Enhancing Cross-Project Learning

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Abstract
Organizations are increasingly using projects to conduct a wide range of activities. In the IT industry, in particular, projects are the basic way of working. Even in project-based organizations, there is often a problem of capturing the learning from projects so that it is available for use by other projects. Instead, each project tends to start from scratch, often making the same mistakes as others have made before. This happens even though most organizations have now instituted project reviews, which ensure that project team members capture what they have done on a particular project, codify these lessons in a written document of some kind, which is then stored on a database that others can search at a later point in time. The effectiveness of this information and communication technologies (ICT) approach to capturing and sharing project learning has not been found to be very effective. This is confirmed in the study that is reported in this article. More importantly, the author explores the reasons this approach is typically not very effective. Cross-project learning can be enhanced if project reviews focus on capturing lessons related to the processes and procedures that have been successfully used, and if these lessons are shared through social networks that project members can make use of when they need help with a problem that cannot be easily solved using the existing knowledge and expertise of team members.