[AISWorld] JAIS 2014 Volume 15, Issue 4 (April) Contents

[JAIS]

Contents of Volume 15, Issue 4 (April) Journal of the Association for Information Systems (JAIS) Official Publication of the Association for Information Systems

Published: Monthly Electronically

ISSN: 1536-9323

Published by the Association for Information Systems, Atlanta, USA http://aisel.aisnet.org/jais/
Editor-in-Chief:  Professor Suprateek Sarker, University of Virginia, USA

EDITORIAL

Innovation in Information Infrastructures: Introduction to the Special Issue

Eric Monteiro, Norwegian National University of Science and Technology
Neil Pollock, The University of Edinburgh
Robin Williams (corresponding editor), The University of Edinburgh

To obtain a copy of the entire article, click on the link below: 
http://aisel.aisnet.org/jais/vol15/iss4/4/

PAPER ONE

Generification by Translation: Designing Generic Systems in Context of the Local

Line Silsand, The Artic University of Norway
Gunnar Ellingsen, The Artic University of Norway

ABSTRACT
While the mechanisms of generification during implementation and use of large-scale systems are well known, this paper extends and analyzes the notion into the design phase of generic systems and provides insight into the associated socio-technical key mechanisms at play. The paper draws on the information infrastructure literature, and emphasizes how generic systems’ designs always face infrastructural challenges and opportunities in the development process. The paper illustrates how a vendor solved the infrastructural challenges by (to a large degree) lending on local practice, translating perspectives, and carefully adjusting their design strategy over time. We argue that our findings have implications for practice because they underscore the malleability of the collaboration process between vendor and users. First, we suggest that designing a generic system calls for a flexible vendor willing to change and adjust the development strategy along with the evolving project. Second, to strengthen the user-developer collaboration, we highly recommend giving the user-participants, at the very early stage of a development project, a basic understanding of software design, and raising their skills in making precise contextual narratives. Third, we emphasize the importance of the project management’s engagement in recruiting clinical personnel and in making it possible for the clinicians to participate in the project. Empirically, the paper presents the initial stages of a large electronic patient record (EPR) development project that has been running from 2012 in the North Norwegian health region and is due to finish in 2016.

To obtain a copy of the entire article, click on the link below: 
http://aisel.aisnet.org/jais/vol15/iss4/3/


PAPER TWO

Innovation Of, In, On Infrastructures: Articulating the Role of Architecture in Information Infrastructure Evolution 

Miria Grisot, University of Oslo
Ole Hanseth, University of Oslo
Anne Asmyr Thorseng, University of Oslo

ABSTRACT
In this paper, we address the question: “which conditions enable successful information infrastructure innovation?”. Information infrastructures are characterized by nonlinear evolutionary dynamics. Based on a case study that examines the design, development, and initial use of a web-based solution for patient-hospital communication at a Norwegian hospital over a ten-year period, we trace the evolution of a new II. This longitudinal analysis takes installed base cultivation as its conceptual basis. Specifically, we draw on three aspects of a cultivation strategy: growth process, user mobilization, and learning to cultivate. The analysis shows how the solution started as a bottom-up initiative of a small and motivated team at the hospital IT department, and how it grew gradually in a flexible and evolutionary way. Our findings support the argument that successful infrastructure innovations are based on a cultivation strategy addressing specific users’ needs, usefulness, and evolutionary growth. We make three key contributions to information infrastructure research. First, we expose the role architecture plays in the growth of IIs. Second, we provide insights about cultivating IIs, especially in their bootstrap phase. Third, we identify three different but interrelated types of innovation—in, of, on infrastructure—that articulate the critical role of IIs architecture in enabling successful innovation.

To obtain a copy of the entire article, click on the link below: 

http://aisel.aisnet.org/jais/vol15/iss4/2/

PAPER THREE

Grafting: Balancing Control and Cultivation in Information Infrastructure Innovation

Terje Aksel Sanner, University of Oslo
Tiwonge Davis Manda, University of Oslo, University of Malawi
Petter Nielsen, University of Oslo

ABSTRACT:
This paper proposes grafting as a new perspective on information infrastructure (II) innovation. We introduce the organic notion of grafting to help explore innovation processes in settings where control is distributed and episodic. Our case study follows the implementation of mobile phone-based reporting of routine data from sub-district health facilities in Malawi. Initial grafting work entails the careful alignment of available resources, capacities, and interests through the proposition of an information system (IS) innovation (e.g., mobile phone-based reporting). The nurturing of the implementation involves collaborative efforts spanning technological, professional, geographical, and organizational boundaries. This work is taken forward by the identification of opportunities for merging an innovation with existing socio-technical arrangements (e.g., health management information systems in Malawi) in such a way that the parts continue to grow.

To obtain a copy of the entire article, click on the link below: 

http://aisel.aisnet.org/jais/vol15/iss4/1/