I am a Rutherford Discover Fellow and an Associate Professor of Software Engineering at the University of Auckland, New Zealand in the Department of Electrical, Computer, and Software Engineering. I lead the Human Aspects of Software Engineering Lab (HASEL), check it out at https://hasel.auckland.ac.nz.

My research is mainly in the human and social aspects of software engineering. I take a socio-technical perspective, considering the interaction between the social and technical aspects of software engineering. Some of my current research projects include:

• Automated Updates of Software Dependencies. Most modern software systems depend on existing software components, such as packages, libraries, or modules. When critical issues (e.g. security vulnerabilities) are discovered and fixed in a software component, the dependent software systems should include these fixes by updating to the latest version. However, changes in a software component can cause critical failures in the dependent software if the new version includes breaking changes. Each software system that depends on the component will need to update their code to accommodate these breaking changes, making it difficult to automate the update process. This project is investigating novel, advanced methods to automate this process.
• Software Developer Diversity and Inclusion. Despite the recent push to increase diversity, tech jobs remain dominated by men. Women represent less than 25% of the tech workforce at companies like Google and Facebook. The representation is even worse in Open Source Software (OSS), where less than 10% of developers are women. We know that gender diversity on software teams brings many benefits (e.g., improved productivity, innovation, and user experience). It is, therefore, critical to attract and retain women in tech. Yet, women have significantly higher turnover rates (twice as high as men), with many leaving to pursue jobs outside of tech. This project is examining barriers to retention and best practices for inclusive software teams.
• Automated Software Requirement Analytics. The modern software landscape is highly competitive. Software companies need to quickly fix reported bugs and release requested new features, or they risk negative reviews and reduced market share. Online user feedback can provide software improvement insights to software developers. However, the sheer volume of feedback makes manual analysis time-consuming and cost- prohibitive. This project investigates automated techniques to extract and present software requirements from online user feedback data across a variety of feedback channels, for example app store reviews, social media, and question and answer forums. We are also investigating the representativeness of this feedback and how more diverse user needs can be considered by these techniques.

My research has attracted both national and international funding. My research is currently funded by a Royal Society Te Apārangi’s Rutherford Discovery Fellowship, the Royal Society Te Apārangi’s Marsden Fund, the National Science Challenges Science for Technological Innovation’s Veracity Spearshead, and Google.

I employ a variety of both qualitative and quantitative empirical research methods including developing new methods and tools, data mining, repository analysis, social network analysis, interviews, and surveys. My research has been published in the IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering (TSE), Journal of Systems and Software (JSS), Empirical Software Engineering (EMSE) Journal, Information and Software Technology (IST) Journal, and in the proceedings of the International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE), Foundations of Software Engineering (FSE), Mining Software Repositories (MSR), Requirements Engineering (RE), among others. Check out my full list of publications.

I serve in many leadership positions in the software engineering research community. I serve on the program committees of various conferences and workshops including ICSE, ESEC/FSE, RE, and MSR. I am on the editorial boards of the IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, the Empirical Software Engineering Journal, and the Journal of Systems and Software. Check out my current and previous service roles.

Before starting at the University of Auckland, I was a lecturer at Auckland University of Technology. Prior to that, I was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Software Engineering Global interAction Lab in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Victoria, Canada. Previously, I worked for eight years as both a software engineer and a proposal manager at Lockheed Martin. I obtained my PhD from Drexel University in 2014. My PhD dissertation focused on methods to facilitate timely and efficient coordination between software developers. I received a MS in Information Science from Pennsylvania State University in 2008 and a BE from Villanova University in 2004.

I am originally from Philadelphia, PA, USA. I currently live in Auckland, New Zealand with my husband, Adrian, and our two children.