ACTION DESIGN RESEARCH

Ola HenfridssonViktoria Institute & University of Oslo

(in collaboration with M. Sein, S. Purao, M. Rossi, and R. Lindgren)

What kind of research is this?– Objective: to improve some kind of organizational capability– 1+ year process study – Develops a new perspective on this organizational capability– Draws on contemporary theory– Design and release of multiple versions of a technology– Developing innovative features of a technology– Eventually causing a change in organizational strategy– Developing design principles for a particular type of information

system

Available approaches

Design Research Action Research

Candidate 1: Design Research

• Fundamentally, develop prescriptive design knowledge through building and evaluating IT artifacts intended to solve an identified class of problems– Technical novelty– Must be abstracted to develop knowledge

• Relevance of technology artifacts evaluated by utility• DR separates evaluation from building, rarely

accomplishing it in authentic settings• The problem of separation and sequencing

Candidate 2: Action Research

• Fundamentally, a study of change– Central assumption: complex social processes are best studied by

introducing change into these processes and observing their effects

• Focus on practical problems with theoretical relevance

• Produces results relevant to the organization while simultaneously informing theory

• Sees the technology artifact as a black box

• No clear emphasis on the technology artifact

What is an IT artifact?

• An Ensemble: – The material and organizational features that are

socially recognized as bundles of hardware and/or software (cf. Orlikowski and Iacono 2001)

• ”technology as structure”: – Structures of the organizational domain are

inscribed into the artifact during its development and use

What is an IT artifact? (2)

• An emergent thing: – Neither fixed nor independent, instead, emerges from

ongoing social and economic practices (Orlikowski and Iacono 2001)

• Where does emergence come from?– Interaction between technology and an organizational

context (Truex et al. 1999)– Shaped by the interests, values, and assumptions of a wide

variety of communities of developers, investors, users, etc. (Orlikowski and Iacono 2001)

What is an IT artifact? (3)

• Many artifacts are only partly the work of the designer. – Numerous local actions (e.g., use, interpretation, negotiation, and

redesign)

• Cannot be anticipated by reference to any a priori design (Iivari 2003)

Considering the candidates

• DR and AR offer incomplete solutions for us– DR supports abstraction and innovation but relegates authentic

intervention as secondary

– AR supports intervention and knowledge emergence in authentic settings but innovation and abstraction are secondary goals

Our thesis

• To study ensemble artifacts, we need a research method that can account for– Both technological and organizational contexts– Shaping of the artifact via design and use– Influences of designers and users

Combining...

• AR and DR: – Are similar (Järvinen 2007; Lee 2007; Figueiredo

and Cunha 2007)– Should be kept apart (Iivari 2007)– Have commonalities (Cole et al. 2005)

• Suggestions for combining– Use the two in sequence (Iivari 2007)– Interleave the processes (Lee 2007)– Map commonalities (Cole et al. 2005)

Sequencing

Identifyinga need

Building

Reflecting Theorizing

Evaluating

Start an AR process :

Start a DR process :Start a DR process:

Start an AR process:

InterleavingDiagnosing a problem

Action planning

Action taking Build

Evaluating, reflecting

Specifying learning

Start a DR process :

Start an AR process:

A New DR Method: ADR

• Provides explicit guidance for accomodating building, intervention, and evaluation in a concerted research effort

• An approach to produce knowledge by– intervening in an organization – through developing an innovative IT ensemble artifact

• Knowledge that – adds to, refines, or generates theory or theories

– supports IS practitioners in solving immediate problems

ADR

Stage 1: Problem formulation• An immediate or anticipated problem:

– perceived by organizational participants, and framed by the researcher

• Identify the class of which the specific problem is an instance

• Formulate initial research questions• Identify contributing theoretical bases• Identify prior technology advances

Stage 1: Problem formulation (2)

• Practice-inspired Research– Field problems as knowledge-

creation opportunities (rather than theoretical puzzles)

• Theory-ingrained artifact– Artifacts as carriers of theoretical

traces– Iterations based on influences

from theory

Stage 2: Building, Intervention, and Evaluation (BIE)

• BIE intends to support an iterative process at the intersection of the IT artifact and the organizational environment

• Building, intervention, and evaluation are interwoven

• Two forms of BIE:– IT-dominant BIE– Organization-dominant BIE

IT-Dominant BIE

Organization-Dominant BIE

Forms of BIE

1. IT-Dominant BIE 2. Organization-Dominant BIE

Stage 2: BIE Principles• Reciprocal shaping– Emphasizes the inseparable

influences from two domains: the IT artifact and the organizational context

• Mutually influential roles– Mutual learning among participants

in an ADR project

• Authentic and concurrent evaluation– Formative evaluation

Stage 3: Reflection and Learning

• Analyze intervention results• Articulate learning in terms of

theories selected• Ongoing evaluation of adherence to

principles

Stage 3 principle: Guided Emergence

• Captures seemingly incongruent perspectives

• Initial design by researchers, shaped by ongoing organizational use and reflected in redesign (Garud et al 2008; Iivari 2003)

• Combination of – preliminary design of the artifact (Principle 2)– refined by ongoing interactions among

perspectives and participants (Principles 3 and 4 respectively)

– outcomes of formative evaluation (Principle 5)

4. Formalization of Learning

• Abstract results to a class of field problems

• Focused on transferability of results and communication of outcomes

• Outcomes specified as design principles and contributions to theory

Stage 4: Principle

• Generalized Outcomes:– Generalizing the problem instance

– Generalizing the solution instance

– Deriving design principles from the design research outcomes

• BIE is an inductive step that connects design principles to a class of solutions and a class of problems

ADR

Comparing DR, AR, and ADR

Our contribution

• ADR: a customization of Design Research that – Overcomes Stage-Gate Models for Design Research– Recognizes the inherently ensemble nature of IT artifacts– Captures innovativeness for both IT and org-dominant versions– Reconciles one-case Utility against abstraction to Design Principles

• As it– Brings together technology and behavioral IS researchers– Ensures relevance to build bridges with practice

What kind of research is this?– Objective: to improve some kind of organizational capability– 1+ year process study – Develops a new perspective on this organizational capability– Draws on contemporary theory– Design and release of multiple versions of the technology– Developing innovative features of the technology– Eventually causing a change in organizational strategy– Developing design principles for a particular type of information system

Many thanks for your attention!