Shortage of experts is a threat to major UK projects reported the Evening Standard recently, citing a "knowledge gap" whereby 70% of the companies surveyed had yet to launch plans to deal with an upcoming loss of expertise.

Ageing Europe confronts demographic time bomb agreed The Times also in June, the entire continent is in the throes of fundamental and unprecedented changes in its population... posing political, social and economic challenges which are as daunting in their scale as they are pervasive... and much of Europe is set to be engulfed by this wave of change more completely and earlier than other parts of the West, turning it into an experimental test-bed for the phenomenon.

The UK resource pool of qualified engineers and scientists is shrinking just as major infrastructure projects are ramping up.

New ways of stimulating supply, accelerating capability building and maximising effectiveness are being urgently sought by forward-thinking organisations.

KorteQ research is at the leading edge of finding the solutions.

It is notoriously difficult to deliver measurable productivity improvements within knowledge-intensive work processes, due to the reliance on tacit know-how and informal collaboration.

Academics such as Tom Davenport and Larry Prusak have helped to frame the debate. Back in 2004, Harvard professor Dorothy Leonard described the central paradox in transferring knowledge as follows: "people learn only by doing, but constantly reinventing the wheel is inefficient".

We invest in research to bridge the gap between the academic "state of the art" and current practical approaches, grounded in the reality of the daily ways of working at our clients and collaboration partners.

Recognising the importance of sector-based developments, we participate actively within relevant trade associations, develop industry-specific perspectives, gather process benchmarks and challenge our thinking in discussion with peer professionals.