Bendik Bygstad | University of Oslo (original) (raw)

Papers by Bendik Bygstad

Qualitative research approaches are now well established in information systems research, and are... more Qualitative research approaches are now well established in information systems research, and are given equal weight as quantitative research in research methods courses in graduate programs. Similar, the heated paradigm debate seems to largely have cooled off, with interpretivist research now being accepted as an alternative to positivism and other paradigms. However, from the authors’ experience with teaching qualitative methods and reviewing qualitative research work, we see a growing tendency among both students and more experienced researchers to view qualitative and interpretive research as synonyms. We argue that this to some extent is due to a lack of precision in how the interpretivist paradigm is introduced in method textbooks and resources, where the rhetoric is sometimes conflated so as to indicate that all research focusing on the social and contextual aspects of technology use is by default interpretivist. On this background, our mission with this paper is to highlight...

MIS Quarterly, 2013

Sample Cases Contextual Conditions Architecture: tightly coupled (0); loosely coupled (1) Control... more Sample Cases Contextual Conditions Architecture: tightly coupled (0); loosely coupled (1) Control: centralized (0); decentralized (1) Mechanisms Adoption (A): unactualized (0); actualized (1) Innovation (I): unactualized (0); actualized (1) Scaling (S): unactualized (0); actualized (1) Outcome: unsuccessful (0); successful (1) Comb: combination of mechanisms No Case Contextual Conditions Mechanisms Outcome Comb Reference Arc Con A I S

Information Systems Journal, 2016

To what extent can software ‘travel’ to organizations and countries for which it was not designed... more To what extent can software ‘travel’ to organizations and countries for which it was not designed for, and how important are local contexts for a successful design and implementation of generic software? Information systems researchers have differing views on this, some emphasizing the strengths of the generic and others the importance of contextual aspects. Contributing to this debate, Pollock and Williams have coined the term generification in order to describe how large vendors succeed in globalizing software packages through management by community, content and social authority. In this paper, we explore an approach that we call open generification, which extends Pollock and Williams' work in the sense that we acknowledge the need for and the feasibility of generic software, but propose an alternative model for the governance of it. Open generification is not about managing the community of users attached to a software package by homogenization or segmentation but aims at addressing the diverse needs of the community the software is expected to serve. Our empirical basis is a longitudinal study of the development of an open‐source health information system software (District Health Information software version 2), which is being used in more than 47 countries. Its success is attributed to a continuous interplay between generic and specific software and continuous cycles of embedding (implementing the global in the local context) and disembedding (taking local innovations into the global). We identify and discuss the contingent mechanisms of this interplay.

European Journal of Information Systems, 2020

Two central approaches to IT-enabled organisational change are process innovation and digital inf... more Two central approaches to IT-enabled organisational change are process innovation and digital infrastructure research. In this study, we investigate the alignment between them, both from a theoretical and a practical perspective. They have quite different basic assumptions on evolution; process innovation is a top-down approach, while digital infrastructures evolve bottom-up and are partly outside direct managerial control. Our research question is, how can a process innovation initiative successfully align with an underlying digital infrastructure? Our empirical evidence is an in-depth case study at a new high-tech hospital in Norway. Building on a proposed framework of alignment between process innovation and digital infrastructure, we identify, analyse three architectural alignment mechanisms. We found that (i) the careful deployment of lightweight IT in onsite configuration, loosely coupled from the infrastructure activities, allows for fast process innovation while leveraging the slow and nonlinear evolution of infrastructure (ii) the interaction between lightweight IT and large clinical systems by a set of boundary resources resolves the tension between innovation and infrastructure. For practitioners, we show that lightweight IT can serve as a mediating technology in the configuration.

Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the... more Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the past decade. Yet, the number of empirical studies based on this perspective has so far been limited. This indicates a need for a more explicit method for critical realist data analysis. To address this, we extend former research on critical realist methodology by presenting a framework for identifying and understanding causal structures in critical realist studies, termed mechanisms. The framework consists of steps involved in identifying ...

Journal of Information Technology, 2010

Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informan... more Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informants in interpretive case study research. In line with Van de Ven's call for engaged scholarship, we Investigate how to involve the informants in case studies, not only for the collection of facts, but also in the co-construction and interpretation of the case narrative. The paper builds on a longitudinal case study, in which we explored an approach of extensive informant involvement. Using the ladder of analytical abstraction as our analytical tool, we discuss how an extended involvement of informants may enrich the Interpretive process In case study research, and increase the relevance of the findings. We discuss how and under what conditions this form of involvement may take place, and potential challenges of this approach.

Smart Working, Living and Organising, 2018

Much of the information produced in hospitals is clinical and stored for the purposes of document... more Much of the information produced in hospitals is clinical and stored for the purposes of documentation. In practice, most of it is never used. The potential of analytics is to reuse this information for other purposes. This is easier said than done, because of technical, semantic, legal and organizational hindrances. In particular, hospitals are not organized to leverage the value of big data. In this study we ask, what does it take to establish an analytics capability in a large hospital? Our empirical evidence is a longitudinal study in a high-tech hospital in Norway, where we followed the development an analytics capability, and assessed the organisational benefits. We offer two findings. First, the analytics capability is much more than the technology; it is the network of analytics technology, an analytics team and the medical and administrative decision makers. Second, we identify institutionalization, both organizationally and temporally, of the analytics process as the key success factor.

Journal of Information Technology, 2017

This paper proposes a simple terminology for understanding and dealing with two current phenomena... more This paper proposes a simple terminology for understanding and dealing with two current phenomena; we suggest calling them heavyweight and lightweight IT. Heavy-weight IT denotes the well-established knowledge regime of large systems, developing ever more sophisticated solutions through advanced integration. Lightweight IT is suggested as a term for the new knowledge regime of mobile apps, sensors and bring-your-own-device, also called consumerisation and Internet-of-Things. The key aspect of lightweight IT is not only the cheaper and more available technology compared with heavyweight IT, but the fact that its deployment is frequently done by users or vendors, bypassing the IT departments. Our theoretical lens is generativity, the idea that complex phenomena arise from interactions among basic elements. In the context of IT, generativity helps to explain the creative potential of flexible digital technology for knowledgeable professionals and users. The research questions are: how ...

Abstract. This paper aims to contribute to a theory of integration within the field of informatio... more Abstract. This paper aims to contribute to a theory of integration within the field of information systems (IS) project management. Integration is a key IS project management issue when new systems are developed and implemented into an increasingly integrated information infrastructure in corporate and governmen-tal organizations. Expanding the perspective of traditional project management research, we draw extensively on central insights from IS research. Building on socio-technical IS research and software engineering research, we suggest four generic patterns of integration: big bang, stakeholder integration, technical inte-gration and socio-technical integration. We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are ideal types. To explore the forces and challenges in these patterns, three longitudinal case studies were conducted. In particular we investigate the management challenges for each pattern. We find that the patterns are conte...

This material is brought to you by the International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) at ... more This material is brought to you by the International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) at AIS Electronic Library (AISeL). It has been accepted for inclusion in ICIS 2008 Proceedings by an authorized administrator of AIS Electronic Library (AISeL). For more information, ...

Critical realism has attracted increasing attention as an alternative to positivist and interpret... more Critical realism has attracted increasing attention as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research for explaining contemporary phenomena. There are now several sources for information systems' (IS) scholars providing guidance on conducting critical realist studies. However, the most challenging step of a critical realist data analysis, the identification of causal mechanisms, is still insufficiently described. Identifying mechanisms is challenging. Drawing on the concept of affordances as an analytical construct offers the researcher a tool to identify and analyse mechanisms. We present a step-wise framework for identifying structural components of a mechanism, how these components interact to produce an outcome and contextual influences on this outcome. We illustrate the application of the framework through an example of the identification of IS innovation mechanisms in a case study in the airline industry. In doing so, we argue that the approach offers a methodological tool for identifying generative mechanisms, helping the researcher in conducting a more precise data analysis in empirical research.

This study elucidates the organizational ripple effect of a large-scale technology-based healthca... more This study elucidates the organizational ripple effect of a large-scale technology-based healthcare enterprise development. It addresses the interplay between organizational information technology (IT) architecture and IT governance and the mediating role of inter-organizational interdependencies and coordination mechanisms. The research questions are; what ripple effect does IT architecture create in healthcare organizations, and how? What mechanisms are being used to manage them? We take a coordination perspective to conceptualize formal and informal mechanisms for implement-ing the IT architecture integration mandate, and propose an analytical framework to develop our ar-gument. Our empirical evidence is a large networked healthcare organization engaged in an IT mega-program aimed at improving clinical services through integration and standardization facilitated by an enterprise architecture practice. Based on our findings and building on coordination theory, we contribute to the enterprise architec-ture literature by providing analysis of coordination and governance challenges in enterprise archi-tecture work. The findings demonstrate that IT architecture integration and standardization in com-plex organizational settings augment organizational coordination efforts by increasing socio-technical interdependencies which necessitate coordination-oriented hybrid governance mechanisms. Large and complex organizations involved in IT-based organizational transformation need to consider: i) socio-technical interdependencies and the ensuing coordination ripple effect of their IT architecture choices and ii) address mechanisms for lateral coordination as part of their enterprise architecture and IT governance processes if socio-technical interdependencies are to be managed adequately.

NOKOBIT, Dec 5, 2011

Contemporary organisations experience an increasing pressure to change. This requires organisatio... more Contemporary organisations experience an increasing pressure to change. This requires organisational agility, ie the ability to sense and respond continuously to changes in the environment. To support this unprecedented challenge, Enterprise Architecture has been proposed as an architectural and organisational foundation. This is a rather grand promise. In this exploratory study we discuss the usefulness of the approach, building on the framework of Ross et. al. Our research question is, to what degree can medium sized ...

To what extent can software 'travel' to organizations and countries for which it was not designed... more To what extent can software 'travel' to organizations and countries for which it was not designed for, and how important are local contexts for a successful design and implementation of generic software? Information systems researchers have differing views on this, some emphasizing the strengths of the generic and others the importance of contextual aspects. Contributing to this debate, Pollock and Williams have coined the term generification in order to describe how large vendors succeed in globalizing software packages through management by community , content and social authority. In this paper, we explore an approach that we call open generification, which extends Pollock and Williams' work in the sense that we acknowledge the need for and the feasibility of generic software, but propose an alternative model for the governance of it. Open generification is not about managing the community of users attached to a software package by homogeniza-tion or segmentation but aims at addressing the diverse needs of the community the software is expected to serve. Our empirical basis is a longitudinal study of the development of an open-source health information system software (District Health Information software version 2), which is being used in more than 47 countries. Its success is attributed to a continuous interplay between generic and specific software and continuous cycles of embedding (implementing the global in the local context) and disembedding (taking local innovations into the global). We identify and discuss the contingent mechanisms of this interplay.

Journal of Information Technology, Jan 1, 2011

Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informan... more Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informants in interpretive case study research. In line with Van de Ven's call for engaged scholarship, we investigate how to involve the informants in case studies, not only for the collection of ...

Information Systems Development: …, Jan 1, 2002

The main mechanisms in the SE frameworks addressing these lessons learned are identified as itera... more The main mechanisms in the SE frameworks addressing these lessons learned are identified as iterative and incremental development and a stakeholder focus. The implication from this is that the SE frameworks, at least in the setting of in-house development projects with a certain degree of organisational flexibility, may lead to better implementation of information systems.

Information Systems …, Jan 1, 2010

We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are i... more We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are ideal types. To explore the forces and challenges in these patterns, three longitudinal case studies were conducted. In particular we investigate the management challenges for each pattern. We find that the patterns are context-sensitive and describe the different contexts where the patterns are applicable. For IS project management, the four integration patterns are a contribution to the management of integration risksextending the vocabulary for assessing and mitigating these risks in IS development. For practitioners the four integration patterns represent an analytical framework to be used in planning modern IS development projects.

Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the... more Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the past decade. Yet, the number of empirical studies based on this perspective has so far been limited. This indicates a need for a more explicit method for critical realist data analysis. To address this, we extend former research on critical realist methodology by presenting a framework for identifying and understanding causal structures in critical realist studies, termed mechanisms. The framework consists of steps involved in identifying structural components of a mechanism, how these components interact to produce to an outcome, and contextual influences on this outcome. We illustrate the application of the framework through an example of the identification of IS innovation mechanisms in a case study in the airline industry. Overall, we argue that the mechanism approach can improve empirical studies in the IS field, by providing ontological depth, creative thinking and more precise explanations.

Qualitative research approaches are now well established in information systems research, and are... more Qualitative research approaches are now well established in information systems research, and are given equal weight as quantitative research in research methods courses in graduate programs. Similar, the heated paradigm debate seems to largely have cooled off, with interpretivist research now being accepted as an alternative to positivism and other paradigms. However, from the authors’ experience with teaching qualitative methods and reviewing qualitative research work, we see a growing tendency among both students and more experienced researchers to view qualitative and interpretive research as synonyms. We argue that this to some extent is due to a lack of precision in how the interpretivist paradigm is introduced in method textbooks and resources, where the rhetoric is sometimes conflated so as to indicate that all research focusing on the social and contextual aspects of technology use is by default interpretivist. On this background, our mission with this paper is to highlight...

MIS Quarterly, 2013

Sample Cases Contextual Conditions Architecture: tightly coupled (0); loosely coupled (1) Control... more Sample Cases Contextual Conditions Architecture: tightly coupled (0); loosely coupled (1) Control: centralized (0); decentralized (1) Mechanisms Adoption (A): unactualized (0); actualized (1) Innovation (I): unactualized (0); actualized (1) Scaling (S): unactualized (0); actualized (1) Outcome: unsuccessful (0); successful (1) Comb: combination of mechanisms No Case Contextual Conditions Mechanisms Outcome Comb Reference Arc Con A I S

Information Systems Journal, 2016

To what extent can software ‘travel’ to organizations and countries for which it was not designed... more To what extent can software ‘travel’ to organizations and countries for which it was not designed for, and how important are local contexts for a successful design and implementation of generic software? Information systems researchers have differing views on this, some emphasizing the strengths of the generic and others the importance of contextual aspects. Contributing to this debate, Pollock and Williams have coined the term generification in order to describe how large vendors succeed in globalizing software packages through management by community, content and social authority. In this paper, we explore an approach that we call open generification, which extends Pollock and Williams' work in the sense that we acknowledge the need for and the feasibility of generic software, but propose an alternative model for the governance of it. Open generification is not about managing the community of users attached to a software package by homogenization or segmentation but aims at addressing the diverse needs of the community the software is expected to serve. Our empirical basis is a longitudinal study of the development of an open‐source health information system software (District Health Information software version 2), which is being used in more than 47 countries. Its success is attributed to a continuous interplay between generic and specific software and continuous cycles of embedding (implementing the global in the local context) and disembedding (taking local innovations into the global). We identify and discuss the contingent mechanisms of this interplay.

European Journal of Information Systems, 2020

Two central approaches to IT-enabled organisational change are process innovation and digital inf... more Two central approaches to IT-enabled organisational change are process innovation and digital infrastructure research. In this study, we investigate the alignment between them, both from a theoretical and a practical perspective. They have quite different basic assumptions on evolution; process innovation is a top-down approach, while digital infrastructures evolve bottom-up and are partly outside direct managerial control. Our research question is, how can a process innovation initiative successfully align with an underlying digital infrastructure? Our empirical evidence is an in-depth case study at a new high-tech hospital in Norway. Building on a proposed framework of alignment between process innovation and digital infrastructure, we identify, analyse three architectural alignment mechanisms. We found that (i) the careful deployment of lightweight IT in onsite configuration, loosely coupled from the infrastructure activities, allows for fast process innovation while leveraging the slow and nonlinear evolution of infrastructure (ii) the interaction between lightweight IT and large clinical systems by a set of boundary resources resolves the tension between innovation and infrastructure. For practitioners, we show that lightweight IT can serve as a mediating technology in the configuration.

Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the... more Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the past decade. Yet, the number of empirical studies based on this perspective has so far been limited. This indicates a need for a more explicit method for critical realist data analysis. To address this, we extend former research on critical realist methodology by presenting a framework for identifying and understanding causal structures in critical realist studies, termed mechanisms. The framework consists of steps involved in identifying ...

Journal of Information Technology, 2010

Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informan... more Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informants in interpretive case study research. In line with Van de Ven's call for engaged scholarship, we Investigate how to involve the informants in case studies, not only for the collection of facts, but also in the co-construction and interpretation of the case narrative. The paper builds on a longitudinal case study, in which we explored an approach of extensive informant involvement. Using the ladder of analytical abstraction as our analytical tool, we discuss how an extended involvement of informants may enrich the Interpretive process In case study research, and increase the relevance of the findings. We discuss how and under what conditions this form of involvement may take place, and potential challenges of this approach.

Smart Working, Living and Organising, 2018

Much of the information produced in hospitals is clinical and stored for the purposes of document... more Much of the information produced in hospitals is clinical and stored for the purposes of documentation. In practice, most of it is never used. The potential of analytics is to reuse this information for other purposes. This is easier said than done, because of technical, semantic, legal and organizational hindrances. In particular, hospitals are not organized to leverage the value of big data. In this study we ask, what does it take to establish an analytics capability in a large hospital? Our empirical evidence is a longitudinal study in a high-tech hospital in Norway, where we followed the development an analytics capability, and assessed the organisational benefits. We offer two findings. First, the analytics capability is much more than the technology; it is the network of analytics technology, an analytics team and the medical and administrative decision makers. Second, we identify institutionalization, both organizationally and temporally, of the analytics process as the key success factor.

Journal of Information Technology, 2017

This paper proposes a simple terminology for understanding and dealing with two current phenomena... more This paper proposes a simple terminology for understanding and dealing with two current phenomena; we suggest calling them heavyweight and lightweight IT. Heavy-weight IT denotes the well-established knowledge regime of large systems, developing ever more sophisticated solutions through advanced integration. Lightweight IT is suggested as a term for the new knowledge regime of mobile apps, sensors and bring-your-own-device, also called consumerisation and Internet-of-Things. The key aspect of lightweight IT is not only the cheaper and more available technology compared with heavyweight IT, but the fact that its deployment is frequently done by users or vendors, bypassing the IT departments. Our theoretical lens is generativity, the idea that complex phenomena arise from interactions among basic elements. In the context of IT, generativity helps to explain the creative potential of flexible digital technology for knowledgeable professionals and users. The research questions are: how ...

Abstract. This paper aims to contribute to a theory of integration within the field of informatio... more Abstract. This paper aims to contribute to a theory of integration within the field of information systems (IS) project management. Integration is a key IS project management issue when new systems are developed and implemented into an increasingly integrated information infrastructure in corporate and governmen-tal organizations. Expanding the perspective of traditional project management research, we draw extensively on central insights from IS research. Building on socio-technical IS research and software engineering research, we suggest four generic patterns of integration: big bang, stakeholder integration, technical inte-gration and socio-technical integration. We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are ideal types. To explore the forces and challenges in these patterns, three longitudinal case studies were conducted. In particular we investigate the management challenges for each pattern. We find that the patterns are conte...

This material is brought to you by the International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) at ... more This material is brought to you by the International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS) at AIS Electronic Library (AISeL). It has been accepted for inclusion in ICIS 2008 Proceedings by an authorized administrator of AIS Electronic Library (AISeL). For more information, ...

Critical realism has attracted increasing attention as an alternative to positivist and interpret... more Critical realism has attracted increasing attention as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research for explaining contemporary phenomena. There are now several sources for information systems' (IS) scholars providing guidance on conducting critical realist studies. However, the most challenging step of a critical realist data analysis, the identification of causal mechanisms, is still insufficiently described. Identifying mechanisms is challenging. Drawing on the concept of affordances as an analytical construct offers the researcher a tool to identify and analyse mechanisms. We present a step-wise framework for identifying structural components of a mechanism, how these components interact to produce an outcome and contextual influences on this outcome. We illustrate the application of the framework through an example of the identification of IS innovation mechanisms in a case study in the airline industry. In doing so, we argue that the approach offers a methodological tool for identifying generative mechanisms, helping the researcher in conducting a more precise data analysis in empirical research.

This study elucidates the organizational ripple effect of a large-scale technology-based healthca... more This study elucidates the organizational ripple effect of a large-scale technology-based healthcare enterprise development. It addresses the interplay between organizational information technology (IT) architecture and IT governance and the mediating role of inter-organizational interdependencies and coordination mechanisms. The research questions are; what ripple effect does IT architecture create in healthcare organizations, and how? What mechanisms are being used to manage them? We take a coordination perspective to conceptualize formal and informal mechanisms for implement-ing the IT architecture integration mandate, and propose an analytical framework to develop our ar-gument. Our empirical evidence is a large networked healthcare organization engaged in an IT mega-program aimed at improving clinical services through integration and standardization facilitated by an enterprise architecture practice. Based on our findings and building on coordination theory, we contribute to the enterprise architec-ture literature by providing analysis of coordination and governance challenges in enterprise archi-tecture work. The findings demonstrate that IT architecture integration and standardization in com-plex organizational settings augment organizational coordination efforts by increasing socio-technical interdependencies which necessitate coordination-oriented hybrid governance mechanisms. Large and complex organizations involved in IT-based organizational transformation need to consider: i) socio-technical interdependencies and the ensuing coordination ripple effect of their IT architecture choices and ii) address mechanisms for lateral coordination as part of their enterprise architecture and IT governance processes if socio-technical interdependencies are to be managed adequately.

NOKOBIT, Dec 5, 2011

Contemporary organisations experience an increasing pressure to change. This requires organisatio... more Contemporary organisations experience an increasing pressure to change. This requires organisational agility, ie the ability to sense and respond continuously to changes in the environment. To support this unprecedented challenge, Enterprise Architecture has been proposed as an architectural and organisational foundation. This is a rather grand promise. In this exploratory study we discuss the usefulness of the approach, building on the framework of Ross et. al. Our research question is, to what degree can medium sized ...

To what extent can software 'travel' to organizations and countries for which it was not designed... more To what extent can software 'travel' to organizations and countries for which it was not designed for, and how important are local contexts for a successful design and implementation of generic software? Information systems researchers have differing views on this, some emphasizing the strengths of the generic and others the importance of contextual aspects. Contributing to this debate, Pollock and Williams have coined the term generification in order to describe how large vendors succeed in globalizing software packages through management by community , content and social authority. In this paper, we explore an approach that we call open generification, which extends Pollock and Williams' work in the sense that we acknowledge the need for and the feasibility of generic software, but propose an alternative model for the governance of it. Open generification is not about managing the community of users attached to a software package by homogeniza-tion or segmentation but aims at addressing the diverse needs of the community the software is expected to serve. Our empirical basis is a longitudinal study of the development of an open-source health information system software (District Health Information software version 2), which is being used in more than 47 countries. Its success is attributed to a continuous interplay between generic and specific software and continuous cycles of embedding (implementing the global in the local context) and disembedding (taking local innovations into the global). We identify and discuss the contingent mechanisms of this interplay.

Journal of Information Technology, Jan 1, 2011

Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informan... more Recent information systems research calls for interaction between the researcher and the informants in interpretive case study research. In line with Van de Ven's call for engaged scholarship, we investigate how to involve the informants in case studies, not only for the collection of ...

Information Systems Development: …, Jan 1, 2002

The main mechanisms in the SE frameworks addressing these lessons learned are identified as itera... more The main mechanisms in the SE frameworks addressing these lessons learned are identified as iterative and incremental development and a stakeholder focus. The implication from this is that the SE frameworks, at least in the setting of in-house development projects with a certain degree of organisational flexibility, may lead to better implementation of information systems.

Information Systems …, Jan 1, 2010

We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are i... more We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are ideal types. To explore the forces and challenges in these patterns, three longitudinal case studies were conducted. In particular we investigate the management challenges for each pattern. We find that the patterns are context-sensitive and describe the different contexts where the patterns are applicable. For IS project management, the four integration patterns are a contribution to the management of integration risksextending the vocabulary for assessing and mitigating these risks in IS development. For practitioners the four integration patterns represent an analytical framework to be used in planning modern IS development projects.

Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the... more Critical realism has emerged as an alternative to positivist and interpretive research during the past decade. Yet, the number of empirical studies based on this perspective has so far been limited. This indicates a need for a more explicit method for critical realist data analysis. To address this, we extend former research on critical realist methodology by presenting a framework for identifying and understanding causal structures in critical realist studies, termed mechanisms. The framework consists of steps involved in identifying structural components of a mechanism, how these components interact to produce to an outcome, and contextual influences on this outcome. We illustrate the application of the framework through an example of the identification of IS innovation mechanisms in a case study in the airline industry. Overall, we argue that the mechanism approach can improve empirical studies in the IS field, by providing ontological depth, creative thinking and more precise explanations.

IKT-basert innovasjon i offentlig sektor. En håndbok basert på erfaringer fra Høykom-programmet... more IKT-basert innovasjon i offentlig sektor. En håndbok basert på erfaringer fra Høykom-programmet 1999–2008

Denne boken beskriver hvordan offentlig sektor kan tilby nye og gode tjenester gjennom IKT-basert innovasjon. Forfatterne beskriver prosessen og erfaringene fra regjeringens Høykom-program som ble gjennomført i årene 1999–2008. Høykom-programmet støttet statlige og kommunale prosjekter hvor ny informasjons- og kommunikasjonsteknologi ble tatt i bruk for å skape innovative tjenester og mer effektiv samhandling.

Boken vil være av stor interesse for de som i praksis ønsker å utvikle nye offentlige tjenester. Deler av boken er skrevet som en håndbok og beskriver konkret hvilke suksesskriterier og utfordringer man bør ta hensyn til for å skape vellykkede innovasjonsprosesser i offentlig sektor. Den største utfordringen ved IKT-basert tjenesteinnovasjon i offentlig sektor er ikke å få teknologien til å virke, men å få aktørene til å akseptere den nye arbeidsdelingen som teknologien gjør mulig. Dette krever et innovasjonsteoretisk perspektiv som fanger opp offentlig sektors særpreg og utfordringer. Forfatterne presenterer en rekke eksempler og caser innen helsesektoren, skole og utdanning, kommunal forvaltning, statsetater og utbygging av fysisk infrastruktur.

Gjermund Lanestedt er selvstendig konsulent og arbeider hovedsakelig med det offentlige som målgruppe – innen områdene e-forvaltning og prosjektledelse. Han ledet Høykoms sekretariat i perioden 2000–2005, og var sentral i utviklingen og gjennomføringen av programmet.

Bendik Bygstad er førsteamanuensis ved Norges informasjonsteknologiske høgskole (NITH). Han forsker på innovasjon, og satt i Programstyret for Høykom i årene 2005–2007.

Today increasing shares of mobile phones are so-called “smart phones”. They come equipped with to... more Today increasing shares of mobile phones are so-called “smart phones”. They come equipped with touchbased
screens, enabling the user to interact in an easier and efficient way, compared to standard buttons.
However, such screens require visual navigation, apparently ruling out access for the visually impaired. In
this paper we ask, how can touch-based phones be extended to be applicable for the visually impaired? Two
possible technologies are screen-readers and haptics (tactile feedback). In this paper we suggest a solution
based on a combination of voice and haptics. Design research was chosen as the methodology for the project.
Design research highlights the importance of developing a solution over the course of several iterations, and
to perform product evaluation using external participants. The research contribution is an Android based
prototype that demonstrates the new user interface, allowing the visually impaired to seamlessly interact with
a smart-phone. Operation relies on voice and haptic feedback, where the user receives information when
tapping or dragging the finger across the screen. The proposed solution is unique in several ways, it keeps
gestures to a minimum, it does not rely on physical keys, and it takes the technologies of screen readers and
haptics one step further.