SNAIL at the CIONet Evening: Technical Debt - Risk or Opportunity?

On September 18th, in the enchanting setting of Les 7 Meuses in Profondeville, CIONet brought together a panel of IT professionals and academic researchers to explore a major issue in digital transformation: technical debt.

Professors Xavier Devroey and Benoît Vanderose, accompanied by Nicolas Riquet, a PhD student of the team, participated to the panel to share their expertise on the strategic and organizational dimensions of technical debt. We emphasized that this debt is not limited to technological choices: it often reflects organizational compromises, tensions between standardization and creativity, and social dynamics within development teams. The evening was also an opportunity for Nicolas to highlight his industrial research and to open the discussion on how to make this debt visible, measure it, and manage it collectively, involving both IT and business teams.

Finally, on a lighter note, it was also a chance to reconnect with Jean François Gillet, a 2017 graduate of the evening master’s program and a panel member as Head of IT Architecture at the Walloon Public Service.