Knowledge sharing in cross-cultural software team
Knowledge Sharing in Cross-Cultural Software Teams
(Barrett.M, Oborn.E)
Judge Business School, University of Cambridge
Commentaries:
Abstract
The purpose of this analysis paper is to dissect problems that face multicultural teams, and access about means to enhance its coordination and finally performance of the team. We analyze an example of a software team working in a cross-cultural environment from “Knowledge Sharing in Cross-cultural software teams”-paper of Micheal Barrett (Jude Business School, Cambridge University) and Eivor Oborn (Department of BioSurgery and Surgical Technology, Imperial College London). They draw on a field study of a Jamaican-Indian software team to unpack how the system specification and formal coordination affected knowledge sharing and cross cultural team performance.
JAMSURE an insurance company from Jamaica, facing the reinsurance crisis in the 1990, needed a new insurance system in order to meet new requirements of the reinsurers. The company decided to implement the new general insurance system-GENSYS, which needed to be developed in house. A consultancy firm (GLOBAL) has been commissioned to cooperate with a user group at GENSURE and JAMSURE. The last one decided to create software company (GROUPIT) in order to create software needed and commercialize it internationally.
The software development (GROUPIT) have been initiated from spec* established by GLOBAL. GROUPIT development team couldn’t understand the spec properly. GLOBAL provided a short-term help. Finally the GENSURE’s information system department jointed GROUPIT. Because of inter-team conflicts GENSYS has been delivered but not fully implemented. The new software wasn’t an international success as expected.
We analyzed the case, by evaluating possible causes of the failure of the project and what practices would prevent this event through three interlinked sections: Knowledge sharing in a cross cultural context, Cross