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his/her organization's processes - and the design of the system in order to optimize
human well-being and overall system performance. In our case, we use the theoretical
and methodological framework of course-of-action in order to analyze the activity of
software engineers within Very Small Enterprises (VSEs, up to 15-25 employees).
Recall the definition of the course-of-action in §2.1: what, in the observable activity
of an agent […] is pre-reflexive or again significant to this agent, i.e. (i) presentable, (ii)
accountable and (iii) commentable by him/her at any time during its happening […].
Software workers do not achieve complex technical gestures or do not have to progress
along a detailed procedure. So (i) presentations to an observer are quite difficult to re-
produce and presentable artifacts that are most notable and representative of the job are
the outputs of software activities and tasks. (ii) Accounts are easier to collect and ob-
serve because a minimum of traceability and reporting is performed in any organization
and if it is not sufficient, accounting can be provoked without significantly modify the
course of the activities. (iii) Comments are not natural objects and have to be provoked:
reports, self competency assessment (§ 4.3).
The course-of-action framework proposes self confrontation as an indirect means to
document actor's experience or pre-reflective consciousness or immediate understand-
ing of his/her activity at every instant t; the fact is highlighted that the experience at
instant t differs from what is called the reflective consciousness, which concerns par-
ticular and situated periods of the actor's activity, when he/she considers his/her past
activity with a given purpose [8].
However, considering these two levels of consciousness, we may think that there
are two different levels of description of software processes. The first level - on
which this paper is focused - is concerned with the day-to-day course of a software
project and its associated activities while the second level - on which most Software
Engineering standards are focused - is concerned with a description of these activi-
ties. We believe that the first level is related with theories-in-use, those that can be
inferred from action [2]. And we think that the second level is related with espoused
theories, those that an individual claims to follow. The purpose of our work is to pro-
vide an observatory of existing processes and practices that could help to situate pro-
ject processes and practices in-use regarding to espoused standards.
2.4 Application for Software Engineers in VSEs
The semiological framework of course-of-action makes it possible to describe the
courses of action in general structural terms, expressing underlying regularities. It
allows on the one hand, such a description of the global dynamics of the courses of
action, and on the other hand, such a description of their local dynamics. It also links
these two descriptions. As we discuss in §5.3, the smaller units, based on individual
courses-of-action, describe the carrying out of all or part of software engineering base
practices. Hence, the global dynamic, which is related to the composition of these
performed practices, is a description of what we may call process-in-action.
The course-of-action analysis operates on what, in the observable activity of an
agent, is presentable, accountable and commentable by him/her. A sound analysis
