Information Technology Workforce Skills: The Software and IT Services Provider Perspective

Goles, Tim; Hawk, Stephen; Kaiser, Kate M.

doi:10.1007/978-3-540-88851-2_5

Cited by 30 publications

(38 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…These findings extend and reinforce the message that IT professionals are expected to possess both non-technical and technical skills and that their choices are "not either/or but both" [3, p. 114]. Furthermore, preliminary findings of a follow-up study with IT software and service providers indicate that these same skills are important for all IT professionals [6,7].…”

Section: The Case For a Varied Set Of Skillssupporting

confidence: 68%

The requisite variety of skills for IT professionals

et al. 2010

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Introduction IT professionals are beset by ongoing changes in technology and business practices. Some commentators have suggested that, in order to stay competitive, IT professionals should retool themselves to gain competency in specific in-demand technical skills. This article argues that thriving in such a dynamic environment requires competency in a broad range of skills, including not only technical skills, but non-technical skills as well. Our research shows that IT departments in non-IT companies report that while both technical and non-technical skills are important, the skills most critical to retain in-house and most sought in new mid-level employees are non-technical skills such as project management, business domain knowledge and relationship skills. These skills are critical because they enable IT departments to work effectively with other departments, internal users, and external customers and suppliers. Non-technical skills leverage technical skills to augment the organization's overall effectiveness in designing and delivering solutions to meet an organization's challenges and opportunities. These findings depart from previous articles emphasizing technical skills as a basis for valuing IT workers and other research recommending business-oriented skills only for those managing IT workers, not for IT professionals themselves. Our findings lead us to the realization that in today's environment of continuous and fast-paced change, a mix of skills is essential for IT professionals. We believe that the Law of Requisite Variety can help explain the need for greater breadth of knowledge and skills among IT professionals. From cybernetics, the Law of Requisite Variety states that adapting to change requires a varied enough solution set to match the complexity of an environment. In this case, IT workers need a broad enough range of knowledge and skills to meet the demands of their increasingly dynamic and complex profession. Based on our research, we offer a framework outlining six skill categories. We believe that all six skill categories are critically important for the career development of IT professionals.

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Section: The Case For a Varied Set Of Skillssupporting

confidence: 68%

The requisite variety of skills for IT professionals

et al. 2010

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“…It involves the planning, organizing, controlling the project, and managing project risk, in order to meet the project objectives within various time and budget constraints (R. Chan & Rosemann, 2001;Goles, Hawk, & Kaiser, 2008). Reich (2007) refers to this as process knowledge in her research.…”

Section: Project Management Knowledgementioning

confidence: 99%

“…They state that this knowledge is more important and has a greater impact on project success than application domain and development method knowledge. Research done by Goles et al (2008) has found that project management skills and knowledge are one of the highest ranked skills for IT firms today.…”

Section: Project Management Knowledgementioning

confidence: 99%

Identifying the Knowledge Requirements of a New Project Entrant: An Informing Science Approach

Whyte

Minnaar

2014

InformingSciJ

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IT projects fail for many reasons. Often this is attributed to poor project management; however, knowledge, though a critical resource within organizations and projects, is often overlooked as a cause of project failure. Changes to project teams can affect the knowledge balance within the team and new entrants often have to learn large amounts of information before actively contributing to the project. This research sought to identify the knowledge requirements of new project entrants to enable them to become productive sooner. It also investigated the Inkwenkwesi knowledge model as a framework for defining the knowledge requirements of new project entrants.Employing a novel research approach, the study identified knowledge that was needed prior to starting on the project and knowledge needed during the project, which all contributed positively to the new entrant becoming productive more quickly on a project. The study also concluded that the Inkwenkwesi knowledge model was useful for defining the knowledge needed by new project entrants.

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“…As such, OOSD projects involve challenges and risks that are not encountered (at least to the same extent) in the other remote sourcing models. The primary challenge is the combining of team members from two or more companies-which may have very different organizational rules, working practices, operational systems, and governance structures-into an effective team [26].…”

Section: Related Conceptsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why They Do Not Understand -- A Model of Knowledge Discourse in the Transition Phase of Globally Distributed Projects

Wende

Schwabe

Philip

et al. 2013

2013 46th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences

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This paper contributes to the field by applying the Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) for building a model,which improves the understanding of the role of project set-up and communication in the transitionphase of projects involving global virtual teams.Although research has highlighted the importance of knowledge transfer in offshore outsourced projects, the literature says little about real-world knowledgetransfer problems experienced by project managers and provides little guidance for developing solutions. In this paper, we investigate knowledge transfer problems in the transition phase of offshore outsourcedsoftware projects and how set-up of the phaseinfluences unstructured knowledge transfer. Using the SSM, we identify relevant constructs and relationships and build a conceptual model. This highlights the importance of an appropriate communication inception as a basis for relationship building and defines a new construct, 'knowledge discourse', whichsignifies the importance of two-way interaction for the transfer of unstructured knowledge.Posted at the Zurich Open Repository and Archive, University of Zurich ZORA URL: https://doi.org/10.5167/uzh-72301 Accepted Version Originally published at: Wende, Erik; Schwabe, Gerhard; Philip, Tom; King, Gregory (2013). Why they do not understand -a model of knowledge discourse in the transition phase of globally distributed projects. In: Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences-46, Maui, Hawaii, 7 January 2013 -10 January 2013. Why They do not Understand -a Model of Knowledge Discourse in the Transition Phase of Globally Distributed Projects

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Information Technology Workforce Skills: The Software and IT Services Provider Perspective

Cited by 30 publications

References 22 publications

The requisite variety of skills for IT professionals

The requisite variety of skills for IT professionals

Identifying the Knowledge Requirements of a New Project Entrant: An Informing Science Approach

Why They Do Not Understand -- A Model of Knowledge Discourse in the Transition Phase of Globally Distributed Projects

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