD student in Software Engineering - University of Gothenburg, Sweden

Type of employment: Fixed-term employment, Four years - full time PhD studies
Extent: 100 %
Location: Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Lindholmen - Göteborg
First day of employment: As agreed
Reference number: UR 2013/503


The department is strongly international, with approximately 80 faculty and 70 PhD students from 30 countries. The department is a fully integrated department with University of Gothenburg and Chalmers University of Technology as principals. The positions are placed in the Software Engineering (SE) Division at the department, with University of Gothenburg as the employer. Within the SE division, research ranges from software architecture, requirements, process improvement and change management, human factors, model-driven software development development, agile processes, to verification and validation. The department includes additional strong groups within related fields of CSE; see http://www.chalmers.se/cse/EN for an overview.

Software Engineering is a strategic area at the department and activities in the field are envisaged to grow further. To this end, the Software Engineering division was founded in 2010 by University of Gothenburg and Chalmers University of Technology in a joint venture. In 2011, the Software Research Centre was established in close collaboration with industrial partners, which presents excellent opportunities to conduct research with industry. The division actively collaborates with industrial partners from the automotive and telecommunications domain.

Job assignments
The focus on psychology in software engineering (SE) has increased in the last couple of years. In order to fully understand and increase productivity, these social aspects need consideration. Very little is done in the multidisciplinary field of combining software development with social and group psychology. Some studies have been made regarding personality traits and SE, but many aspects are to be found on the group-level such as norms, culture, leadership, group development, conflict management etc. Many believe that these aspects become extra important in an agile development process.

The PhD student position focuses on integrating psychological factors into software engineering practices. The research will use a multi-disciplinary approach and rely on quantitative as well as qualitative methods. During the thesis work a new methodology to integrate social psychology aspect into software development will be developed. Examples of research question that can be addressed are: a) How can psychological (group dynamics) aspects be integrated into agile software development? b) How do improved team-level processes affect results? c) How can the effects of psychological aspects be assessed?

The doctoral program is supposed to lead to the doctoral degree, equivalent to four years of full-time studies, which includes research, studies in courses, and participation in seminars and conferences. The position extends over a maximum of five years, 20% of which consists of teaching and other duties at the department.
Eligibility
The qualifications for education on a doctoral level are: degree in advanced level, at least 240 university points, of which 60 are on an advanced level, or in an other way acquired similar knowledge.

For the present position, we require an MSc degree in Software Engineering (or equivalent) AND in social sciences (preferably a MSc in Psychology and/or Business Administration) with a high level of knowledge in statistics and research methodology. The degree should include a MSc thesis project corresponding to a minimum of half a study year, preferably longer and within a multidisciplinary field (technical and social science). We accept application from candidates that will complete their degree by summer. The studies should be of relevance for the described research area and a large number of university credits are considered an advantage (within relevant fields). We require the applicant to have excellent skills in presentation, communication, and writing. We also expect the applicant to have the ambition to take on responsibility and ability to work independently towards set goals. The student should have good social skills and find it easy to communicate and collaborate. It is preferable that the latter is also visible through contacts the student has with industry.

Assessment
Regulations for the evaluation of qualifications for education on a doctoral level are given in SFS 1998:80.
Additional information

Following documents should be included in the application:
-CV
-attested copies of education certificates, including grade reports and other documents, English language test e.g. TOEFL score,
-letters of recommendation from academic institutions and/or previous employers,
-details of your specific qualifications for the position,
-list of publications,
-relevant work such as bachelor's or master's thesis (or outline of a thesis under preparation).


Click here for further details and application

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