Institutional Logics and Pluralistic Responses to Enterprise System Implementation: A Qualitative Meta-Analysis

Local Adaptation Without Work Intensification: Experimentalist Governance of Digital Technology for Mutually Beneficial Role Reconfiguration in Organizations

This 1.5-year ethnographic study of a U.S. medical center shows that avoiding loss of autonomy and work intensification for less powerful actors during digital technology introduction and integration presents a multisited collective action challenge. I found that technology-related participation problems, threshold problems, and free rider problems may arise during digital technology introduction and integration that enable loss of autonomy and work intensification for less powerful actors. However, the emergence of new triangles of power allows for novel coalitions between less powerful actors and newly powerful third-party actors that can help mitigate this problem. I extend the political science perspective of experimentalist governance to examine how a digital technology-focused, iterative collective action process of local experimentation followed by central revision can facilitate mutually beneficial role reconfiguration during digital technology introduction and integration. In experimentalist governance of digital technology, local units are given discretion to adapt digital technologies to their specific contexts. A central unit composed of diverse actors then reviews progress across local units integrating similar digital technology to negotiate a new shared understanding of mutually beneficial technology-related tasks for each group of actors. The central unit modifies both local routines and the technology itself in response to problems and possibilities revealed by the central revision process, and the cycle repeats. Here, accomplishing mutually beneficial role reconfiguration occurs through an experimentalist, collective action process rather than through a labor-management bargaining process or a professional-led tuning process.

Interoperability in the era of digital innovation: An information systems research agenda

Digital innovation enables new forms of cyber-physical innovation based on digital business ecosystems. However, the realization of the opportunities arising from such innovation substantially hinges on interoperability, that is, the ability of two or more systems to exchange information and understand that exchanged information. While interoperability is a long-standing topic in research and practice alike and a valuable knowledge base exists, digital innovation poses novel challenges that might not be covered by conventional wisdom. Accordingly, we review the literature and, first, propose an organizing framework for existing interoperability knowledge involving the contextual conditions of low interoperability, the mechanisms to increase interoperability, and the associated outcomes. Second, we use the framework to identify previous research foci in the scholarly discourse about interoperability and to discuss the potential limitations of this past work in light of digital innovation. Third, we propose a research agenda that enables information systems (IS) research to address the identified limitations—involving conceptual, scoping, and methodological issues—and provide specific recommendations on how to address the identified issues in future IS research. Finally, we propose five major research topics for further inquiry by combining the challenges identified in current knowledge with the current shift toward hyper-connected ecosystems underlying digital innovation.

Putting Sense and Mind into Your Enterprise Systems: A Qualitative Study of IS Assimilation in Large Public Organizations in India

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the information systems (IS) assimilation level of an enterprise system in the post-implementation phase, through the lens of IS governance mechanisms and IS support structures, impacted by the socio-cognitive processes. The research follows a qualitative approach and builds on semi-structured interviews with enterprise system stakeholders in large public sector organizations in India. The study posits that high levels of IS governance mechanisms and high levels of IS support structures lead to a high level of IS assimilation only in the presence of higher level socio-cognitive processes. A not-so-higher level of socio-cognitive fabric results in low or moderate IS assimilation levels in spite of high levels of IS governance and/or IS support structures.

Despite close to a couple of decades of IS research on enterprise systems, IS assimilation is still an enigma for practitioners and academicians. The generalizability of the results of this study may be applicable to any public organization in a developing country, like India, which are using enterprise system solutions but are yet to reap the potential benefits. The results present a way forward for practitioners to ensure optimal resources and focus for the triad- IS governance, IS support structures and socio-cognitive processes.

An empirically sound telemedicine taxonomy – applying the CAFE methodology

Aim

Because the field of information systems (IS) research is vast and diverse, structuring it is a necessary precondition for any further analysis of artefacts. To structure research fields, taxonomies are a useful tool. Approaches aiming to develop sound taxonomies exist, but they do not focus on empirical development. We aimed to close this gap by providing the CAFE methodology, which is based on quantitative content analysis.

Subject and methods

Existing taxonomies are used to build a coding scheme, which is then validated on an IS project database. After describing the methodology, it is applied to develop a telemedicine taxonomy.

Results

The CAFE methodology consists of four steps, including applicable methods. It helps in producing quantitative data for statistical analysis to empirically ground any newly developed taxonomy. By applying the methodology, a taxonomy for telemedicine is presented, including, e.g. application types, settings or the technology involved in telemedicine initiatives.

Conclusion

Taxonomies can serve in identifying both components and outcomes to analyse. As such, our empirically sound methodology for deriving those is a contribution not only to evaluation research but also to the development of future successful telemedicine or other digital applications.