Lecture 1: Introduction

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Lecture 1Introduction

• Jarmo Sarkkinen

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ICWPTAims description

• To provide an understandable, both theoretical
  and practical, introduction to the emerging field
  of implementing meaningful changes in work
  practices (WP) and technologies (T) on IT
  development projects. More specific aims include
  the following ones. To demonstrate which social
  (situational, institutional and societal) issues
  may have a central role in the course of
  implementing changes in WPT. To emphasize that
  change is more than providing IT it is also a
  matter of dealing with IT in work, as part of
  work systems and practices. To emphasize issues
  such as diversity of viewpoints, voices and
  representations of design. To emphasize what
  developer skills, qualifications and orientations
  are needed. To stress the importance of
  understanding the role of human interaction,
  intersubjectivity and understanding as factors of
  successful change processes. Finally, the aim is
  to introduce a set of methods grounding changes
  in IT upon stakeholder viewpoints, and work, work
  systems and practices.

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ICWPTLectures discussions

• 28h gt 3 cu/5 cp
• Lectures (11.1.-23.2.06) will be held on
  Wednesdays at 10-12 am (Place Auditorio) and on
  Thursdays at 10-12 am (Place Etäluokka)
• No exercises, but approx. 5 articles will be read
  and they are discussed in a couple of
  get-togethers both in groups and in public
• These get-togethers are basically mandatory (at
  least 4 of these will be arranged later)

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ICWPTExams

• Exam 1 2.3.2006
• Exam 2 on April
• Exam 3 on May
• Exam 4 on June?
• Material for exams include
• Lecture slides, your own lecture notes (be
  active!) and some book chapters and articles
  (those to be discussed plus some additional but
  easily digestible texts to be announced later)

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ICWPTStaff

• Responsible lecturer
• Jarmo Sarkkinen /Dept. of IT
• jarmo.sarkkinen_at_utu.fi
• Tel. [phone]
• Room 2158

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ICWPTMaterial

• Literature and any other relevant reading
  material will be announced as part of lectures,
  and information together with links (if possible)
  will be added on the course home page
  http//staff.cs.utu.fi/kurssit/ICWPT/ after each
  lecture.
• Lecture slides as ppt files will be accessible
  through web on the course home page after
  lectures as well.
• Distribution of articles not available on web?

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ICWPTRules of the game numerical evaluation

• Final exam 0-5
• Participation in (basically mandatory) group
  discussions with the active group participation
  in public discussions may increase group members
  final score up to the higher score in borderline
  cases

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ICWPTContent

• Four thematic parts of the course
• Conceptual basis
• The developer view
• The interaction view
• Methods of change

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Implement

• To implement is to
• put into practical effect
• carry out
• supply with implements
• An implement is
• a tool or instrument used in doing work
• a means of achieving an end
• To implement changes
• ???

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IS implementation four views

• as technology acceptance
• as organizational change
• as organizational problem-solving involving
  mutual adaptation
• as meaning construction seen through a critical
  framework as totality of meanings as part of
  social reality with (un)intended results (Myers
  1994)

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ICWPT

1. NOT a matter of requirements elicitation,
   requirements analysis or requirements planning
2. During pre-implementation (NOT actual
   implementation)
3. During early stages of ISD
4. Is a matter of changes (NOT of systems and
   technologies as such)
5. Implemented on paper or on computer (NOT as
   systems or technologies)
6. Representations of changes (NOT actual changes
   within organizations)

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ICWPT

1. To plan a change in work practices and
   technologies is already to implement it to some
   extent
2. Carried out during interaction in development
   teams
3. Is a matter of constrained construction of
   objects of change
4. Process matters (Keil 1991) (NOT factors)

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IS success

• The common belief in the development of IS has
  been that user participation is a condition for
  success, for a high-quality process of
  development and the system itself
• Positive consequences such as system usage and
  user information satisfaction may follow
• The relationship between user participation and
  system success is, after all, an issue of dispute

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Factors of success
RESPONSIBILITY
IS success (e.g., system use user satisfaction)
USER PARTICIPATION
USER INVOLVEMENT
CONTROL OVER DECISION OUTCOME
But what is (user) participation?
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IS/IT failure

• Failure rates are high
• How to define failure?
• Absolute system failure (termination failure)
• Correspondence failure
• Process failure
• Interaction failure
• Expectation failure

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Failing to learn--learning to fail

• E.g., American companies spent 59 billion in
  1995 in cost overruns on runaway IS projects
• Failing to learn from organizational experiences
• Failing to learn effective means for solving
  problems and even learning to fail
• The Taurus project (Drummond 1996)

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Model of learning failure (Lyytinen Robey
1999)
Failure to learn
Persistence of Invalid Myths-in-Use
Barriers to learning -Limits on
intelligence -Disincentives to
learning -Organizational design -Educational
barriers
Learned Failure in ISD
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Temptations behind IS/IT mess(Alter 2005)

• Technology system
• Technology is a magic bullet
• No responsibility for systems
• No performance measurements
• Superficial analysis
• One-dimensional thinking
• The assumption that desired changes will
  implement themselves

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Participation processes and interaction, and
IS/IT success

• To study participation itself, instead of
  measuring the significance of factors such as
  user involvement for the success of
  participation, the user participation process
  needs to be concerned (Cavaye 1995). As part of
  this process, the dynamics of the user-analyst
  relationship, the interaction itself, is seen to
  affect the extent and effectiveness of the
  process significantly (ibid., p.314). It is,
  however, insufficient in heterogeneous design
  teams if the focus is merely on shop-floor users.
  The participation view thus needs to extend to
  include many types of professionals, managerial
  personnel, for example (Markus Mao 2004).

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Changethree facets of IS

• System
• Group collaboration
• Organization

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Changethe system facet

• IT as a key element of change (i.e., object of
  change)
• Heterogeneity and incompatibility among systems
• The seamless IS infrastructure
• Data sharing and functionality across systems
  independently of the platform

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Changethe group collaboration facet

• People working on a common process
• Activities coordinated, contingencies dealt with,
  and practices changed through discussion and
  learning
• Unpredictability

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Changethe organizational facet

• Managing work
• Global organizational concerns, organizational
  objectives and business goals, policies,
  regulations, work flow and project plans
• Initial requirements for large systems typically
  originate in this facet

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Interrelationships between facets

• How do changes in one facet
  entail changes to another facet?

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The work system framework(Alter 2005)

• Focusing on work, not just IT
• A work system is a system in which human
  participants and/or machines perform work using
  information, technology, and other resources to
  produce products and/or services for internal or
  external customers
• Key elements include work practices,
  participants, information and technologies

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Work practice (WP)

• Rarely defined
• Practice
• habitual or customary performance,
• the act or process of doing something
  performance or action, a habitual or customary
  action or way of doing something, a habit or
  custom, or exercise of an occupation or
  profession
• WP a customary way of doing work

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Work practice (WP)

• Work practice accounts for
• the concrete and mundane activities of
  practitioners as they are encountered by the
  members of work communities in the everyday
  settings with the interest in the processes of
  interaction between practitioners and their use
  of the material media and tools as well as
  technological environment (Karasti 2001, p.26)
• The book Inside the IMF by R.H.R. Harper (1998)

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The work system framework(Alter 2005)
What is wrong with this figure?
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Final notes

• Whichever the period of ISD, current and future
  work practices and technologies are not
  necessarily separated in discussions
• There is no predetermined contents for
  discussions carried out in different periods of
  ISD
• It is normal that during requirements
  determination, people test ideas, and during
  system testing determine requirements