Datasheet

might seem unusual. In fact, there are two good reasons to look at theories even
when we’re trying to be practical.
Firstly, theories allow us to consider and examine the world in ways that are
otherwise very difficult. By abstracting away much detail and considering a few
key factors, they allow us to look at the issue in hand in a new and potentially
revealing way. This provides a grounding for conducting learning and change
in practice.
Secondly, we all struggle to understand people and events around us. This
understanding then informs our own actions. In order to make sense of the
world, we all use our own set of theories. Some of these will be explicit and we
will know that we’re using a theory; other theories will be implicit and
unspoken. By looking at different theories we open our minds to different
models of the world: if these models make sense to us, they will inform our
actions in the future and change the way in which we act.
Studying theories of learning and change should better prepare us for
practising learning and change. Hopefully some of the theories given here
will change the way you see the world and might prompt you to discard some of
the theories that you’re already using. This is the start of the change process.
Terminology
This book draws on a large variety of sources from software development,
computing and information technology in general, and from the business
world. These sources use different terms for what are essentially the same
things. Although sometimes these terms refer to different things, the
underlying concept is, from our point of view, the same.
For simplicity, I’m going to consider the terms Information Technology
(IT), Information Systems (IS) and Information Technology and Communica-
tions (ITC) as synonymous. Some of the authors quoted discuss Manage-
ment Systems (MS) and Management Information Systems (IMS). Strictly
speaking, the terms refer to subsets of information systems, but the
difference isn’t important for our purposes.
This book is primarily concerned with the development of software;
that is, software development. This is a discipline necessary to all kinds of
IT(C) and it is a subset of IT. On the whole, I will use the term software
development when I am specifically discussing some aspect of the devel-
opment process and IT when I am discussing the wider dimensions.
In addition, I will use the terms firm, company and corporation as
synonyms. While these terms usually refer to profit-making entities, for
our purposes I include not-for-profit organizations within them.
The word organization is a more flexible term that may refer to a large
multinational corporation, a division of a large company, a branch office
or a single team, depending on the context or your own terms of reference.
12 Chapter 1