Keeping up-to-date with information technology: Testing a model of technological knowledge renewal effectiveness for IT professionals

In a rapidly changing IT environment, IT professionals need to keep abreast of technological knowledge. We examined how well this is achieved by developing a motivational model of "technological knowledge renewal effectiveness." We hypothesized that (1) renewal effectiveness was influenced by the IT professional's career orientation, perceived IT dynamism, tolerance of ambiguity, delegation; and (2) that this positively affected both intrinsic and extrinsic job satisfaction. Survey data from 126 IT professionals was used to test the hypotheses. The results generally supported the research model. We discussed the implications of these results in both research and practice. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.