Predicting Attrition among Software Professionals: Antecedents and Consequences of Burnout and Engagement
In this study of burnout and engagement, we address three major themes. First, we offer a review of prior studies of burnout among IT professionals and link these studies to the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model. Informed by the JD-R model, we identify three factors that are organizational job resources, and posit that these (a) increase engagement, and (b) decrease burnout. Second, we extend the JD-R by considering software professionals’ intention to stay as a consequence of these two affective states, burnout and engagement. Third, we focus on the importance of factors for intention to stay, and actual retention behavior. We use a unique dataset of over 13,000 respondents at one global IT organization, enriched with employment status 90 days after the initial survey. Leveraging partial least squares structural equation modeling and machine learning, we find that the data mostly support our theoretical model, with some variation across different subgroups of respondents. An importance-performance map analysis suggests that managers may wish to focus on interventions regarding burnout as a predictor of intention to leave. The Machine Learning model suggests that engagement and opportunities to learn are the top two most important factors that explain whether software professionals leave an organization.
Fri 2 MayDisplayed time zone: Eastern Time (US & Canada) change
11:00 - 12:30 | Human and Social 3SE In Practice (SEIP) / Journal-first Papers / Research Track / New Ideas and Emerging Results (NIER) at 206 plus 208 Chair(s): Yuan Tian Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario | ||
11:00 15mTalk | Relationship Status: “It’s complicated” Developer-Security Expert Dynamics in ScrumSecurity Research Track Houda Naji Ruhr University Bochum, Marco Gutfleisch Ruhr University Bochum, Alena Naiakshina Ruhr University Bochum | ||
11:15 15mTalk | Soft Skills in Software Engineering: Insights from the Trenches SE In Practice (SEIP) Sanna Malinen University of Canterbury, Matthias Galster University of Canterbury, Antonija Mitrovic University of Canterbury, New Zealand, Sreedevi Sankara Iyer University of Canterbury, Pasan Peiris University of Canterbury, New Zealand, April Clarke University of Canterbury | ||
11:30 15mTalk | A Unified Browser-Based Consent Management Framework New Ideas and Emerging Results (NIER) Gayatri Priyadarsini Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, Abhishek Bichhawat Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar | ||
11:45 15mTalk | Predicting Attrition among Software Professionals: Antecedents and Consequences of Burnout and Engagement Journal-first Papers Bianca Trinkenreich Colorado State University, Fabio Marcos De Abreu Santos Colorado State University, USA, Klaas-Jan Stol Lero; University College Cork; SINTEF Digital | ||
12:00 7mTalk | A Controlled Experiment in Age and Gender Bias When Reading Technical Articles in Software Engineering Journal-first Papers Anda Liang Vanderbilt University, Emerson Murphy-Hill Microsoft, Westley Weimer University of Michigan, Yu Huang Vanderbilt University | ||
12:07 7mTalk | Best ends by the best means: ethical concerns in app reviews Journal-first Papers Neelam Tjikhoeri Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Lauren Olson Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Emitzá Guzmán Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam | ||
12:14 7mTalk | Shaken, Not Stirred. How Developers Like Their Amplified Tests Journal-first Papers Carolin Brandt TU Delft, Ali Khatami Delft University of Technology, Mairieli Wessel Radboud University, Andy Zaidman TU Delft Pre-print | ||
12:21 7mTalk | Exploring User Privacy Awareness on GitHub: An Empirical Study Journal-first Papers Costanza Alfieri Università degli Studi dell'Aquila, Juri Di Rocco University of L'Aquila, Paola Inverardi Gran Sasso Science Institute, Phuong T. Nguyen University of L’Aquila |