Educating Reflective Practitioners: The Design of an IT Management Masters Program

The IT Management Group at Umeå University, Sweden, has developed a master program in IT management with emphasis on incorporating practice in the learning process. The basic premise lies in the use of reflection-in-action as an approach to presenting students with practical problems throughout the program. We discuss the ways in which practice is at the heart of the program, both as a tool for exemplifying codified knowledge such as technical skills and methods but also as arenas for situated knowledge creation and transfer where reflection and action are intertwined. The paper ends with a discussion of the program design, challenges in implementing the reflective practice approach and competencies the students need in their future professional roles.