Keynote Address: How Do Companies Learn? Selected Applications from the IT Sector

Abstract

Organizational Learning is a phenomenon that is hard to grasp. In software development, as in other areas, the chance for significant improvements depends on the ability to learn from past experiences. But even here, organizational learning is not the natural consequence of a project, not even of successful projects. This can be traced back to two reasons. On the one hand, such success is frequently the result of complex interactions during the course of the project, and it is often difficult to establish a time and place relationship between cause and effect. Furthermore, assessment is done on the basis of certain interests, which often only become transparent towards the end of the project. On the other hand, company incentive systems often result in people quickly going on to the next project, and continuing to study a finished project is considered a loss of time. Thus, as expected, the learning effect is low.