Technologist engagement with risk management practices during systems development? Approaches,effectiveness and challenges

The inability to engage with systems risk during the development of integrated socio-technical systems presents a real threat to global and local socio-economic stability. Current theories on system risk engagement are driven by a functionalist orthodoxy. Accordingly, risk management is either non-existent, done in parallel to other development activity, or used by organisations as an instrument of control. Systems risk management needs to be addressed at the source of the problem: the systems engineering process. This paper addresses the predominant failure to appropriately engage with systems risk during development. It provides, with respect to the theoretical dimensions, a diversity of risk perspectives, complexity and socio-technical systems theory. A broad literature review on different risk concepts, risk management perspectives and organisational paradigms (functionalist, interpretive, radical humanist and radical structuralist) is also presented. In order to overcome a lack of a holistic and reflective risk management approach to systems development, this paper sketches an integrated soft systems methodology approach which can be used for engaging with systems risk during systems development.     

The “problem” in and of management information systems

Management Information Systems uncritically draws upon a number of disciplines for its theoretical framework. In doing so it has imported a host of ontological, epistemological and behavioral assumptions which have shaped the theories, technologies and practices of information system analysis, design and implementation. This has taken place without careful reflection upon the historical emergence of these assumptions or upon the context within which attempts are made to operationalize them. This paper argues that the Management Information Systems field is in need of researching itself. It proposes that through a combination of genealogical and ethnographic research methodologies, the historical emergence of theoretical constructs and the organizational context within which information systems operate should be critically examined. In the following analysis, the historical emergence of the “problem” as a generic construct in the Management Information System literature is examined and contrasted to the manner in which a group of manufacturing managers defined problems within their organizational context. A critical tension is revealed which suggests that information systems researchers, analysts and designers need to at least broaden their assumption about the nature of organizational reality, human behavior, information processing and problem solving.     

How does organisational absorptive capacity matter in the assimilation of enterprise information systems?

Extant literature offers two mostly distinct perspectives on enterprise systems assimilation – driven either by internal expertise and learning capability or by external institutional pressures. This study combines the two perspectives and subscribes to the view that organisations’ learning capability moderates their acquiescence to institutional pressures. The study then anchors organisational learning capability to the concept of absorptive capacity and proposes that its two dimensions – potential absorptive capacity (PACAP) and realised absorptive capacity (RACAP) – affect enterprise systems assimilation through different pathways. Our survey‐based empirical study of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems in the post‐implementation stage reveals that while both PACAP and RACAP have a positive direct impact on assimilation, PACAP positively moderates the impact of mimetic (institutional) pressures, but not normative (institutional) pressures, on assimilation; whereas RACAP positively moderates the impact of normative pressures, but not mimetic pressures, on assimilation. Thus, our theoretical contribution lies in understanding the distinct ways in which PACAP and RACAP moderate the influence of external institutional pressures on enterprise systems assimilation.     

Emergency management information systems: Could decision makers be supported in choosing display formats?

Recent information technologies make it possible to include sophisticated three-dimensional display formats in emergency management information systems (EMIS), decision-support systems that facilitate decision making in crisis situations. However, if decision makers are to improve their decisional performance, they must correctly identify appropriate situations for using these formats. We conduct two experiments and find that, as prior research has suggested, decision makers do not choose the most appropriate display format, but their performance improves when given prospective decisional guidance. We discuss implications of these findings for EMIS design, for the training of emergency management professionals, and for future research on display formats and decisional guidance.     

User experience: does it matter in complex systems?

This paper explores the concept of user experience (UX) within complex systems in the domain of nuclear power production. The specific context is the development of main control room solutions. As UX has become a prevalent concept in human–computer interaction and related research fields, it is a valid question, whether the concept could bring something new to the research concerning complex safety–critical systems also. In this paper, we introduce the concept of UX as an indicator of the users’ subjective feeling of the appropriateness of the proposed tool for the activity. Based on activity theoretical contemplation, we presume that UX is grounded in the feelings and emotions evoked in the usage of the systems and which concern the status of the whole activity. In the paper, a theory-based characterization of UXs in the particular domain is developed based on three general functions of a tool: instrument, psychological, and communicative. We present the operationalization of UX and three studies in which UXs concerning different control room systems during a control room transformation process were followed. Based on the results of the three studies, we find that the significance of UX as an indicator of quality in use lies in the ability to bring the professional users’ experiences, which are embedded in the inner characteristics of the work and not always observable by external evaluators, to the process of designing new systems. Evidence to support the initial background assumption that UXs may concern instrumental aspects of tools was identified in the studies.     

Improving information systems students’ teamwork and project management capabilities: Experiences from an innovative classroom

This paper describes an innovative teaching project that was developed and implemented to help MIS students improve their systems development “soft skills” in areas such as teamwork, group development, and project management. The project focused on improving students’ understanding of Systems Analysis and Design (SA&D) concepts by training and assigning students in an advanced SA&D course as formal team leaders and project managers for student groups in the introductory SA&D course. Students used CASE and Project Management tools to understand and apply course concepts. Faculty and students used e-mail facilities and interactive World Wide Web pages to facilitate both personal and broadcast communication among the multiple participants. This approach was used in two different semesters, with insights from the first implementation serving as the basis for improvements in the classroom activities the second time. Results suggest the pedagogical approach has significant conceptual value, but major logistical and operational problems must be overcome for successful implementation. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A comparison of ‘traditional’ and multimedia information systems development practices

As multimedia information systems begin to infiltrate organizations, there arises a need to capture and disseminate knowledge about how to develop them. Little is thus far known about the realities of multimedia systems development practice, or about how the development of multimedia systems compares to that of ‘traditional’ information systems. Herein are discussed the findings of a survey of multimedia developers in Ireland. Practitioners generally agree that systematic approaches are desirable in order to beneficially add structure to development processes, but they are predominantly using their own in-house methods rather than those prescribed in the literature.     

Can executive information systems reinforce biases?

Executive information systems represent a significant departure from traditional computer-based information systems. Advocates of executive systems claim that their systems offer the leading-edge option for making computers truly effective for supporting key management functions. This paper examines the interaction between key characteristics of executive systems and fundamental features of human thinking drawn from the field of Behavioral Decision Theory. We examine the possibility that the operation of these systems may reinforce or intensify certain biases in human information processing. We present three examples of potential bias-intensification: availability, regression effects, and overconfidence. Next, the paper applies the concept of decisional guidance to develop design implications for executive systems. Lastly, the paper offers avenues for theoretical development and empirical research.     

Does code decay? Assessing the evidence from change management data

A central feature of the evolution of large software systems is that change-which is necessary to add new functionality, accommodate new hardware, and repair faults-becomes increasingly difficult over time. We approach this phenomenon, which we term code decay, scientifically and statistically. We define code decay and propose a number of measurements (code decay indices) on software and on the organizations that produce it, that serve as symptoms, risk factors, and predictors of decay. Using an unusually rich data set (the fifteen-plus year change history of the millions of lines of software for a telephone switching system), we find mixed, but on the whole persuasive, statistical evidence of code decay, which is corroborated by developers of the code. Suggestive indications that perfective maintenance can retard code decay are also discussed     

Does the cost function matter in Bayes decision rule?

In many tasks in pattern recognition, such as automatic speech recognition (ASR), optical character recognition (OCR), part-of-speech (POS) tagging, and other string recognition tasks, we are faced with a well-known inconsistency: The Bayes decision rule is usually used to minimize string (symbol sequence) error, whereas, in practice, we want to minimize symbol (word, character, tag, etc.) error. When comparing different recognition systems, we do indeed use symbol error rate as an evaluation measure. The topic of this work is to analyze the relation between string (i.e., 0-1) and symbol error (i.e., metric, integer valued) cost functions in the Bayes decision rule, for which fundamental analytic results are derived. Simple conditions are derived for which the Bayes decision rule with integer-valued metric cost function and with 0-1 cost gives the same decisions or leads to classes with limited cost. The corresponding conditions can be tested with complexity linear in the number of classes. The results obtained do not make any assumption w.r.t. the structure of the underlying distributions or the classification problem. Nevertheless, the general analytic results are analyzed via simulations of string recognition problems with Levenshtein (edit) distance cost function. The results support earlier findings that considerable improvements are to be expected when initial error rates are high.     

Applying forensic techniques to information system risk management – first steps

Over the past 15 months we have been discussing End-to-End Digital Investigation (EEDI) and how we can use structured approaches to system modeling to help solve security incidents and perform incident post mortems. Our next task is to apply some of these techniques to information security and risk management.     

Having expectations of information systems benefits that match received benefits: does it really matter?

A study was conducted to examine the effect of implementing a new system on its users, specifically, the relationship between pre-implementation expectations and their perceived benefits based on post-implementation experience. Disconfirmation theory was used as the theoretical basis; this predicts that unrealistically high expectations will result in lower levels of perceived benefit than those associated with realistic expectations (i.e. where expectations match experience). Support was found for this prediction, refuting the predictions of dissonance theory. In addition to examining expectations of system use generally, six expectation categories were examined to identify the critical categories where managers should keep expectations from becoming unrealistically high. Significant relationships were found for three expectation categories: system usefulness, ease of use, and information quality. The results indicate that creating and maintaining realistic expectations of future system benefits really does matter.     

Does reliable information matter? Towards a trustworthy co-created recommendation model by mining unboxing reviews

Online review forums provide customers with powerful platforms to express opinions and influence business trends, while allowing firms to collaborate and co-create value with customers. However, information overload due to the huge amount of reviews posted daily complicates the efforts of consumers to locate reliable information when making a purchase decision. Therefore, this study develops a trustworthy co-created recommendation model. The proposed model mines unboxing reviews, calculates the trust scores of the reviewers, and then generates the recommended products by combing this information with customer preferences using a multi-criteria decision-making method. An illustrative example of mobile phones demonstrates the recommendation procedure of the proposed model. The proposed model is evaluated via an empirical experiment to examine the satisfaction of study participants by using a seven-point Likert scale. An analysis of the structural equation modelling results indicates that three factors (i.e. confidence in decision quality, enhanced problem-solving ability, and satisfaction with resource expenditure) significantly and positively affect the purchase decision-making process. Moreover, the proposed model outperforms a baseline model in all four factors, ultimately increasing user satisfaction. In addition to its theoretical framework for co-creating value with customers to develop a trustworthy co-created recommendation model, as supported by various theories of trust, the proposed model provides further insights into the role of customer reviews in designing recommendation models, as well as the extent to which such models impact user decisions.     

Specifying information systems for business process integration – A management perspective*

Supply chain management and customer relationship management are concepts for optimizing the provision of goods to customers. Information sharing and information estimation are key tools used to implement these two concepts. The reduction of delivery times and stock levels can be seen as the main managerial objectives of an integrative supply chain and customer relationship management. To achieve this objective, business processes need to be integrated along the entire supply chain including the end consumer. Information systems form the backbone of any business process integration. The relevant information system architectures are generally well-understood, but the conceptual specification of information systems for business process integration from a management perspective, remains an open methodological problem. To address this problem, we will show how customer relationship management and supply chain management information can be integrated at the conceptual level in order to provide supply chain managers with relevant information. We will further outline how the conceptual management perspective of business process integration can be supported by deriving specifications for enabling information system from business objectives. This work has been funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung), record no. 01HW0196.     

Gender differences in computer attitudes: Does the school matter?

In most western countries, the participation of females in ICT professional careers is not only low but is also still falling [Anderson, N., Lankhear, C., Timms, C., & Courtney, L. (in press). Because it’s boring, irrelevant and I don’t like computers’: Why high school girls avoid professionally-oriented ICT subjects. Computers & Education.]. Policy makers as well as researchers often assume that the interest of girls in computing and ICT-professions could be increased at school. For example, female teachers who are confident ICT-users, are expected to act as positive role models for girls. However, because most of the research on gender and computing has been focussing on the influence of none-school related factors, there is little empirical evidence that schools or teachers are able to influence girls’ attitude toward ICT. Using the data of a Dutch large-scale survey on ICT use in primary education (almost 4000 grade 5 students), this study explores the influence of both none-school related factors and school related factors on students’ computer attitude. Although the between-school variance of girls’ computer attitude is higher than that of boys’ computer attitude, multilevel analyses show that most of the variance in computer attitude is explained by none-school related student factors. Two school related factors turned out to have a small positive effect on the computer attitude of girls: a teacher-centred pedagogical approach and the computer experience of female teachers.     

Ordinal depth information from accommodation?

The ability to judge egocentric distance was assessed in two groups of six observers using a manual pointing task. The purpose of the study was to determine the extent to which blur-driven accommodation can provide information on target distance in the absence of any retinal cues to distance. Observers were extremely accurate when carrying out the pointing task in a 'full-cue' condition. In contrast, observers were extremely poor at carrying out the task when accommodation was the only distance cue available. Responses on individual trials bore little relationship to the actual target distance in any of the observers. On the other hand, accommodation weakly biased the mean responses in some observers. This bias appears to be due to the observers' effective use of accommodation to determine whether the target presented in one trial was nearer or further away than the target presented in the previous trial. Accommodation therefore appears to provide ordinal information, although the distance signal may actually arise from accommodation-driven vergence. The poverty of accommodation as a source of metric information was highlighted in a second group of observers who all demonstrated a strong bias when perceiving distance in the presence of an initially ambiguous retinal cue. It is concluded that accommodation can act as a source of ordinal distance information in the absence of other cues to distance but the contribution of accommodation to normal distance perception in full-cue conditions is questioned.     

Does source matter? Examining source effects in online product reviews

Drawing on the literature about online source classification, source credibility, and attribution theory, this study examines how the source of a product review influences people’s product judgments. Results from a between-subjects experiment suggest that the perceived source of a message (the visible source) impacts how people evaluate actual reviewer (the original source) and product. Reviews made by regular Internet users (visible sources) lead to greater trust in the actual reviewer (the original source), compared to product reviews from product makers. Results further indicate that visible sources play a crucial role in helping people judge the credibility of online reviews. Particularly, the identity of a visible source is used to consider the intention of original source of the message, which in turn determines message persuasiveness. The authors conclude that evaluating the intentions of online reviewers is a critical antecedent to forming opinions about online reviews and products.     

Research of information systems: from parochial to international,towards global or glocal?

The development over time of the Information Systems Journal and information systems (IS) research in general is examined by applying both quantitative and qualitative data analyses. The evidence suggests that the journal and the IS discipline have both evolved from parochial and national to become international. This evolution has influenced the phenomena and contexts being studied and, ultimately, theory and practice. Cultural and institutional differences are major obstacles to globalizing IS research. Based on a trilemma for theoretical development among generality, accuracy and simplicity, glocalization is suggested as an alternative to globalization. The merits of glocal research and education, with globally connected villages, are discussed.