  Evolving a software process model without a retrospective and, in
consequence, without an understanding of the process evolution, can lead to
severe problems for the software development organization, e.g., inefficient
performance as a consequence of the arbitrary introduction of changes or
difficulty in demonstrating compliance to a given standard. Capturing
information on the rationale behind changes can provide a means for better
understanding process evolution. This article presents the results of an
exploratory study with the goal of understanding the nature of process changes
in a given context. It presents the most important issues that motivated
process engineers changing important aerospace software process standards
during an industrial project. The study is part of research work intended to
incrementally define a systematic mechanism for process evolution supported by
rationale information.

Software Engineering