An Analysis of Kinds of Skills and Knowledge in Information System Development

Methods are important in information system development (ISD), but skills and knowledge of the participants in the project matter as well. The paper focuses on projects in the business environment, and the part of ISD that bridges the gap between the social world of the business organisation and the formal world of software development. In the theoretical part, research is discussed from quite diverse disciplines. The common factor is that all theories are in some way related to the creating, presenting and developing of new structures that will change the social environment. A case is presented for an application and analysis of the theoretical concepts, paying special attention to the importance of managing differing worldviews and different kinds of knowledge in a project. The paper shows how a design process is a complex of multiple interdependent learning cycles (a concept from Soft Systems Methodology), where different knowledge domains and different kinds of knowledge are involved. Different kinds of artefacts are involved in the coordination between the different learning cycles. An important group of artefacts has a life cycle that start as an empty shell with a suggestive name, evolving in subsequent cycles into formally and fully specified IT concepts. In the transition from the social world of business to the formal world of IT, social skills and knowledge about human behaviour is crucial in information system development.