BEYOND THE ENIGMATIC UTOPIA: RESEARCHING FACTS AND FAILURES IN ICT PROJECTS

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BEYOND THE ENIGMATIC UTOPIARESEARCHING FACTS
AND FAILURES IN ICT PROJECTS
Jarle Brosveet
SKIKT Researchers Conference 8th April 2002
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BEYOND THE ENIGMATIC UTOPIARESEARCHING FACTS
AND FAILURES IN ICT PROJECTS

• Jarle Brosveet
• jarle.brosveet_at_hf.ntnu.no
• Centre for Technology and Society
• Department for Interdisciplinary Studies of
  Culture
• Norwegian University of Science and Technology
  (NTNU)
• 7491 Trondheim, Norway

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FACTS AND NEW KNOWLEDGE

• Interrelationship between users and developers
  as experienced in three different Norwegian ICT
  research projects by
• assessing the attitudes and outlook of developers
  and users
• giving an appraisal of how various attitudes
  influenced the outcome of these three research
  projects
• focusing on the systems engineering background of
  designers of ICT systems.

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RECENT EXPERIENCE

• Pros
• Systems engineering theory and practice is
  currently undergoing rapid change so as to
  encourage focus on social and cultural elements
  vital to the successful completion of systems
  engineering projects.
• Cons
• Attitudes towards the outside social researcher
  can be troublesome when it comes to investigating
  the interrelationship between users and
  developers.

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HOW TO ESTABLISH FACTS?

• Problems
• No agreement as to who is responsible
• No agreement as to the shortcomings
• Claims change continually
• Facts appear to be highly negotiable
• Social constructivist approach (Latour)
• - role-definition strategies
• - scenario-building strategies

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THREE PROJECTS

• The municipal service bureaux case
• 1950s-1990s Rise and fall
• The Fredrikstad electronic highway case
• 1997-1999 No rise
• The medical ICT case 2000-2001
• State of flux

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MUNICIPAL SERVICE BUREAUX (1)

• Seven institutions for the outsourcing of
  municipal ICT solutions
• 1950s-1960s Success story
• 1960s-1980s Concept eroded with the introduction
  of new technology and changes in user sentiment

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MUNICIPAL SERVICE BUREAUX (2)

• Interviews
• Retired managing directors accused user-owners of
  being uncooperative and acted as if the
  interviewer were an investigator dispatched by
  one of their previous user-owners.

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FREDRIKSTAD ELECTRONIC HIGHWAY (1)

• Believed to contribute to increased industrial
  activity in an economically backward region
• 1997 Feasibility study completed with
  participation of user groups
• User groups specifications proved inconclusive
  and major telecom provider, Telenor was called
  upon
• May 1999 Project terminated

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FREDRIKSTAD ELECTRONIC HIGHWAY (2)

• Interviews
• Technocrats found to be blameworthy, user aspects
  overlooked despite participation of user groups

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MEDICAL ICT (1)

• Intended to follow the actions of developers and
  users (laboratory study)
• 2000 Denial to follow ORBIT project, denial to
  follow KVALIS project
• 2001 Patient statistics register project not
  initiated
• 2002 Feasibility study concerning electronic
  patient journal research centre

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MEDICAL ICT (2)

• No interviews, instead participatory research
• Technocrats uncooperative, so reliance on
  participation in feasibility study within social
  medicine

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WHO'S AFRAID OF THE BIG BAD WOLF

• Municipal service bureaux case Developers not
  entirely honest, users overstating criticism
• Fredrikstad electronic highway Ambiguous sense
  of guilt for terminating project
• Medical ICT Developers uncooperative, users
  mostly silent or indifferent

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GREAT EXPECTATIONS (1)

• The incomplete learning process.
• Developers are often at a loss to determine
• what knowledge is applicable to new situations
• how re-usable knowledge can be derived from what
  they experience.

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GREAT EXPECTATIONS (2)

• When knowledge is structured or codified,
  traditional systems engineering methods are
  looked upon by developers as being sufficient if
  user requirements are simple.
• The importance of unstructured and tacit
  knowledge is underestimated

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KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES

• Codification strategy
• Personalization strategy
• See Table 2 in text.

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PRIDE AND PREJUDICE

• Difficulties in dealing with developers
• Developers pride being hurt
• group dominance at work
• socialization of researcher into group
• threat of exclusion of researcher

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REAPPRAISAL AND CONCLUSIONS (1)

• It appears that the attitudes of developers and
  users towards cooperating with the social
  researcher depend on the combined activity levels
  of these two groups.
• The possibility of success is greatest in cases
  where developers and users alike are presently
  inactive.

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REAPPRAISAL AND CONCLUSIONS (2)

• In all other instances, developers as well as
  users tend to be weary of the intruding social
  scientist so as to render interviews ineffective
  or even refuse to be cooperative in providing
  insight into the social and contextual
  implications of the systems engineering process.
• See Table 3 in text.

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