Torbjörn Nordström: Information Systems Stewardship

The seminar will treat the subject of Torbjörn Nordström's doctoral thesis. I have received the following abstract from him.

Abstract:

This thesis address the problem of taking care of and qualitatively enhance the relation between an organisation and its computer support. I have given this task the name information systems stewardship. Understanding the relation between a computer application and the organisational activities it is supposed to support directs the interest and analysis to the thinking "behind" computer applications, its basic assumptions. The mood of most such thinking within Informatics is a design mood, which I argue ought to be complemented with a care mood for stewardship purposes. The dominating design mood has focused the interest both in practice and among researchers investigating the practice to the design process. A care mood, however, needs to consider what it is that is being cared for, that is, the designed product. An investigation of the organisational actions the computer applications should support shows an inherent tension in organisational actions and identify a key stewardship problem. Should information systems support a better readiness to act or a readiness for better actions? Organisational actions can be seen as a trade off between these two desires. This trade off I argue to be an important part of the thinking behind computer applications.

Discussing, criticising, questioning, settling, deciding, explaining, or searching for basic assumptions, means engaging in a constructive conversation. The constructive conversation is the most important source of knowledge for the task of information systems stewardship. The constructive conversation aims at broadening the perspective on a situation, among actors in the situation, by making it possible to introduce new or different ideals and thus change the setting of the situation. Systems "die" when conversation stops, that is, when the information system is no longer receptive to what goes on outside it will eventually become either oppressive or obsolete.

Maintenance and continuation of constructive conversations are fundamental for cooping with change, which focus the interest on behaviours or circumstances that can be seen as obstacles or threats to constructive conversations. These are named conversation killers, a term that denotes both persons and phenomenons. The opposite to conversation killers are conversation pushers. Efforts to arrange for constructive conversations and strategies or actions to overcome different conversation killers are typical conversation pushing activities.

Software maintenance failed badly as an implementation of information systems stewardship. A first step out of the maintenance crisis could be to go from software maintenance to conversation maintenance. Such a development can be seen as an effort to establish systems management as a replacement, or enrichment, of software maintenance. Systems management has its focus on promoting an effective conversation between developers of computer applications and people using the applications developed. This is, however, not enough for stewardship purposes. How are we then to understand information systems stewardship? The answer is given in terms of a maturity model, identifying problems that stewardship organisations face. The problems identified are general in the sense that it is properties in the organisation and in the computer support, rather than in the specific business activity, that are identified as generating these problems. Maturing in terms of information systems stewardship means to learn more about and develop one's perspective on the computer and its relation to the activities it supports. This learning enables the organisation to identify and handle more complex and difficult problems, problems that when the higher levels of maturity is reached are distinctly non technical. Instead it is the thinking behind the implementation of the technology that emerges as the fundamental area of concern for information systems stewardship.

Välkommna!
Kenneth Nilsson