The Need for Acquiring Knowledge About New Technologies

Software development is becoming a more complex domain to master due to the constant change and stream of new technologies. The result is that it “is very difficult to keep the organization ahead in the competition”. Many industries have similar problems, but the software industry is probably worse than other industries due to the fact that the pace of change is faster.

The emergence of new technologies makes software more powerful, but at the same time “new technologies is every project manager’s worst nightmare”. Every emerging technology cannot be mastered overnight and it is extremely hard to accurately estimate the cost of a project when the technologies it will be using are new and unproven, and may even change during the project.

Lack of time causes a lack of experience, constantly pushing the boundaries of an organization’s development set of skills and competencies. When developers or project managers use a technology that is new to all team members of a given project, the engineers all too often resort to the "learning by doing" approach. This often results in serious delays of projects.

Knowledge Management fosters a knowledge sharing culture within the company that helps facilitate sharing of knowledge related to new technologies. Knowledge Management also makes the point that time should be spent on actively searching for knowledge both within the organization and outside. Knowledge sharing occurs within communities of practice and interests, which can help speed up the learning curve.