The Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineering (IEEE) Computer Society and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) have formed a Joint Steering Committee for the Establishment of Software Engineering as a Profession (SEEEPP). The Committee's Working Groups are beginning deliberations on electronic mail, and are scheduled to complete their work before November 1995. This project presents a rare opportunity to study a technical profession coming into being. A research group of two ethics specialists and a computer science specialist have approval to monitor the activity of the Working Group on Reliability and Safety. While joining in the Working Group's deliberations, the researchers will study the factors that two powerful professions (electrical engineering and computer science) bring to bear in discussing, examining and resolving questions concerning technical, educational, and ethical standards for the new profession. The project will proceed by monitoring the e-mail of the Working Group, complemented with telephone interviews for further explanation and with participation in teleconferences or face-to-face meetings. The research team will meet monthly to analyze the process. The team expects to prepare two reports, one a research paper contributing to the understanding of professions and the development and uses of professional codes, and the other, a report assisting the Joint Steering Committee. If warranted, a proposal for a larger research project may develop out of this work.
