Evolution of an IS development effort. An ANT interpretation
| Published date | 01 May 2009 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/13287260910955110 |
| Pages | 150-167 |
| Date | 01 May 2009 |
| Author | Amit Mitra,Laura Campoy |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management |
JSIT
11,2
150
Journal of Systems and Information
Technology
Vol. 11 No. 2, 2009
pp. 150-167
#Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1328-7265
DOI 10.1108/13287260910955110
Evolution of an IS development
effort
An ANT interpretation
Amit Mitra and Laura Campoy
Department of Strategy and Operations Management,
Bristol Business School, University of the West of England, Bristol, UK
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to stand back from the debate of success and failure and
develop an interpretive account based on narratives of major actors to enable project managers with
a rich understanding of a complex organisation.
Design/methodology/approach – Actor network theory (ANT) was the method that was applied
to both frame and sum narratives that were gathered from the six subjects along with anecdotal
evidence and confidential documents used for this research.
Findings – Success is based on the perception of both actors as well as the principal audienceof the
Commonwealth Games (CWG). Second information systems (IS) success is uniquely associated to an
event like the CWG.
Research limitations/implications – Most of the data used for the research was after the
conclusion of the games. Therefore usefulness of interpretation may have a time dimension. Probably
if the subjects had included spectators and other project managers during the games, the quality of
conclusions could have been further enriched.
Practical implications – Project managers of futu re events may be able to inter nalise the role of
co-ordination and agreement that is necessary among different actors to achieve success.
Originality/value – Originality of present paper stems from its ‘‘unusual’’ identification of success –
as it has attempted to outline distinctions between certainty of success and anything contrary to
success. Project managers, organisers and researchers of IS projects are likely to find value in the
paper in being able to appreciate the evolutionary nature of IS success.
Keywords Information systems, Narratives, Project management, Operations management
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Reviewing primary research on information systems (IS) success literatu re shows that
it was the late 1980s and 1990s when the bulk of research was published. Yet, does this
mean that IS success and for that matter IS failure have been adequately understood.
Probably, thiswi ll neverbe so as new types of IS are created to fulfil new expectations
of developers and users, there will always be the need to contextualise and understand
unique elements that contribute to success of particular systems. It is true that today a
much larger volume of IS systems are used by people. The term IS for the pu rposes of
this research includes people, processes and technology that have been used to plan
and deliver to expectations for a major event like the Comm onwealth Games (CWG).
The kind of specialist wrapping that used to be prevalent for IS being commissioned in
the 1980s and 1990s has also disappeared. Today IS is treated as something more
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/1328-7265.htm
Anonymised subjects – Neil: Senior Broadcasting Engineer, Host Broadcasting Organisation;
Mark: Member of the Board of the CWG Federation, with special responsibility in the IT/
technology area; Richard: Director of Sports, CWG, Manchester 2002; Terry: Technology
Director, CWG, Manchester 2002; Susan: Director of venues, CWG, Manchester 2002; Frank:
Principal Project Manager, Microsoft
An IS
development
effort
151
integrated within everyday life and more importan tly has influenced our lives in such a
way that without them many activities would be difficult to envisage. Widespread
advantages of internet use have also enabled to de-mystify systems development and
consequent understanding of success. However, as long as IS fails, studying IS success
will remain meaningful.
Whyte et al. (1997) mention that success does not mean a system producing the best
but being capable of doing the job as expected and perceived by the user. So from such
a perspective, developing holistic appreciation of what works when a large number of
disparate actors are involved is what makes an investigation into success meaningful.
Whilst we are in a wo rld where technology is largely taken for granted when it is
equated with other givens like running wate r, electricity and such like elements of life
yet treating technology as neutral would be simplistic. Various research studies (e.g.
Mitra, 2001) have shown that there are reciprocal influences between technology and
recipients of that technology.
The study using an interpretive paradigm will investigate through narratives of key
personnel how IS success got developed and delivered into the success of CWG. Evidence
collection for the study began at one end of a continuum with p erceivedexp ectations of
key players and then tried to validate these expectations in the light of their
experiences at the other end.
1.1 Perception of IS success
Notions of IS success and IS failure are complex and therefore capable of rich
interpretation.As alluded to earlier, a considerable body of literature has emerged inthe
area of IS success (cf. Delone and McLean, 1992) together with a parallel stream and
probablylarger bank of studies on IS failure (cf. Sauer, 1994). Preliminaryconsultation of
these two streamsof IS research, indicate little interaction between the two.Interestingly,
only one of thenumerous references in the originalDeLone and McLean (1992) paper has
‘‘failure’’ in its title and that title also contains‘‘success’’(Robey and Zeller, 1978).DeLone
and McLean’s (1992) paper contains virtually negligible content on IS failure and this
seems to be the overwhelming characteristic ofthe IS success literature. On the opposite
end of the spectrum, Sauer’s famous work, ‘‘Why IS Fail: A case study approach’’ (1993)
has two references with titles containing the word ‘‘success’’ out of a total of about 200
besides there is not a single reference in common between DeLone and McLean (1992)
and Sauer (1994)although six authors appear in both.
Our intention in this paper is to stand back from the debate about an exact
definition and nature of IS success as there are many diverse ways through which
success has been studied within the IS community. For instance, ‘‘effectiveness’’
(Seddon et al., 1999), ‘‘avoidance of failure’’ (Fortune and Peters, 2005), ‘‘attainment of
purpose’’ (Whyte and Bytheway, 1996), ‘‘integrated dependent variable’’ (DeLone and
McLean, 1992; Seddon, 1997) are all constructs through which successful IS have been
studied so far. However, interpretive research analysis of success is limited. Perhaps
Kanellis et al.’s (1998) work is the only specific research using an interpretive paradigm
to estimate success. Drawing on different reference disciplines like philosophy,ar tificial
intelligence and organisational theory has made Kanellis et al.’s (1998) work uniquely
useful. Another probable strength of the work is that they clarify success not to be an
objective entity but something that is emergent as a result of the inter play between
social and technical within a particular organisation. At the same time, a relentless
pursuit of ‘‘fit’’seems to pervade literatu re until recent times (see for e.g. Kanellis et al.,
1998; Rai et al., 2002). Establishing such close connections between variables seems to
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