Author: joaovcunha

Phenomenography is a qualitative method used in research on education. See here for an explanation. It also has some promise in management research, cf. this paper. It is a bit too interpretive for my own taste (focus on meaning instead of practice). However, I am intrigued by the focus on individual differences which is lacking from practice studies and from other interpretive methods in management research. Take a look and let me know what you think.

On the video below, I apply the distinction between gardeners and architects to academic writing.

If you want to listen to a great discussion of the original concept in fiction and literature, the video below by Brandon Sanderson is worth the watch.

In the video below I show how I moved from a rough outline to a clean outline for the theory section of a paper. Enjoy!

Final outline (paragraphs with asterisks are quotes from papers)

0. The current model of IS success and some of its applications offer some openings to improve the specification of agency therein, and highlight the challenges that need to be addressed when doing so. 0.*. Contrasting this model with the broader specification of the role of agency in IS provides a template / path to improve the role of agency in the model of IS success and outlines some of the benefits that justify doing so. 

1. The opportunity to improve the specification of agency in the model of IS success

1.1. Research on IS success has always specified a role for users. 

(NOTE: Here I am specifying the first type of use: actualization)

1.1.*. This is evident in the the DeL/McL model which remains one of the key frameworks to explain IS success.

1.1.*.*. <The role of users in the extended DeL/McL model>

1.1.1. This role has expanded as models of IS success have been revised and extended.

1.1.1.*. This is aptly illustrated in the development and application of the DeL/McL model 

1.1.1.*.*. <The role of users in the application of the DeL/McL model to BI>

1.1.2 Overall, this shows progress in specifying the role of agency in IS success / shows that there are more avenues to incorporare agency in the model of IS success.

1.1.2.*. But there is still a big gap between how agency is specified in IS success and the efforts to improve how agency is specified in the research on IS writ large. 

1.2. Research on the use of ISs in organizations and their effects has a deeper and broader specification of the role of users.

(NOTE: Here I am specifying the second type of use: improvisation / adaptation).

1.2.1. This specification is deeper because it takes the effects of IT and even IT iself as an accomplishment of practice.

1.2.2. This specification is broader because it shows that employees also improvise and adapt information systems to their situated conditions for action.

1.3. The potential of agency in the model of IS success

1.3.1.  The model of IS success has acknowledged improvisation, but has dismissed it as an obstacle to information system success.  

1.3.2. However, research on agency in MIS have improved the specification of key individual components of IS success in ways that have not only advanced theory, but which have also offered practical advice for managers.

1.3.2.*. <List elements of model that have benefitted from MIS/agency> 

1.3.3. These studies suggest that introducing agency in the model of IS success can improve the specification of a broader set of components of IS success, broadening theoretical implications and improving practical implications / advice.

1.3.*. In the study reported next, we specify and extend the role of agency in IS success by explaining the role of analysts in <improving the quality of managers decisions>

1.4. Specifying the role of agency in IS success by exploring agency in MSSs (BISs). 

1.4.1. Exploring the role of agency in MSSs allows us to address a key obstacle to <a good specification of agency in IS success>: the limited specification of agency in MSSs compared with the rich specification of agency in MISs.

1.4.1.*. This is an obstacle because MSSs are at the end of of the upward flow of information and therefore mediate the effect of MISs (and other ISs) on the quality of decision making / success of MISs. 

1.4.2. Literature reviews show that MSSs suffer from the same limited take of agency adopted by research on IS success

1.4.3. 

1.4.3.1. However, some studies that look at the role of agency on MIS have provided some empirical evidence of a similar role of agency in MSSs. 

1.4.3.2. Moreover, research on MSSs has argued for the distributed nature of analysis

*.

We have one final point to make before leaving this discussion of the process model in Figure 2. This is that value from BA may be generated by many people in an organization, not just data scientists (Davenport & Patil, 2012). For this reason, the words ‘executed over and over again in different parts of the organization’ in Figure 2 are very important. Our argument is that (a) many, many people throughout an organization may have access to BA tools, (b) all of them may have useful insights, and (c) one million ‘ten-dollar’ insights are worth as much as one ‘ten-million dollar’ insight. In other words, repeated execution of the process in panel A of Figure 2, by people all over the organization, is the fundamental driver of benefits from business analytics.

*. Analysis is a distributed, rather than individual process: “A key emphasis in many of these studies is that individual managers, as skilled rhetoricians, are – through their strategic framing tactics – able to shape and direct the interpretations of organizational members and other stakeholders towards a new set of interpretive frames (e.g., Fiss & Zajac, XXXX)[…]there is very little similar research within the management and organizational literature that explores detailed social interactions of this kind, and how – and under what conditions – it leads to the establishment of joint interactive frames. […]

1.4.3.3. Moreover research on framing / decision making also highlights the fundamentally practical nature of analysis

*. Another area for further research that we wish to highlight involves the experiential grounding of frames in actual practices. This interconnection is important not only to better understanding the initiation, diffusion, and institutionalization of institutional change (Smets, Morris, & Greenwood, 2012), but also to offsetting an otherwise more narrow view of framing as a largely symbolic and cognitive process of meaning-making that stands apart from the practices and immediate experiences of individuals and groups.

*.*. 

“Although technology can act as a rationality carrier, it is insufficient for developing organizational capabilities by itself (Ulrich & Lake, 1991). Hence, organizational researchers have called for research on rationality persistence in organizations via its distribution between humans and technology artifacts (Latour, 2005). Fostering analytical decision making values in employees is one way to ensure rationality persistence (Sadler-Smith & Shefy, 2004). Decision makers need to undergo a systematic shift in their values to accept and embrace analytical decision making as a belief system. Our analytical decision making orientation construct represents the encouragement that employees at all levels of the organization perceive to make decisions based on information and evidence and to support ideas, opinions, proposals, and so on with facts and figures wherever possible. Advanced organizations in this direction show widespread respect for measurement and evaluation. In the context of BI, such organizations readily use and exploit technologies that infuse rationality in decision making; they routinely perform complex analyses on large data sets to solve difficult problems, and their routine business processes incorporate analytical processing.”

*.

Ergo, more recent studies (Fink et al., 2017; Shollo & Galliers, 2016) have criticized overemphasizing technology without accounting for the human ‘sense-making’ processes. As Sharma, Mithas, and Kankanhalli, 2014, p. 435) “insights emerge out of an active process of engagement between analysts and business managers using the data and analytic tools to uncover new knowledge.” Accordingly, Shollo and Galliers (2016) have provided empirical evidence of the BI&A agency in data selection and problem articulation for the active process of knowing.

*.

Ergo, more recent studies (Fink et al., 2017; Shollo & Galliers, 2016) have criticized overemphasizing technology without accounting for the human ‘sense-making’ processes. As Sharma, Mithas, and Kankanhalli, 2014, p. 435) “insights emerge out of an active process of engagement between analysts and business managers using the data and analytic tools to uncover new knowledge.” Accordingly, Shollo and Galliers (2016) have provided empirical evidence of the BI&A agency in data selection and problem articulation for the active process of knowing.

1.4.4.The insights provided by research on agency in MIS show that a similar effort in research on MSS can not only provide improved specifications of the process of computer-assisted analysis in organizations, but also introduce an alternative / complementary path for IS success because it offers the opportunity complete and to link the effects of agency on the model of IS success. 

1.4.4.1. Research on MIS has shown that the solutions to MSS problems, and improving its conditions for success can be solved by human / organizational solutions rather than just by technological solutions (cf. Paper on EKPs).

*. 

analytic leadership is ‘the extent to which people in any organi- zational unit take leadership of initiatives or projects to increase use of business analytics for organizational gain’. With respect to leadership, Davenport et al. (2010, p.57) say: ‘If we had to choose a single factor to determine how analytical an organization will be, it would be lead- ership. … Leaders have a strong influence on culture and can mobilize people, money, and time to help push for more analytical decision making’

1.4.4.2. In Ain 2019, BI chanllenges reduce BI effectiveness. In my paper, BI challenges lead to new practices to overcome such challenges and ensure effectiveness.

1.4.4.*. Introducing agency in the model of MSS success can also help to address several shortcomings / bottleneckes / open questions of research on this type of information technology, cf. opening of very salty MISQ paper

1.4.4. In the study reported next, we explore the role of agency in an MSS and use it to specify the role of agency in IS success. 

Rough draft outline

1. The model of IS success has yet to benefit from the extensive theoretical development of the role of agency in research on MIS. 

1.1. The core model of IS success does recognize the role of agency by including ‘use’ as one of its components

1.2. Applications of this core model have further specified the link between IS use and IS success 

1.3. This has provided a detailed explanation of the role of users / use in IS success, and emphasized the importance of taking agency into account when specifying a model if IS success. 

1.4. However, comparing how models of IS success specify agency with how agency has been incorporated in the research on IS writ large, it is clear that there is ample space to improve the specification of the role of agency in the model of IS success.

2. It is necessary to improve the specification of the role of agency in the model of IS success because, the specification of people as ‘users’ limits the explanatory potential of these models for technologies such as MISs and MSSs who collect, provide and analyze the information that organizations use to make decisions.

3. Next we specify the current specification of agency in research on IS success and highlight the theoretical potential of improving the specificaiton of agency therein. This is followed by the specification of the methodological procedures that we followed to build a model of IS success that improves the specification of the role of agency therein.

(/EXTENDED SECTION OUTLINE)

(DETAILED PAPER OUTLINE)

0. The model of IS success has been slow to incorporate agency.

0.*. This limits the explanatory potential of these models for technologies such as MISs and MSSs who collect, provide and analyze the information that organizations use to make decisions.

1. The opportunity for agency in the model of IS success

1.1. Part of the reason is that groundwork for the model of IS success has been established in the very early stages of the theorization of the role of agency in information systems.

1.1.1. The DeLorean model, which recent literature reviews have shown to still be the central framework for research on IS success was established in 1992

1.1.2. This is contemporary with early applications of structuration theory.

1.1.3. There have been developments, extensions and applications of this model but these have not included agency.

1.1.4. However, some like the application of this model to the upward flow of information and analysis have opened up several avenues to incorporare agency in the model of IS success

1.2. Lack of agency in the model of IS success is also an effect of the gap between the specification of the role of agency in MIS and MSS

1.2.1. IS succcess in the upward flow of representation is very much focused on the decision making processes, where MSSs play a key role: as a key role of MISs is to provide information for MSSs, it is incorrect to establish the succses of MISs on their own. 

1.2.2. MSSs have benefitted from far less research on agency than MISs and even from research on IT as a whole. 

1.2.2.1. There has been a growing number of papers that have uncovered the role of agency in how MISs collect and report information up the organization.

1.2.2.2. The literature on MSS has yet to benefit from an effort to specify the role of agency in the process of computer-assisted analysis

1.2.2.3. There has been some research on the role of use and users, but most of this research leaves out the appropriations and improvisations documented by research on MIS.

*.

We have one final point to make before leaving this discussion of the process model in Figure 2. This is that value from BA may be generated by many people in an organization, not just data scientists (Davenport & Patil, 2012). For this reason, the words ‘executed over and over again in different parts of the organization’ in Figure 2 are very important. Our argument is that (a) many, many people throughout an organization may have access to BA tools, (b) all of them may have useful insights, and (c) one million ‘ten-dollar’ insights are worth as much as one ‘ten-million dollar’ insight. In other words, repeated execution of the process in panel A of Figure 2, by people all over the organization, is the fundamental driver of benefits from business analytics.

*. 

analytic leadership is ‘the extent to which people in any organi- zational unit take leadership of initiatives or projects to increase use of business analytics for organizational gain’. With respect to leadership, Davenport et al. (2010, p.57) say: ‘If we had to choose a single factor to determine how analytical an organization will be, it would be lead- ership. … Leaders have a strong influence on culture and can mobilize people, money, and time to help push for more analytical decision making’

*. 

Analytical people: The extent to which there are people within the organizational unit with an analytic mindset who help drive business value from BA. (Davenport et al., 2010) 

*.*. In this model analytical people are consumers, rather than producers of data and analyses (they do produce analyses, but for themselves, not to shape the decisions of others).

1.2.2.*. Instead, the few papers that document use thus, emphasize the negative effects improvisations and appropriations.

1.2.2.*. “The problem to date has been a too simplistic definition of this complex variable. Simply saying that more use will yield more benefits, without considering the nature of this use, is clearly insufficient. Researchers must also consider the nature, extent, quality, and appropriateness of the system use. The nature of system use could be addressed by determining whether the full functionality of a system is being used for the intended purposes.”

2. The potential of agency in the model of IS success

2.0. Research on agency MIS is more than a model of the potential of agency to advance research on MSS.

2.1. Research on agency in MIS have improved the specification of key individual components of IS success in ways that have not only advanced theory, but which have also offered practical advice for managers.

2.1.*. <List elements of model that have benefitted from MIS/agency> (maybe do a table that includes #2.1 and #2.2)

2.1.*.*. Notes:

*. Cf. Laumer: Amount of use explains success, we add that type of use also explains success.

2.2. These studies suggest that introducing agency in MSS can improve the specification of a broader set of components of IS success, broadening theoretical implications and improving practical implications / advice.

2.2.*. <List elements of model that can benefit from new MSS/agency> (maybe do a table that includes #2.1 and #2.2) 

2.2.*.*. Notes:

*.There is also a disconnect between the collective nature of IT use in MIS and the individual nature of IT use in MSS

*. Value of IS is different to different people, which basically means that effectiveness requires adaptation, which is what I find in my research. (Mirani 1998) 

*. Applications of the model of IT success (incl applications to BIS cf. Clark 2007) show that the model of IT success can only start with properties of IT if we assume that those properties are stable / IT features and not an accomplishment of people

* Applications of the model of IT success (incl applications to BIS cf. Clark 2007, *AND* Wixom 2001) show that the model of IT success needs an additional set of variables to avoid IT centric explanations of success

*. Analysis is a distributed, rather than individual process: “A key emphasis in many of these studies is that individual managers, as skilled rhetoricians, are – through their strategic framing tactics – able to shape and direct the interpretations of organizational members and other stakeholders towards a new set of interpretive frames (e.g., Fiss & Zajac, XXXX)[…]there is very little similar research within the management and organizational literature that explores detailed social interactions of this kind, and how – and under what conditions – it leads to the establishment of joint interactive frames. […]

*. Another area for further research that we wish to highlight involves the experiential grounding of frames in actual practices. This interconnection is important not only to better understanding the initiation, diffusion, and institutionalization of institutional change (Smets, Morris, & Greenwood, 2012), but also to offsetting an otherwise more narrow view of framing as a largely symbolic and cognitive process of meaning-making that stands apart from the practices and immediate experiences of individuals and groups. 

*. Analytical people: The extent to which there are people within the organizational unit with an analytic mindset who help drive business value from BA. (Davenport et al., 2010) 

*.*. In this model analytical people are consumers, rather than producers of data and analyses (they do produce analyses, but for themselves, not to shape the decisions of others).

*.*. “Although technology can act as a rationality carrier, it is insufficient for developing organizational capabilities by itself (Ulrich & Lake, 1991). Hence, organizational researchers have called for research on rationality persistence in organizations via its distribution between humans and technology artifacts (Latour, 2005). Fostering analytical decision making values in employees is one way to ensure rationality persistence (Sadler-Smith & Shefy, 2004). Decision makers need to undergo a systematic shift in their values to accept and embrace analytical decision making as a belief system. Our analytical decision making orientation construct represents the encouragement that employees at all levels of the organization perceive to make decisions based on information and evidence and to support ideas, opinions, proposals, and so on with facts and figures wherever possible. Advanced organizations in this direction show widespread respect for measurement and evaluation. In the context of BI, such organizations readily use and exploit technologies that infuse rationality in decision making; they routinely perform complex analyses on large data sets to solve difficult problems, and their routine business processes incorporate analytical processing.”

*.

Ergo, more recent studies (Fink et al., 2017; Shollo & Galliers, 2016) have criticized overemphasizing technology without accounting for the human ‘sense-making’ processes. As Sharma, Mithas, and Kankanhalli, 2014, p. 435) “insights emerge out of an active process of engagement between analysts and business managers using the data and analytic tools to uncover new knowledge.” Accordingly, Shollo and Galliers (2016) have provided empirical evidence of the BI&A agency in data selection and problem articulation for the active process of knowing.

2.3. the insights provided by research on agency in MIS show that a similar effort in research on MSS can not only provide improved specifications of the process of computer-assisted analysis in organizations, but also introduce an alternative / complementary path for IS success because it offers the opportunity complete and to link the effects of agency on the model of IS success. 

2.3.*.

*. Research on MIS has shown that the solutions to MSS problems, and improving its conditions for success can be solved by human / organizational solutions rather than just by technological solutions (cf. Paper on EKPs).

*. In Ain 2019, BI chanllenges reduce BI effectiveness. In my paper, BI challenges lead to new practices to overcome such challenges and ensure effectiveness.

*. *. Kaplan (2008) argues that a key limitation of prior research on strategic frames is its persistent focus on cognitive aspects and their consequences (Nadkarni & Narayanan, 2007; Gilbert, 2006). As a result, research often backgrounds the actual processes by which frames are socially constructed and negotiated. 

*. ”Building on Petter et al’s (2012) identification of the importance of information quality, we argue that if users perceive the format or the presentation of information as a threat, this will lower the benefits of the information for their organizations and organizations should redesign the format of the information. Similarly, if users perceive the usability of the information as a threat to their task, organizations should better align the usability of the information with users’ tasks. In other words, the inter- ventions an organization would implement to improve information quality differ along these two dimensions.”

*.

*. DeLone and McLean (2003) in their ten-year update of the DeLone and Mclean success model (1992) depict ‘‘net benefits’’ as the most important success measure for IS, with net benefits referring to ‘‘cost savings, expanded markets, incremental additional sales, reduced search costs and time savings’’ (p. 26). Their updated model is a dynamic one, with the realized net benefits feeding back to further intention to use and user satis- faction. The notion of organizational change and transformation as an important aspect of success, however, is not included. Further, an integrative framework for information technology business value published recently by Melville et al. (2004) is uni-directional and omits the cyclical processes of organizational transformation and learning and the time-lagged nature of benefits that have been shown in econometric studies to be vital in understanding IT value generation. Although these authors recognize complementary organizational changes as a factor in achieving value from IT, they do not consider chan- ged organizational forms and capabilities themselves as assets that result from IT imple- mentation. (IMPTT: In the discussion, I can talk about IS success as having an additional dimension which is IS/Organizational transformation as a new net benefit cf. GREGOR ET AL 2006) / Notice that this comes from research on IT value, thread carefully. 

*. *

Although the general IT literature is fairly consistent in classifying IT assets as either physical or human [17,64,79], it includes different ways in which the two types of assets are related to each other. One approach is that IT-related knowledge and skills are complementary to physical IT assets, implying that they are orthogonal to each other [6]. An alternative approach is that the experience and expertise of IT personnel may constrain the quality of physical IT assets [30], and therefore a model that accounts for the effect of human IT assets on physical ones is superior to alternative models of reversed causality or orthogonality [36].

2.4. Introducing agency in the model of MSS success can also help to address several shortcomings / bottleneckes / open questions of research on this type of information technology, cf. opening of very salty MISQ paper

3. My paper motivates, illustrates and specifies this project by addressing the following research question: <research question>.

3.*. (Note that BI is a good setting to add agency to the model of IS success because BI has detailed model of IS success and this model has several variables that link to use)

EXAMPLE LETTER

Dear Editor,

Please find attached our paper titled ‘<TITLE>’ for consideration for publication in the Journal of Information Technology.

In this paper, we address the contradictory results provided by research on control in remote work arrangements. We argue that this contradiction can be specified as a set of mutually constituted tensions when these studies are considered together. We show that control in RWAs can be specified as a distributed accomplishment of managers and employees as each tries to address the contradictions that are at the core of their experience with remote work. 

We are excited to submit the paper to the Journal of Information Technology for three related reasons. First, the Journal has published several compelling papers based on analytical literature reviews, proposing ambitious research agendas (see below for a list of papers cited in this letter). These include Reuver et al.’s (2018) research agenda on digital platforms; Wiener et al.’s review on big data business models and Pereira et al.’s review on IT maturity models. 

Second the Journal is home to several debates related to the core substantive issues in our paper. The Journal has published several major pieces on surveillance, including Zuboff’s paper on ‘the big other’ and Cecez-Kecmanovic’s paper on ‘the rise of the digital surveillance economy’ which was part of a lively debate hosted on the Journal anchored on the publication of Clarke’s paper on the risks inherent in the digital surveillance economy. The journal has also published research on telework, including van der Meulen et al.’s study on impact of temporal and spatial separation along with media use on knowledge sharing networks.

We hope you find that our paper contributes to, and advances these rich debates and conversations in the Journal of Information Technology. We look forward to the feedback of the review team.

<Suggestions for review team>

Sincerely,

The Authors.

Cited papers from previous issues of JIT:

1. The resistible rise of the digital surveillance economy: A call for action

Dubravka Cecez-Kecmanovic

First Published March 4, 2019

2. Risks inherent in the digital surveillance economy: A research agenda

Roger Clarke

First Published March 1, 2015

3. The digital platform: A research agenda

Mark de Reuver, Carsten Sørensen, Rahul C. Basole

First Published June 1, 2018 

4. A review of methods used on IT maturity models development: A systematic literature review and a critical analysis

Rúben Pereira, João Serrano

First Published February 17, 2020

5. No teleworker is an island: The impact of temporal and spatial separation along with media use on knowledge sharing networks

Nick van der Meulen, Peter van Baalen, Eric van Heck, Sipko Mülder

First Published February 20, 2019

6. Big-data business models: A critical literature review and multiperspective research framework

Martin Wiener, Carol Saunders, Marco Marabelli

First Published March 4, 2020

7. Big other: Surveillance capitalism and the prospects of an information civilization

Shoshana Zuboff

First Published March 1, 2015

Find today’s video here:

You can read the methods section of the paper I discussed in the video below:

Research setting

DeskSales was created to reduce the cost of sale at M-Tel. Before DeskSales, M-Tel used field salespeople to sell all the products in its portfolio to its 100 largest corporate customers. The problem of doing so was cost. M-Tel estimated that a field salesperson costed $250 per customer contact whereas a desk salesperson costed $2.50 per customer contact. DeskSales was set up  to reduce the cost of sale by taking away the smaller sales from field salespeople. DeskSales was led by a general manager who saw herself as “the salesperson for ‘the desk’ [ie. DeskSales]” within M-Tel. Five years after DeskSales was launched she was offered a position in the company’s board of directors. Her success at the head of DeskSales was due to her ability to deliver on her cost and revenue goals. To cut costs, she hired desk salespeople with very little work experience and redundant employees from M-Tel’s service units. To increase revenue, she imposed a demanding sales targets on desk salespeople. 

Desk salespeople and their service work. Desk salespeople found even simple products such as ADSL connections (broadband internet access at home) difficult to sell because of their limited sales experience. As their sales began to lag behind their targets, their supervisors told them to take on their customers’ service issues to become “their customer’s central point of contact.” The goal was to educate customers to rely on desk salespeople when they needed help with their existing M-Tel products, and especially when they needed to place orders. Desk salespeople could then report these orders as their own sales, earning their bonus and pushing their managers’ careers ahead. At the end of DeskSales’ first year, an internal report showed that one in every two calls that desk salespeople took came from customers placing service requests. Three in every five of the remaining calls were from service representatives updating desk salespeople on outstanding service issues. This report stated that desk salespeople were involved in two thirds of all service issues in that year. This subtle form of deviance ensured that desk salespeople received some of the largest bonuses in M-Tel’s salesforce and helped their unit surpass its sales target.

These were difficult accomplishments. Desk salespeople did not have the training nor the permission to do most service work. They needed M-Tel’s service representatives to do it for them. However, service units were only supposed to take requests from customers or other service units and thus had a legitimate reason to refuse desk salespeople’s requests for  help.

M-Tel’s service units. M-Tel’s service units were geographically separated from DeskSales and their communication channels limited desk salespeople’s ability to build social ties with service representatives. Service units managed their work through a first-in-first-out (FIFO) system. Service requests arrived at a central email address for each service unit. There was also a central phone number (called the ‘helpline’) for each unit. Customers could call this number to ask questions and get updates on their service issues. The only possibility of direct communication with service representatives was through their direct phone numbers used to obtain information for outstanding service tasks. Service representatives were responsible for turning emails and calls into service requests that were added to a database called “the bucket” in M-Tel’s lingo. They were required to address the requests that had been in the “bucket” for the longest time.

DeskSales is a unique context to study how employees use of technology that replaces interaction to enlist the help of others. On the one hand, the stakes that desk salespeople had in service work were high. It was their main source of revenue, the best opportunity to earn their bonus and to maintain their job in the unit. On the other hand, they had to overcome cumbersome technologies that replaced interaction which were difficult obstacles to enforce compliance with their service requests. This tension turns DeskSales into a research setting that amplifies the challenges and opportunities for using technology to enlist the help of others and thus exposes processes that may go unnoticed in less demanding contexts.

Here’s the example of the practice that I discussed in the video:

A third practice consisted of finding service representatives with a compliant disposition and send them every request that could be addressed by their service unit. To do so, desk salespeople collected the phone numbers of service representatives who had been expedient and helpful in responding to requests posted to their unit in the past, much like desk salesperson Melissa did when she received a complaint from a customer about a delay in a private circuit installation. She sent an email to the private circuit service unit and attempted to address it to service representative Frances by introducing her name in the subject field and in the first line of the message (see ‘send messages to cooperative service representatives’ in table 2). When asked if she knew Frances, she replied:
No, I came across her when I was changing all the circuits for BigRetailer a few months ago. […] When my orders landed on her inbox, I always got the OPC [a message confirming that an order was completed] in the same day and sometimes in less than an hour! […] Now if I have anything for them [the service unit dealing with private circuits], I try to send it her way.

This explanation suggests the expectation that some service representatives were more compliant with customers’ requests forwarded to them by desk salespeople. It suggests that there is persuasive potential (and not only threats to persuasion attempts) in people’s appropriation of the positional power of others. Desk salespeople tapped into the susceptibility of service representatives by taking advantage of the way in which M-Tel set up communication technology in the service department. The use of a central email address to submit requests allowed desk salespeople the opportunity to find helpful service representatives. Notice that, in this practice, desk salespeople did not try to establish personal ties with service representatives. Instead they improvised with central email addresses to convey requests for help to service representatives that appropriated the positional power of customers by addressing customers’ requests.

Here’s one of the tables I discuss in the video:

Today’s video is about how to make small datasets publishable.

I mentioned Steve Barley’s piece in the video. Full reference is the following: Barley, S. R. (1986). Technology as an occasion for structuring: Evidence from observations of CT scanners and the social order of radiology departments. Administrative science quarterly, 78-108.

I’ll also take this opportunity to mention a couple of qualitative studies that are worth reading because they take a different approach to defining what a complete social unit is:

1. Turner’s work on pilgrimages as rite of passage, where the pilgrimage is the social unit: Turner, V. (1974). Pilgrimages as social processes. Dramas, Fields and Metaphors: Symbolic Action in Human Society, 166-230.

2. On a related note, Michael Rosen’s delicious studies of corporate parties where the micro-event is the social unit:

*. Rosen, M. (1985). Breakfast at Spiro’s: Dramaturgy and dominance. Journal of Management, 11(2), 31-48.

*. Rosen, M. (1988). YOU ASKED FOR IT: CHRISTMAS AT THE BOSSES’EXPENSE. Journal of Management Studies, 25(5), 463-480.

3. Weick’s study of the Man Gulch disaster, where the event is the social unit: Weick, K. E. (1993). The collapse of sensemaking in organizations: The Mann Gulch disaster. Administrative science quarterly, 628-652.

4. Gouldner’s study of a gypsum mine and factory that does a great job of weaving two social units into a single study: Gouldner, A. W. (1954). Patterns of industrial bureaucracy.