Investigating traits of top performing software developers

The recruitment, development, and retention of top performing information technology (IT) professionals is a key concern within IT organizations today. It is therefore important for IT management to understand the characteristics and behaviors of high performing IT personnel in order to identify them and to create an environment conducive to their development and retention. However, the personality traits and behaviors of top‐performing developers have not received a lot of attention in the literature on IT personnel. Describes a research method for identifying and measuring the characteristics of exceptional software developers and presents the results of a pilot study using MBA students. The results of the pilot are intended to be used to refine the methodology and serve as input to future research involving IT managers. These results indicate that the research design holds the promise of providing a profile of top performing IT personnel.