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Pressure for higher productivity and faster delivery is increasinglypervading software organizations. This can lead software engineers to act likechess players playing a gambit -- making sacrifices of their technically soundestimates, thus submitting their teams to time pressure. In turn, time pressurecan have varied detrimental effects, such as poor product quality and emotionaldistress, decreasing productivity, which leads to more time pressure anddelays: a hard-to-stop vicious cycle. This reveals a need for moving on fromthe more passive strategy of yielding to pressure to a more active one ofdefending software estimates. Therefore, we propose an approach to supportsoftware estimators in acquiring knowledge on how to carry out such defense, byintroducing negotiation principles encapsulated in a set of defense lenses,presented through a digital simulation. We evaluated the proposed approachthrough a controlled experiment with software practitioners from differentcompanies. We collected data on participants' attitudes, subjective norms,perceived behavioral control, and intentions to perform the defense of theirestimates in light of the Theory of Planned Behavior. We employed a frequentistand a bayesian approach to data analysis. Results show improved scores amongexperimental group participants after engaging with the digital simulation andlearning about the lenses. They were also more inclined to choose a defenseaction when facing pressure scenarios than a control group exposed to questionsto reflect on the reasons and outcomes of pressure over estimates. Qualitativeevidence reveals that practitioners perceived the set of lenses as useful intheir current work environments. Collectively, these results show theeffectiveness of the proposed approach and its perceived relevance for theindustry, despite the low amount of time required to engage with it.

Moving on from the software engineers' gambit: an approach to support the defense of software effort estimates