educating reflective enterprise systems practitioners: a design research study of the iterative...

doi: 10.1111/isj.12032

Info Systems J (2014) 24, 445–473 445

© 2013 Wiley P

Educating reflective Enterprise Systemspractitioners: a design research study of theiterative building of a teaching frameworkEli Hustad & Dag H. Olsen

Department of Information Systems, University of Agder, Kristiansand, Norway, email: [email protected]

Abstract. This research paper reports on the iterative design of a teaching frameworkdeveloped for teaching Enterprise Systems (ES) classes for Information Systems (IS)graduates. These systems embed technical complexity and create organizationalchallenges when implemented in organizations. Therefore, teaching good ES classesis pedagogically challenging for faculty, and ES curricula are difficult for students. Wehave gradually designed and rebuilt curricula and teaching frameworks over 8years.This has also resulted in a set of eight design principles. We report from our designand evaluation process and present our final artefact, the teaching framework. Theaim is to educate reflective practitioners with multiple ES skills, enabling them to tacklethe complexities of ES implementation contexts. The framework has implications for ISeducational research and practice and has some generic values that are transferable toother academic institutions and adaptable to other IS learning environments. Further,the study contributes to IS design research by extending its application area. The ESteaching framework is a specific contribution to IS teaching frameworks as a class ofproblems.

Keywords: Information Systems teaching, Enterprise Systems, Action DesignResearch, reflective ES practitioners, hermeneutic circle, collaborative learning

INTRODUCTION

Scholars have recently paid attention to Enterprise Systems (ES) in higher education programs(Hawking et al., 2004; Mohamed & McLaren, 2009; Watson & Schneider, 1999). Technically,these systems are standardized, integrated software solutions, based on ‘best practice’industry solutions and are offered as off-the-shelf packages from different vendors (Davenport,1998), such as SAP Business Suite, Oracle E-business Suite and Lawson M3. The softwaremanages organizational resources by integrating information flows across several functionsinto a single computer system to serve the needs across different departments.

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The concept of an ES refers to several different categories of business systems or softwaresuites, such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management(CRM), Supply Chain Management (e.g. Hendricks et al., 2007; Huiping, 2009), KnowledgeManagement Systems (Alavi & Leidner, 2001), and Data Warehousing and BusinessIntelligence (BI) (e.g. Chaudhuri et al., 2011). Organizations seek benefits from such systems,such as increased efficiency and productivity improvements (Aral et al., 2006; Hitt et al., 2002),increased innovative performance (Engelstätter, 2012), improved communication acrossthe enterprise (Akkermans & Van Helden, 2002), and cost and data redundancy reduction(e.g. Haug et al., 2009), by avoiding incompatible ‘silos’ of legacy systems that have integrationchallenges and high maintenance costs (Finnegan & Currie, 2010).

ES, however, embed technical complexity and create organizational challenges whenimplemented in organizations (Markus & Tanis, 2000). For example, the requirements fortechnical configuration, changes in business processes and new organizational roles forthe employees are complex changes that are often taken too lightly (Volkoff et al., 2007).The implementation of an enterprise-wide system imposes its own logic on anorganization and often restricts the way business must be performed, which in turn,reduces employee flexibility (Davenport, 2000). ES of several types are widely implementedin both small and large enterprises.

Academic institutions try to keep up with contemporary trends in business environments, andthey have started to integrate ES classes into higher education programs. In particular, differentkinds of ES software have been implemented at several universities to provide students withhands-on experiences (Watson & Schneider, 1999). Due to the complexities of ES, studentsmust gain different types of knowledge and skills. Thus, ES classes are pedagogicallychallenging for faculty to teach, and the variety and scope of both theoretical and practicalES skills are difficult for students to learn.

Despite a growing interest for utilizing ES in education, few studies report on how universitiescombine innovative technologies with other pedagogical means to enhance learning in ESclasses. Moreover, there are no appropriate frameworks in the literature to support ES teachingin practice. After teaching ES classes for some years, we have reflected on the learning contextthat has emerged over time, and we have realized the need to develop theoretical interpreta-tions into a generic teaching framework by combining our learning experiences with establishedpedagogical principles and learning theories.

The following overarching research focus guided us as we gradually developed the teachingframework: How can faculty create an effective learning environment for the education ofreflective ES implementers?

The teaching framework, comprising a set of design principles (DPs) and the learning contexttriangle, is the artefact and generalized outcome of this research, and its design process is thetopic of this paper. Our research builds on a longitudinal and interpretive study conducted at aNorwegian university when we were teaching ES classes for Information Systems (IS) graduatestudents. The framework was developed over time by implementing improvements based uponiterative experience loops. Inspired by reflective practice and knowing-in-action (Schön, 1983,1987), these improvements were based on our reflection-in-action during teaching as well ason our reflection-on-action and double-loop learning after teaching (Argyris & Schön, 1978).

© 2013 Wiley Publishing Ltd, Information Systems Journal 24, 445–473

Educating reflective ES practitioners 447

The research followed an interpretive approach, and the principles of the hermeneutic circleto create a teaching framework over time where knowledge was developed iteratively throughreflection loops to understand the whole from its parts (Klein & Myers, 1999). This wasperformed by combining existing theories (e.g. pedagogy, learning theories and ES concepts)and empirical data gathered longitudinally from teaching experiences and evaluations.Methodologically, this study utilized design research (DR) principles (Hevner et al., 2004),and we adopted concepts and ideas, in particular, from specific methods such as actionresearch (AR) (Markus et al., 2002) and action design research (ADR) (Sein et al., 2011).

The paper starts by presenting its grounding and knowledge base within IS education, andthe reflective practitioner literature and emphasizes the necessity and importance of educatingproficient ES implementers. This is followed by a presentation of the related educationalresearch, pedagogical principles and learning theories. After that, an explanation of theresearch setting and methodological approach is presented. Then, we introduce a report onthe design process, which accompanies the gradual and iterative building of ES curriculatowards the proposed teaching framework, or final artefact. Finally, the paper discusses therelevance and validity of the framework and its implications.

GROUNDING IN IS EDUCATION AND REFLECTIVE PRACTIT IONER LITERATURE

The approaches and methods used to educate future IT professionals have fuelled important,ongoing debates (e.g. Cameron, 2008; Dahlbom & Mathiassen, 1997; Denning, 1992, 2001;Holmström et al., 2011; Iivari et al., 2008; Mathiassen & Purao, 2002; Purao et al., 2009; Riihijärvi& Iivari, 2008). The resulting research articles pose fundamental questions about the appropriate-ness of pedagogical approaches designed to give students the skills and competencies required inpresent IT practices. A number of articles have argued that themove from stand-alone applicationsto complex enterprise-wide systems requires a new set of skills from would-be IT professionals(Dhar & Sundararajan, 2007; Hawking et al., 2004; Lee et al., 2003; Smith et al., 2002).

In practice today, an ES is a very important technology for doing business, and almost allbusinesses have some kind of ES. This is evident from the survey of key ITand IT managementissues by Luftman et al. (2012). Senior IT executives regarded ES technology, such as BI andERP systems, as the most important technology. Topics related to the management of ES weretop IT management concerns, such as ‘ITand business alignment’, ‘business agility and speedto market’, ‘business process management’ and ‘business productivity and cost reduction’.

An ES is more than a technical application; ES involve new mindsets for doing business andrequire organizational changes within the enterprise in terms of strategies, structures, businessprocesses and culture (Al-Mashari & Al-Mudimigh, 2003; Allen, 2005; Davenport, 1998). Thus,the sociotechnical complexity of an ES requires diverse skills and rigorous expertise, far beyondthe demands of a functional IS confined to one department or functional area (Markus, 2004).Therefore, ES topics are important within IS educational research.

Over several years, we have observed companies’ desire to recruit IS graduates withappropriate ES skills. Businesses need proficient ES implementers, and they seek out studentswith these competencies. Our aim is to educate IS professionals to become ‘reflective



practitioners’ (Schön, 1983). It is not sufficient only to master ES in theory; ES implementersneed to tackle emerging problems during implementation in practice, enact situations andparticipate in dialogues to sort out possible situations, and reflect upon the challenges andpossible solutions. The concept of reflection-in-action (Mathiassen, 1999; Mathiassen & Purao,2002) embeds the ideas of Schön’s (1983) professional practice. It relates not only to scientificknowledge and technical rationality, such as procedural knowledge and standardizedimplementation methods for IS professionals, but also to non-canonical practices andimprovisation to solve problems in situ (Brown & Duguid, 1991).

Schön (1983) highlights the importance of tacit knowledge and that our knowing is in ouraction. He emphasizes learning activities, such as experiencing, reflecting, interpreting and tak-ing action to understand different learning processes. Reflection is a critical activity as it enablesthe individual to uncover meaning and to make his/her experiences explicit. Schön distinguishesbetween ‘reflection-in-action’ and ‘reflection-on-action’. The former describes experiences andideas that inform our actions in a situation that is unfolding. In an educational setting,reflection-in-action typically occurs during dialogue between students and lecturers. Becauseof the lecturer’s experience with a topic, he/she can immediately take action and explain difficulttopics for students from a different angle. The latter relates to reflection after a situation that hasbeen uncertain or complex. The reflective actor uses his/her prior understandings andexperiences of a phenomenon to combine them with his/her new understanding and retrospec-tive reflection. The participant then takes new action based on this after-event reflection.Students having difficulty completing an assignment just after an introductory lecture oftenrequire reflection-on-action. They might need more time to reflect on new knowledge from thelecture and to combine the new knowledge with their existing knowledge base or frame ofreference before they understand how they should take action and actually do the assignment.

Complex organizational learning processes take place when companies implement ES(Robey et al., 2002). Therefore, we need to prepare students for the organizational learningprocesses in which they will be involved, and IS professionals need appropriate ES skills totackle complex ES implementation in practice. Theoretical and accepted knowledge isimportant; however, the ability to apply this knowledge and reflect on problems, going beyondaccepted assumptions and double-loop learning (Argyris and Schön, 1978), is important forsolving complex problems in an ES context. The concept of double-loop learning involvesreflecting on, and challenging, the assumptions and objectives of actions, which allows one tosee problems in new ways. This concept is essential to adapt to a changing environment.

This process of change can be applied to ES and is important to IS graduates. In many ways,organizations need to ‘unlearn’ before they adapt to new processes, new roles and a new ES(Robey et al., 2002). The concept of unlearning as a prior stage to new learning and adoptionof new knowledge represents processes that require changes in mindset and establishedassumptions. Therefore, we connect unlearning to the double-loop learning concept. Teachersmust provide IS graduates with challenging business cases and scenarios that force them intodouble-loop learning cycles.

Prior research has identified certain technical and organizational challenges in differentphases of the ES lifecycle: selecting an ES package, implementation and post-implementation(Markus & Tanis, 2000). Moreover, researchers and practitioners alike have identified a number



of critical success factors to guide firms along the ES journey (Somers & Nelson, 2004). Advicefrom experienced practitioners on these systems is necessary during the implementationprocess. Thus, IS graduates who start to work on ES projects would benefit from having a broadunderstanding of the implementation process and its related challenges.

Hands-on training connected to specific ERP packages, such as SAP, is increasingly beingimplemented in ES teaching programs. Several of themajor ERP vendors, including SAP,Microsoft,and Oracle, have developed university alliance programs, and universities have focused oncollaboration by establishing ES teaching partnership with ES vendors and consultant companies(Ask et al., 2008; Klose et al., 2004; Rosemann & Maurizio, 2005). Studies report, however, thatintegrating ES software into the curriculum is resource intensive and challenging for teachers aswell as for students (Fedorowicz et al., 2004; Seethamraju, 2007). The lack of ERP skills amongacademic staff has been an important challenge, because its solution requires expensive trainingof lecturers (Hawking et al., 2004). Moreover, to develop appropriate lab assignments, and upgradeand maintain implemented software on a continuous basis, is resource demanding. Theseexpenses may also discourage hands-on ES courses (Bradford et al., 2003; Seethamraju, 2007).However, despite the challenges with practical ERP training, business schools and educationprograms in IS are still establishing ES classes focusing on hands-on experiences with ERPsystems (Rosemann & Maurizio, 2005; Watson et al., 1999; Winkelmann & Leyh, 2010).

Recommended ES teaching approaches also emphasize the importance of teaching generalES concepts and ES issues, which are highlighted in the study of Boyle & Strong (2006) whocompiled a list of ERP skills that organizations expect from IS graduates. They found that themost important skills related to business functional knowledge, and in particular, to the abilityto understand the business environment. The second most important set of skills wastechnology management knowledge – knowledge of ERP concepts, the ability to learn newtechnology and the ability to understand the strategic impact of an ES on an organization.The third set of skills was interpersonal skills, and the forth item of importance was teambuilding skills and knowledge. The ability to work cooperatively in a team environment to planand accomplish project assignments was highly valued. Furthermore, interpersonal skills relateto dealing with uncertainty, being sensitive to organizational culture (Lee et al., 1995), andleveraging team diversity (Majchrzak et al., 2005; Maznevski, 1994).

Educational researchers have also tied critical success factors to the requirement for ESskills. For example, Mohamed & McLaren (2009) compared the research stream of ERPeducation with the stream of ERP implementation success factors. They found that ESeducation programs did not sufficiently accentuate several ‘soft skills’ associated with ERPsuccess: change management, organizational and employee resistance and performanceincentive schemes. Their study has implications for ERP class design, which would benefit froman increased focus on interpersonal skills.

IS graduates are required to understand contextual differences among organizations in terms ofstructure, culture and social aspects, in addition to the complex sociotechnical interplay thatunfolds in an ES context (Allen, 2005). Because of this complexity, the learning process for anindividual or a team is likely to include double-loop learning to cope with problems that challengeestablished assumptions and reflection-on-action to come to effective solutions. For example, oneimplementing organization would differ from another in terms of business tasks, processes,



structure and sociocultural factors. Thus, experiences from one ES’s implementation are notnecessarily completely transferable to another context (Hanseth et al., 2001).

Despite the establishment of a diversity of ES education programs, there are still shortages of ERPconsultants who have sufficient ERP skills to handle complex ES implementations. Technical com-petency and hands-on experiences with ES software are obviously not the most important compe-tences needed to cope with ES implementations. The next section presents the pedagogicalprinciples and theories of learning important to emphasize in an integrated teaching approach.

PEDAGOGICAL PRINCIPLES AND PERSPECTIVES OF LEARNING

Instructivism and traditional teaching approaches have been criticized for generating passivestudents (Dewey, 1986; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Vygotsky & Cole, 1978). One criticism is that thetraditional classroom model and cognitive learning are too mechanistic, because this approachfocuses on transmission between teacher and students only (Lave & Wenger 1991). In addition,traditional education is authoritarian and does not take the students’ actual learning processesthrough experience into account (Dewey, 1986). Moreover, instructivism is blamed for stimulatingonly surface learning (Atherton, 1999). Instructivism is often associated with cognitive learning andindividual thinking, and it ranks individual knowledge higher than collective knowledge (Cook &Brown, 1999). Students as learners in the classroom may build declarative knowledge in termsof ‘knowing what’ (facts, concepts and theories) (Brown & Duguid, 2001); however, buildingprocedural knowledge, or ‘knowing how’, is more challenging in a classroom context.

In contrast to the instructivism approach, experiential approaches, constructivism andsociocultural pedagogy promote learning contexts that engage students as active learners. Forexample in Kolb’s (1984) experiential learningmodel, people engage in concrete experience throughtheir work or learning contexts. This activity is followed by three steps: reflective observation,abstract conceptualization and experimentation. In this model, the process of learning requiresshifts between concrete experiencing, reflective observation, abstract conceptualization andactive doing (experimentation). In order to learn successfully, one must shift between the oppositepoles of concrete experiencing and abstract thinking, between reflective observing and activedoing. The result is a tension between reflective interpreting and active testing. Understanding thiscycle has made an important contribution to understanding learning processes.

In contrast to instructivism, the constructivist teaching approach pays attention to interactionsbetween students, and between students and teacher (Vygotsky & Cole, 1978). In addition, therole of the teacher is more facilitator than authoritarian, and the learning environment is lesshierarchically designed, allowing for increased flexibility and collaboration between teacherand students. Learning, therefore, becomes a reciprocal experience for both students andteacher (e.g. Vygotsky & Cole, 1978). For example, a teacher should not provide fixed answers,but guide the students to be active learners, searching independently for learning resources. Inthis sense, scaffolding has been a useful pedagogical instrument to stimulate active learningprocesses by extending students’ understanding. Scaffolding pushes students beyond theircurrent abilities and levels of understanding (Hammons & Gibbons, 2001). By graduallyreducing the scaffolding – reducing extensive support and fixed answers – the teacher entrusts



the students to learn more independently. Thus, learning is an active cognitive process in whichstudents generate new concepts and mental models while they meet new experiences.

The situated learning model in sociocultural pedagogy has received much attention, both as aneducational approach and as an organizational learning model (Brown & Duguid, 1991; Lave,1988; Lave & Wenger, 1991). Situated learning focuses on collective learning, and accordingly, itis in contrast to cognitive learning, which focuses on individual learning processes. Situated learningtakes place in communities of practice through socialization processes, peripheral participation andactive involvement in practice (Brown & Duguid, 1991; Lave, 1988; Lave &Wenger, 1991). Situatedlearning is a practice-based approach to organizational learning in which social structures andmeanings are continually negotiated through participation, where learning, meaning and identityare all aspects of the same participative act. Learning is, in itself, an evolving form of membership.

Because of the several existing and sometimes competing pedagogical approaches andperspectives on learning described previously, it is important for educators in general, and foreducators teaching ES in particular, to have a broad understanding of different learning models,pedagogical principles and knowledge perspectives to organize a suitable learning context.However, teachers do not necessarily need to choose one learning model over another. Forexample, Sfard (1998) maps cognitive learning – the acquisition metaphor – with socioculturallearning – the participation metaphor. Based upon acquisition, the process of ‘knowing’ is aprocess that provides students with ‘knowing what’ through having or possessing, in combina-tion with active participation and communication in student teams/communities. The idea ofcombining and integrating has been important in designing a teaching framework for ES classes.

The work of Weick (1995) in organizational science, connects sociocultural pedagogy withsome analogies to sensemaking and highlights action and activity in which meanings areinterpreted, rejected and reinterpreted in ongoing processes (Weick, 1995). However,sensemaking also includes ideas regarding combinations. Sensemaking in organizations is asocial process where the cognitive and the social intertwine into a network of intersubjectivelyshared meanings that are sustained through the development and use of a common languageand everyday social interaction. Thus, these ideas also emphasize a combination of bothacquisition (the cognitive) and participation (the sociocultural/practice-based) approaches.

Both the concept of sensemaking and the sociocultural learning model (Lave & Wenger, 1991)share key principles of Schön’s reflective practice concept, where tacit knowledge is a form ofknowing, and hence, inseparable from action. Sensemaking is a different way of understandingthe complexity and ambiguity of organizations and their environments, in contrast to rationalmodels, which have been criticized for ignoring these complexities. Sensemaking is the creationof reality as an ongoing accomplishment that takes form when people make retrospectivesense of the situations in which they find themselves. Sensemaking highlights the ‘invention thatprecedes interpretation. It is also valuable because it implies a higher level of engagement bythe actor’ (Weick, 1995, p. 14). In sum, this section has provided an overview of some significantpedagogical approaches, learning theories and our reflections thereof. These constitute animportant part of the knowledge base informing the design process of an ES teaching framework.We underscore the importance of having this overview to select the most appropriate pedagogicalapproach or a customized combination of approaches, to create an effective ES learning context.Next section presents the research setting for this design study.



RESEARCH SETTING

The research setting for this study was teaching activities in ES classes for IS students at aNorwegian University. The study builds upon 8 years (2003–2011) of teaching experiences.

The Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences at this university has more than 2000students, with the majority enrolled in Business Administration. The centre for ES startedits operations in January 2007 to promote the teaching of ES at the faculty. The ‘raisond’etre’ for the centre was the avid appreciation of the employers of graduates for hands-onexperience in ES.

The primary focus was on developing lab modules for IS and business administration coursesto provide students with hands-on experiences from ERP accounting systems and CRMsystems. The strategy was to obtain ERP software embedded as natural ingredients of differentIS and business administration courses. Moreover, the aim was to illustrate how theoreticalideas and concepts describing these systems in the literature also fitted with these systemsin practice: for example, how marketing, business intelligence, decision-making, andmanagerial coordination may benefit from utilizing CRM systems, and how ERP may supportand decrease the amount of manual work in accounting and finance.

Moreover, ES courses already taught in the IS graduate program (2003–2007) changed theircurricula, from being mainly conceptual courses, towards a combined multimodular approachcomprised of both theoretical and practical modules. By emphasizing the practical modules inthese courses, project work assignments and lab exercises became important parts of thesecourses’ curricula. The purpose of the lab module was to achieve learning by having hands-onexperiences on specific ES software packages. The aim was to understand usability of thesystem, configuration issues and customization opportunities, and furthermore, to reflect onthe potential consequences of customizing an ES.

The centre intrastructure was Visma Global, Microsoft Dynamics AX 3.0 and MicrosoftDynamics NAV 5.0 (Redmond, WA, USA), the ARIS modelling tool (Software AG,Darmstadt, Germany), and Microstrategy BI from Teradata (Dayton, OH, USA). TheSoftware-as-a-Service (SaaS) system, ‘Xledger’ (Oslo, Norway), was up and running bythe end of 2009. A mini course in SAP was set up and ran in 2010 and 2011, supportedby external expertise. Currently, the centre continuously considers new ES and has ongoingdialogues with different ES vendors.

DESIGN RESEARCH METHODS AND THE RESEARCH PROCESS

Design research methods

In IS research, DR creates and evaluates IT artefacts to solve organizational problems (Blakeyet al., 2008). A design process is an opportunity to improve our understanding and to formalizelearning over time. In DR, a dichotomy must be faced; it describes both the process involved indesigning an artefact (set of activities) and a product (the artefact itself) (Hevner et al., 2004).According to Markus et al. (2002), the build-and-evaluate loop is normally iterated a numberof times before the final design artefact and principles are created.



March & Smith (1995) categorized ITartefacts into constructs (e.g. vocabulary and symbols),models (abstractions and representations), methods (algorithms and practices) and instantia-tions (implemented and prototype systems).

The current study utilized DR principles (Hevner et al., 2004; Markus et al., 2002) andadopted concepts from specific methods such as AR (Markus et al., 2002) and ADR (Seinet al., 2011). DR principles were appropriate for this kind of study because of the iterativenature of the research process and the inclusion of artefact building.

Figure 1, adapted from Sein et al. (2011), depicts the four main stages of the ADR method:(1) problem formulation; (2) building, implementation and evaluation; (3) reflection and learning;and (4) formalization of learning. In the following, we utilize the stages in this model to describeour research design process.

Design research processProblem formulationResearch was driven by the following focus: how can faculty create an effective learningenvironment for the education of reflective ES implementers? There was a need for anappropriate framework to support teaching of ES for IS graduates. The framework shouldembed general DPs and practical guidelines for how to set up and combine different learningcontexts, learning theories and pedagogical principles for teaching and learning complex EStopics. Our framework represents an innovative artefact because no generic framework existsso far for educating reflective ES practitioners. Following the terminology from design science,we define IS teaching frameworks as a class of problems, and our specific ES teachingframework, the learning context triangle (including its DPs), is a contribution to this class.

Different bodies of research and theories have informed this research and the emergingartefact. Both the ES literature and parts of the educational literature (pedagogical principlesand learning theories) have been important.

Figure 1. Action design research method stages (adapted from Sein et al., 2011).



Building, implementation and evaluationWe created an explicit artefact and a set of DPs as a solution to a problem. We applied DRguidelines for building, implementation and evaluation (and rebuilding), recognizing the arte-facts as emergent and sociotechnical – inscribed and shaped by the context over time(Orlikowski, 1996; Sein et al., 2011). The ‘sets of activities’ in this research study representthe longitudinal process of gathering teaching experiences from practice and the iterativedevelopment of DPs, whereas the ‘artefact’ represents our emerging teaching framework.

The research process took place in iterative circles that repeated the sets of activities(build, implement and evaluate) over time. Each circle included evaluation (evaluating teachingpractices and suggesting improvements), learning and reflections on how suggested improve-ments should be implemented (rebuilding of the teaching framework), and the actual implemen-tation step of the refined framework and adjusted teaching practices. In the following, wedescribe how the evaluation process was performed, which data this study rests on, and whatqualitative metrics were used.

Evaluation process and dialogues as qualitative metricsThe design of curricula and the corresponding teaching framework for ES classes went throughregular (at least annual) evaluation processes. We describe this process of evaluation throughan interpretive lens, focusing on ongoing dialogues (qualitative metrics) that influenced oursensemaking process (Klein & Myers, 1999). These dialogues took place between (1) teacherswithin the teaching team responsible for the ES courses, (2) the teaching team and the studentsparticipating in ES classes, and (3) the teaching team and participants (Chief InformationOfficers (CIOs)) from the local business sector. The following sections provide further detailsfor each type of dialogue and for the sensemaking process.Dialogue between instructors teaching Enterprise Systems classes. From 2003 to2006, several instructors assumed responsibility for the sessions of a class, and there werelimited exchanges of experiences among the involved instructors. The introductory coursewas a bit fragmented, and there was a need for more integration of the content within thecourse. Beginning in 2007, two instructors (normally) practiced team-based teaching. Duringsessions, one of the teachers was responsible for the main lecturing, whereas the otherteacher supported his or her colleague with examples and relevant questions to stimulate thediscussion among the students in the class. The responsible teachers held continuousdialogues regarding their experiences, reflections and suggestions for improvements of ESclasses. The teaching team consisted of two to four teachers.Dialogue between faculty staff and students. There was an ongoing dialogue betweenthe students and the instructors who taught ES classes. Students’ feedback was not limitedto centralized evaluation schemes and surveys posted by the university administration. Infact, the evaluation schemes were not very popular among the students, and few studentsresponded. It was often difficult for teachers to follow up on the results from these surveys.Thus, a central aim for the teaching team was to establish constructive and regular dialogueswith students throughout the semester. For instance, at the end of a session, the teachersinitiated a discussion with the students about the learning outcomes and the most difficultissues and encouraged suggestions that would have further benefited the session. Based



upon the feedback and dialogue with the students, teachers discussed and reflected on theirexperiences and made decisions on potential improvements. Once implemented, thesedialogues became an iterative, institutionalized, ongoing process to make final decisionsregarding actions to improve existing and/or forthcoming classes.

In addition, there were mandatory midterm and end-term evaluations and meetings of theStudy Program Advisory Board. The reports, documents and meeting minutes filed from theseevents constitute a historical account of the formal evaluation process. During the midtermevaluation process, the instructors of the course and the student representative organized ameeting where they went through the feedback from the class and codeveloped a documentwith action points based on the feedback. Although recordings of these events could have beenuseful for transcript references and direct quotes, the events were not tape-recorded. Thisavoided any reservations about being open in the sensitive context that a group of studentsrepresents. Besides, tape-recording does not absorb the tacit elements or the body languageof a dialogue or discussion, which are crucial for the researcher to observe. A total of 160students participated in these dialogues during the period of this study. They providedsubstantial feedback on complex issues, which became valuable input to the courses.Dialogue between teaching team and externals. Over time, the instructors teaching ESclasses established research contacts with firms and CIOs that were acquiring, implementing,using or supplying ES of different kinds. The CIOs shared important competencies andsuggested practice-based assignments for the project modules within the ES classes. Theyalso arranged contacts through their company networks and suggested other firms withwhich students might collaborate to complete their projects. Furthermore, the teaching teamreceived advice for improving lab assignments.

In addition to these dialogues, the teaching team organized workshops for CIOs and participatedin different ES seminars to keep track of emerging technologies and new market trends and toestablish new contacts with actual ES vendors and CIOs. These events generated notes anddocuments, and the teaching team had ongoing dialogueswith four to eight external contacts, suchas ES consultants, ES vendors, CIOs and ES teachers from other educational institutions.

Reflection and learning – the research process as a sensemaking processThrough an interpretive lens (Klein & Myers, 1999), we iteratively rebuilt the curricula of ourcourses, and the teaching framework gradually emerged through interactions between existingtheory, empirical data and our own interpretations and reflections. We have utilized pedagogicalprinciples, learning perspectives and ES literature, and combined these with empirical dataconsisting of practical teaching experiences from the courses and evaluations from students,externals and the teaching team.

This design process has also been a sensemaking process for the actors involved (Klein &Myers, 1999). During these design loops, we interpreted, reflected and developed theoreticalinterpretations of the learning context emerging over time.

Analysis of these dialogues transpired iteratively among activities of (1) reflection,interpretation and evaluation of past dialogues; (2) participation in new ones; and (3)development of preliminary theoretical constructs. This process followed the ideas of Klein &Myers’ (1999) third principle:



3. The Principle of Interaction Between the Researchers and the Subjects. Requires criticalreflection on how the research materials (or ‘data’) were socially constructed through theinteraction between the researchers and participants. [Klein & Myers, 1999, Table 1, p. 72]

The research process engaged the authors as ‘involved researchers’ and included elements ofAR, in contrast to ‘outside researchers’ who may conduct interviews from time to time but arenot directly involved in the research context (Walsham, 1995).

The themes emerged through interplay among the actors, consisting of students, theteaching team and the participants from the local business sector. It was advantageous tohave two researchers (both members of the teaching team) in the process of theorizingaround a pedagogical approach, because it provided the possibility to question each other’sassumptions about students’ learning. Both the ongoing dialogues and the documentscreated provide the empirical data upon which this study rests. The formal documents, theoral dialogues and the notes were combined, integrated and analysed according to theprinciples of meaning interpretation (Kvale & Brinkmann, 2009, p. 207). Based on theintegrated content (or our final analytical memos), we reflected on our experiences and howwe had performed our existing teaching practices; furthermore, we sought to understand(interpret) what the teaching approach ideally should be and how it should be performed.Before taking action, we created a broader frame of reference (recontextualization) bycombining the content of the dialogues with our reflected and refined curricula and pedagogyto achieve a more effective learning context (see Section 6.1–6.4 that portrays artefactbuilding and rebuilding in rich descriptions).

Figure 2 summarizes the research process in the context of sensemaking and illustrates howwe approached the ADR method (Figure 1) in practice by utilizing principles of the hermeneuticcircle. The figure presents the actors (industry partners, students and teachers) and elementsinforming the emerging artefact (curriculum, theory and prior empirical studies of teaching ESclasses). Furthermore, it presents the hermeneutic circle in terms of different sensemaking pro-cesses that occur iteratively: experiencing, participating in dialogues, reflecting, interpretingand taking action such as implementing changes in the course program.

Theorizing about our experiences from teaching ES classes, various learning theories andprior empirical studies based on teaching ES classes informed and guided the research pro-cess. Inspired by interpretive research principles for conducting IS research and Walsham(2006), in particular, who reflects on learning from the data, we think the following statementis important: ‘I believe that the researcher’s best tool for analysis is his or her mind,supplemented by the minds of others when work and ideas are exposed to them’ (Walsham,2006, p. 325). In addition, we followed the principles of Klein & Myers (1999). For instance,according to the principle of dialogical reasoning, the researcher’s frame of reference may in-clude inevitable prejudice (principle 5, Klein & Myers, 1999). However, the readings of researchstudies and theories influenced the analysis in this study in a critical manner. Besides, interpre-tive research allowed for the flexible use of established theories during the research process(Walsham, 2006). Reflections of new theoretical frames happened gradually as the analyticalprocess proceeded. For instance, while cognitive learning models dominated the beginning ofES teaching, a more integrative and collaborative learning approach emerged over time.


Figure 2. The iterative process of ‘build, implement and evaluate’ as a sensemaking process.


Formalization of learningThrough an ongoing process, from preliminary understandings of the parts through anemerging understanding of the whole, and then back to a reinterpretation of the parts, the finalproduct of the research process materialized. The final product comprised a complete puzzle ofinterpretations of the infrastructure of the course structure in terms of the learning contexts, thepedagogical means and the learning processes.

In this hermeneutic process of sensemaking, each iterative circle of statements and interpre-tations from participants represented the parts, whereas the evolving teaching framework, thelearning context triangle and the set of DPs for how to develop this framework constituted thewhole. This final product of a complete puzzle represents the generalized outcomes of thisresearch. The following section presents the iterative development of the DPs and the gradualformulation of the teaching framework.

THE ITERATIVE DEVELOPMENT OF DESIGN PRINCIPLES

This section describes the iterative design of the ES courses and the emerging DPs. Bycontrasting our teaching experiences and learning outcomes with the literature, we graduallyimplemented and/or extended the use of different pedagogical principles and pedagogicalmeans to stimulate learning processes among students. The section also presents some ofthe major pedagogical issues faced in this process.



The introductory course in Enterprise Systems in 2003–2006

The introductory course in ES (ES I) appeared in the fall semester of 2003. It was a compulsorycourse in the master program in IS, and it was an overview course that encompassed a varietyof ES topics. ES, and in particular ERP, had received increased attention in the 1990s and hadbeen widely adopted among businesses. It was, therefore, very timely that the master programin IS increased explicit emphasis on ES.

The main goal of the course was to provide the students with an understanding of differentconcepts of ES. The organizing and the pedagogical means have changed over time. Thecourse currently provides an overview of various IT-based systems that support enterprise-widefunctions and processes. The students obtain fundamental insights into the critical factors andchallenges for planning, implementing and using such IS, as well as the various roles theapplications play in an integrated IS architecture. The course also focuses on the options andconstraints of the various systems, and the factors that influence their implementation and use.

The course initially consisted of two submodules: a theoretical module introducing conceptsof ES through books and articles, and a project assignment conducted in groups (2–4 studentsper group). In the project assignment, the students either discussed an actual issue within theES domain or conducted a small study in an organization that already had an ES installed, wasplanning to implement an ES, or was in the middle of an ES implementation process.

The course was organized as weekly sessions, which mainly focused on traditionalclassroom teaching with lectures given by faculty. In parallel with the lectures and readings,students carried out their project work, culminating with a report and an oral presentation.

Two faculty members were in charge of the course in 2003. One, who had just joined thefaculty, had lengthy experience as a CIO in various businesses. He had wide experience thatsignificantly complemented the academic faculty. Therefore, it was possible to assemble anappropriate course curriculum, with important input from practice. He was involved in the coursefrom 2003 to 2006. The other person in charge of the course was an associate professor with aprimarily academic background. These two faculty members involved three of the other facultymembers that supplied modules on topics such as data warehousing, knowledge managementand ERP systems. There was also one guest lecture from a CIO in a large company that hadimplemented SAP and won an award in 2003 for their Data Warehouse application.

The students generally found the course topics quite challenging and the readings quiteabstract. It was quite difficult to comprehend the implementation issues and the relatedchallenges. On the other hand, they indicated that guest lecturers were very valuable. Onestudent commented:

The course is too theoretical oriented, we do not understand what ES really are about… whycan’t you take us to a company so that we can see these kinds of systems, see how theywork in practice?

The course was offered again in the fall semester in 2004. Based on the experiences fromteaching the course in 2003, and the input from students, the course integrated additional inputfrom industry in the form of two guest lectures and a visit to a local company. The number ofother contributing faculty members also increased to five. Otherwise, the curriculum was similar



to the one from 2003. The number of industry guest lecturers increased even further in 2005and 2006, and represented five quite different industries, such as food and beverages, health,consulting, software development, and oil and gas exploration. In addition, there was a demo ofan ES for small-and-medium- sized enterprises (SME).

To provide more practical and applied business cases, the teaching team contacted localcompanies and organized a visit to a company. The company operated in the food andbeverage industry and had five SAP modules installed (implemented in 2002). One ofthe employees organized a round trip inside the factory to provide the students with anoverview of the business processes and logistics supported by the system. The touremphasized processes such as ordering, production, packing, inventory and shipment. Inaddition, the students saw a demonstration of the system. The students were quitesatisfied with this trip and demonstration, and the session became a regular event in thefollowing years.

The rest of the curriculum remained stable and still comprised a variety of ES topics. Two ofthe faculty members were responsible for the course, and three other faculty memberscontributed with specific modules, such as content management, knowledge managementand in-depth ERP. This format continued in 2006.

We established the following two DPs based on the first 4 years of teaching:

DP1: Institutionalize dialogues with students and externals as an evaluation form in EScourses.

DP2: Establish collaboration between business and academia to integrate practice-basedknowledge of ES topics with theoretical knowledge of ES topics.

It became apparent that there were some serious challenges to providing a quality EScourse, which would give students adequate ES skills. Feedback from students indicated thatthe course was very abstract and that theory and concepts were hard to grasp. Students alsoexpressed a desire for a more applied, hands-on approach.

The Enterprise Systems courses in 2007–2008

In 2006, several of the faculty raised the issue of creating a hands-on lab with ESsystems. Other institutions had recently taken steps to provide such lab facilities. Thefaculty started a dialogue with the University of Gothenburg that 1 year earlier hadestablished a centre for ES. The major purpose of this centre was to provide hands-onES lab in business courses. Based on these experiences, we decided that we wouldapply for external funding for establishing a centre for ES. The goal of this centre wouldbe to provide hands-on ES course modules in business and IS courses. In addition, thecentre would become a competency resource for local businesses on ES implementationissues. We were able to obtain backing from the faculty as well as external funding from alocal competency foundation.



The increased focus on ES also led to a more deliberate process among the involved facultymembers to develop further the ES curricula. This led to some changes in the master program.The introductory course moved from the first semester to the second semester in the spring of2008. Furthermore, an advanced course in ES, established as an elective (ES II), was added inthe fall semester of 2007, which was the third semester of the master program. This coursefocused on advanced topics in ES, and from 2007 to 2011, it concentrated on ERP implemen-tation issues. The course combined theoretical issues with hands-on lab exercises and studentprojects. One of the faculty members devoted significant time to creating a lab module inMicrosoft Dynamics AX for this course.

When the introductory course (ES I) repeated in the spring semester of 2008, it included thelab module in Microsoft Dynamics AX, a content management lab and a knowledgemanagement lab. There were guest lecturers from three companies, a visit to one companyand guest lecturers from two vendors of ES. The course topics were similar to previous years,with emphasis on the variety of ES systems.

In the fall semester of 2008, we expanded the lab exercises in ES II to weekly sessions.Microsoft Dynamics NAV 5.0 was used, and we utilized teaching resources from Microsoft’swebsite ‘CustomerSource’ that provided e-learning packages and training materials forcustomers. We focused on assignments to understand logistics, with purchase, sale, inventoryand finance modules.

Reassessment of pedagogical model and design principles in 2007–2008. Animportant implication of the establishment of the centre was increasingly thoroughdiscussions of the pedagogical principles for teaching ES. We had iteratively createdcurricula in the ES courses that consisted of three learning arenas: classroom, ES labs andprojects in organizations. However, we saw the need for further reflection on the learningenvironment that would integrate these three contexts. We conjectured that we shoulddevelop the pedagogical framework further, gradually and iteratively by refining theframework and curricula each semester, as depicted in Figure 2. We discussed theexperiences, evaluated student feedback and assessed the learning outcomes. We reviewedvarious perspectives on learning and pedagogical principles from both educational andorganizational literature. The revisions of the pedagogical framework led to yearly revisions ofcurricula and course activities. The following paragraphs briefly introduces the pedagogicalissues that were most significant in this process.

Firstly, we analysed and contrasted our ES teaching experiences with learning theory and thefindings about ERP skill requirements in Boyle & Strong (2006). The most important skill set inBoyle & Strong (2006) related to business function knowledge. The IS students were taughtsome business functions in the bachelor program. Our ES courses for graduate students builton a course in IT and business development in the first semester of the master program.Students obtained some exposure to business processes in this course, through term projectsin local businesses. The students did interviews with managers, studied process descriptionsand mapped various business processes in the process-modelling tool, ARIS (Software AG,Darmstadt, Germany). We conjectured that we should extend the focus on business processesin the ES courses and emphasize the significance of modelling and understanding the business



processes as a requirement for ES implementation. In this way, the students received good ex-posure to business functions and processes.

The second most important skill set in Boyle & Strong (2006) was technology managementknowledge. We concluded that the students received adequate technology managementtraining in the courses in the master program. The third and fourth most important skill setswere interpersonal and team skills and knowledge. These sets emphasized such skills asabilities to accomplish assignments, deal with uncertainty, be proactive and work cooperativelyin a team environment. These are ‘soft’ skills not normally emphasized in an IT program. Weconjectured that we needed to create a cooperative learning environment that would stimulatestudents to develop these soft skills. Furthermore, we needed to emulate the organizationallearning processes involved. Therefore, the student teams would integrate issues from theorywith hands-on laboratory exercises and projects in organizations. This required that the majorpart of the learning activities take place within student teams.

Secondly, we found that intersubjective sensemaking (Weick, 1995) was an appropriateconcept to make sense of ambiguous situations characterized by the application of tacitknowledge and/or insufficient formal knowledge frameworks. This entailed collective sensemakingto share interpretations and exploremeanings. Students also needed to apply codified (articulated)knowledge to make sense of ambiguous situations and generically subjective sensemaking(Weick, 1995). Collaborative learning consisted of practice-based learning and situatedlearning theory (Lave, 1988), to understand learning processes that occurred in student teams(in project organization and in the lab). Lave (1988) argued that learning as it normallyoccurred was a function of the activity, context, and culture in which it took place; thus it wassituated. Moreover, collaborative social interaction was a critical component of situated learningleading to the social construction of knowledge (Brown & Duguid, 2001). Project work inorganizations and laboratory assignments were important pedagogical means that enhancedcollaborative learning. We surmised that traditional classrooms would not be well suited forES courses and that we should put more emphasis on student activity. This implied theneed to define our role as facilitators and to guide the students to be active learners, not toprovide them with fixed answers. We also adopted the concept of ‘reflective practitioners’(Schön, 1983) and the cycle of four learning activities (experiencing, reflecting, interpretingand taking action) as guiding principles. Our mission was to develop reflective practitioners,with the ability to reflect and integrate complex ES issues, and to stimulate students’ reflectionthrough assignments and projects.

Based on the previous assessments, we formulated three additional DPs:

DP3: Integrate hands-on training in ES labs with theoretical knowledge of ES concepts

DP4: Integrate sociotechnical issues of ES implementation

DP5: Create a cooperative learning environment by utilizing Weick’s concept of intersubjectivesensemaking and collaborative learning



The Enterprise Systems courses in 2009

We introduced our pedagogical approach to the students in the 2009 ES I course. By beingexplicit about our pedagogical approach, we forced students to reason and learn about theirlearning processes, attempting to create a meta-level of learning. We emphasized ourpedagogical approach and our framework in the introductory lecture, and several timesthrough the semester. We presented the pedagogical framework consisting of the threelearning contexts and the significance of group interactions for learning. We strongly encour-aged the students to work in teams throughout the semester. We organized group projectsthat included several group presentations. We arranged labs with Microsoft Dynamics NAVand Microstrategy BI, and ran demos of a knowledge management system (AskMe) and aSaaS system (Xledger.net).

The ES II course ran in a similar fashion in the fall semester of 2009. The focuswithin lectures andclass activities was on ERP implementation, whereas the focus in labs was on installing andconfiguring Microsoft Dynamics NAV and two open source systems, Sugar CRM and Dollibar(ERP system). Studentswere required towork in groups on lab assignments and case assignments.

We found that the focus on the pedagogical approach increased student motivation andheightened student awareness about the interplay between the learning contexts and therationale behind our teaching approach. There was increased activity among the students,and more students demonstrated good understanding of different ES topics. However, we werenot fully satisfied with student participation in class. Approximately one-third of the studentsseldom contributed to discussions in class. The exam results corroborated this view.Discussions with the student representatives after the semester indicated that we couldincrease the extent of group assignments.

Further development of pedagogical model and design principles in 2009. Asdemonstrated in the previous section, our courses integrated issues from the theory withhands-on laboratory exercises and projects in organizations. Thus, there were threelearning contexts: classroom, lab and organizations. We also emphasized that the majorityof learning activities should take place within student teams. We used assignments tostimulate the student groups to integrate organizational and ES systems’ configurationissues (Figure 3). We required the student groups to prepare presentations and writtensummaries of theoretical papers, case studies, various ES systems and emerging EStechnology issues.

Mandatory ES lab assignments were performed in the lab context. The lab assignmentsrequired students to work on solving configuration problems in various ES systems. As depictedin Figure 4, this required students to combine issues from ES theory and organizationalimplementation in the lab context.

We conjectured that to create a learning environment that stimulated students’ knowingprocesses, we needed to integrate real-life ES implementation issues. We perceived thisas our third learning context, the organizational context. Figure 5 illustrates how we usedterm projects to stimulate the student groups to integrate issues from theory and ESconfiguration with organizational implementation issues in the organizational context.

We formulated the above principles into our sixth DP:


Figure 3. Mandatory assignments required the integration of ES theoretical concepts, implementation and configurationissues.

Figure 4. Lab assignments required integration between ES theory and implementation to understand configurationissues.

Figure 5. Term projects required knowledge integration between ES theory and ES configuration issues to make sense oforganizational implementation complexity.


DP6: Create an integrative learning environment of both theoretical and practice-basedknowledge based on three learning contexts, classroom, ES lab and organizational projectassignments.

Decades of research has demonstrated that individuals as well as groups learn throughthe learning cycle (Kolb, 1984). By requiring student groups to work on mandatory projects



and assignments, we stimulated them to go through the phases of the learning cycle.Complex and equivocal problems stimulated students to challenge their understandingand mental models. We illustrate this point with four arrows in a circle in Figure 6.

The learning cycle model (Figure 6) depicts how individuals, groups and organizationslearn from experience. In our classes, the students’ experience was in terms of feedbackfrom peers and professors during and after assignments and projects. The actions takenwere at several levels. Firstly, as the students worked in groups, they discussed interpreta-tions, assumptions, viewpoints and potential actions. Complex and equivocal problemsstimulated students to cycle through loops with initial interpretations and assumptions,where they challenged each other’s viewpoints. Gradually, they built a deeper understand-ing among the group members. Secondly, as the groups presented class assignments,professors and other students challenged them. In addition, students were required topresent drafts of the term projects as well as the final term project. Feedback andconstructive confrontations in class stimulated further reflection, which often stimulated afurther learning loop, or even double loop learning (Argyris & Schön, 1978), wherestudents question the assumptions and conclusions behind the objectives. Double looplearning implied that students also reflected about the anticipated result of an action andthe assumptions behind the strategy for action, and then, revised the assumptions andthe strategy for action. We stimulated important collective and individual learning bymaking students express opinions and assumptions, and challenge each other’s viewpoints(Argyris & Schön, 1978).

Challenging term projects inspired the student teams to challenge their initial beliefs andvalues. We stimulated them to expand their analytical frames to identify explicitly, and then,challenge the underlying assumptions. This led us to our last two DPs:

DP7: Create a student-centric learning environment

DP8: Stimulate meta-level learning processes among students

Figure 6. Single-loop and double-loop learning.



The Enterprise Systems courses in 2010 and 2011

Primarily, our intention was to increase student self-learning activities further. We reduced thenumber of lectures in ES I in the spring semester and used lectures mainly to introduce newconcepts and topics. We continued the strong emphasis on teamwork from the previoussemester. We emphasized that they should view the professors as facilitators, and their peersas valuable resources. This approach gradually reduced the scaffolding (Hammons & Gibbons,2001), and the sessions became more student centric during the semester. We required thestudents to prepare presentations of (1) various research papers, (2) selected system vendors,(3) various emerging technologies and current issues and (4) the term projects. They alsodiscussed case exercises in groups. The students presented their term projects at severalstages, and two groups were responsible for providing feedback for each group. In this fashion,we were able to make the students more accountable for the course progress.

There were only minor changes to topics and lab exercises. We invited three more guestlecturers from various ERP vendors.

In ES II, we decided to offer labs with several ERP software packages from different vendors.This allowed us to expose the students to a wider set of ES applications. We continued to useMicrosoft Dynamic NAV 5.0, and provided a lab in a SaaS system (Xledger.net), SAP and anopen source ERP (Dollibar).

Due to an increased focus on cloud computing and SaaS ERP systems, we used the XledgerERP solution. SaaS principles were especially appropriate for small companies that usually hadlimited resources. Investing in ERP packages, expensive hardware and architecture solutionscould be difficult to handle in small companies. In SaaS solutions, the customer had online accessto the software and worked on the vendor’s server, paying only for the transactions. In Norway,such as anymarket economy,most companies are in the SME category; therefore, we conjecturedthat it was important for students to know systems used in SMEs. A consultant from Xledgersupported the teaching of the software and offered training material and assignments. These as-signments focused mainly on accounting and project management. From a teaching perspective,this ERP solution was easier to maintain and upgrade, but still required significant training.

We provided a SAP mini course by hiring external expertise. Assignments focused on basiclogistic functions (mainly purchase, inventory and sales modules). Finally, we also installed andused the open source solution, Dollibar, mostly for demo purposes.

We experienced increased student motivation and class participation through 2009–2011. Thestudents thrived on the increased extent of mandatory group assignments and the increasedresponsibility for contributing during the sessions. A collaborative and competitive atmospheredid emerge; students provided feedback to each other within and across the groups. On the otherhand, groups and students competed to make the best presentations and projects.

Students were quite satisfied with both courses. The regular master students were particu-larly satisfied with the lab exercises, obtaining hands-on experience to complement the class-room learning. Two German exchange students had previous lab experience with SAP. Intheir evaluations, they emphasized the benefits of integrating the theoretical issues from theclassroom with the lab assignments. They were also satisfied with the lower learning curve ofour ES lab, with Microsoft assignments, for example, compared to the SAP lab.



One significant effect was that the advanced ES course became the most popular elective.Early in 2010, the department board decided that it would run the course only every secondyear. Because of its popularity among students, this decision was overturned.

FORMALIZATION OF LEARNING

We have demonstrated how we iteratively developed our pedagogical framework and DPsthrough teaching the ES courses. The teaching framework, comprising a set of DPs and thelearning context triangle, is the final artefact and generalized outcome of this research. Table 1summarizes the DPs, their descriptions and consequences, and the potential ES skills that thegraduates can achieve. Finally, Figure 7 represents the learning context triangle.

We organized our framework and DPs into a graphical model to depict the interaction of thevarious contexts. Figure 7 depicts our three-dimensional model, the learning context triangle.The teaching framework comprises a combination of different learning contexts and pedagog-ical means and illustrates how this integrative teaching approach initiates various learning pro-cesses. This approach is in accordance with ideas of Sfard (1998), emphasizing a diverse andcombinative pedagogical model and consisting of methods that incorporated and stimulatedboth situated and cognitive learning. In addition, we utilized Weick’s concept of intersubjectivesensemaking, or collaborative learning, implemented by facilitating teamwork.

The laboratory context stimulated learning through experimenting, based upon Dewey’s (1938)innovative and experimental teaching approaches and Kolb’s (1984) continuation of thoseapproaches in an organizational context, as well as practice-based learning, depicted in Figure 7.The project assignments exposed students to organizational settings and implementation issues– organizational, project-based learning (Figures 3 and 5). Both contexts required students tointegrate theoretical knowledge from the classroom (codified knowledge, Figure 7). By graduallyreducing scaffolding, the students were pushed across the boundaries of their knowledge andwere able to internalize new knowledge and integrate it with their existing knowledge.

CONCLUSION

We have iteratively developed DPs and a learning context triangle graphical model to guide theteaching of ES courses. We propose a generic, three-dimensional teaching framework, comprisingdifferent contexts of learning in terms of traditional classroom, laboratory and organizationalsettings. We advise three major pedagogical means in accordance with these contexts of learningto integrate different types of knowledge: (1) the theory of ES, (2) hands-on experiences with ESsoftware and (3) project-based experiences, studying real-life ES implementations in organizations.

We argue that this integrative approach produces students capable of transforming theoret-ical ‘knowing what’ into practical ‘knowing how’ through learning by doing and reflection throughsensemaking (Weick, 1995). A teaching framework must be well founded in learning theory,both from an educational and organizational perspective. In addition, the pedagogical methodsmust be carefully selected to support the learning processes of students, making themcompetent to solve complex problems of high uncertainty and equivocation (Weick, 1995).


Table

1.Des

ignprinciples

Des

ignprinciple

Des

criptio

nCon

sequ

ence

sESskill

DP1

Institu

tiona

lizedialog

ueswith

stud

ents

andex

ternalsas

anev

alua

tionform

inESco

urse

s

Dialogu

esoc

curbe

twee

nteac

hing

team

andex

ternals,

betwee

nfacu

ltystaffa

ndstud

ents,a

ndbe

twee

ninstructorsteac

hing

ESclas

ses.

Iterativean

dfreq

uent

evalua

tion

proc

esse

sof

theartefact

building

andprinciples

behind

it

N.A.

DP2

Estab

lishco

llabo

ratio

nbe

twee

nbu

sine

ssan

dac

adem

iato

integrateprac

tice-ba

sed

know

ledg

eof

EStopics

with

theo

retical

know

ledg

eof

EStopics

Con

tact

with

compa

nies

canbe

establishe

dthroug

hinvitedgu

est

lectures

andby

orga

nizing

visits

toco

mpa

nies

that

have

anES

implem

ented.

Stude

ntswillbe

tterun

derstand

how

anESworks

inan

orga

niza

tion

andho

witsu

pports

diffe

rent

busine

ssproc

esse

s.

ESim

plem

entatio

nskills

Bus

ines

sfunc

tionan

dbu

sine

ssproc

essun

derstand

ing

DP3

Integrateha

nds-on

training

inES

labs

with

theo

retical

know

ledg

eof

ESco

ncep

ts

Labas

sign

men

tsfocu

sing

onus

ing

andco

nfigu

ringESpa

ckag

esarean

impo

rtan

tparto

fthe

learning

contex

tin

anESco

urse

.

Betterun

derstand

ingan

dlearning

ofESco

nfigu

ratio

nissu

esan

dtech

nica

lco

mplex

ityof

thesystem

san

dbe

tter

unde

rstand

ingof

how

tous

ean

ES

ESco

nfigu

ratio

nskills

Tech

nica

lund

erstan

ding

ofthe

logics

inan

ESpa

ckag

e

DP4

Integrateso

ciotec

hnical

issu

esof

ESim

plem

entatio

nIm

plem

entsp

ecificprob

lem-solving

case

assign

men

tsfocu

sing

onthe

complex

ityof

ESco

ntex

tsin

diffe

rent

orga

niza

tions

Increa

setheun

derstand

ingof

orga

niza

tiona

lco

mplex

ityas

sociated

with

implem

entin

gES,

thene

edforch

ange

man

agem

ent,bu

sine

ssproc

essreen

gine

eringan

dch

ange

sin

roles

andtasks.

Soc

iotech

nica

lskills

Bus

ines

sun

derstand

ingab

ility

tofacilitatealignm

entb

etwee

ntech

nology

andorga

niza

tion

DP5

Createaco

operativelearning

environm

entb

yutilizing

Weick’s

approa

chof

intersub

jective

sens

emak

ingan

dco

llabo

rative

learning

Project

workin

orga

niza

tions

and

labo

ratory

assign

men

tssh

ould

bees

sentialp

edag

ogical

mea

ns.

Collabo

rativelearning

isstim

ulated

anden

hanc

edwhe

nse

tting

upstud

enttea

ms.

Interperso

nala

ndteam

skills

Sen

semak

ingskills

DP6

Createan

integrativelearning

environm

ento

fboththeo

retical

andprac

tice-ba

sedkn

owledg

eba

sedon

threelearning

contex

ts(classroom

,lab

andprojec

t)

Bygiving

complex

projec

tas

sign

men

tsto

stud

ents,the

ywillne

edto

integrate

diffe

rent

kind

sof

know

ledg

ean

dskills:

codified

know

ledg

eab

outE

Sco

ncep

tsan

dtheo

ry(classroom

),tech

nica

lskills

ofco

nfigu

ringan

dus

ingESsystem

s(la

b)an

dun

derstand

ingof

ESim

plem

entatio

nin

prac

tice(project).

Stim

ulatese

nsem

akingproc

esse

sProject

man

agem

ents

kills

Abilityto

integratediffe

rent

ES

skillsan

dkn

owledg

e

DP7

Createastud

ent-ce

ntric

learning

environm

ent

Gradu

ally

redu

cescaffoldingto

extend

thebo

unda

riesof

stud

ents’kn

owledg

e.Stude

ntstake

onmoreresp

onsibilities

fortheirlearning

proc

esse

sRefl

ectiveESprac

titione

rskills

Con

tinue

s



Table1.

Con

tinue

d

Des

ignprinciple

Des

criptio

nCon

sequ

ence

sESskill

Letthe

stud

ents

lead

discus

sion

inthe

clas

sroo

man

dmak

ede

cision

s.Put

moreem

phas

ison

assign

men

tsan

dinde

pend

entworkan

dless

emph

asizeon

lectures

.The

role

ofateac

hersh

ould

rather

befacilitativethan

instructive.

DP8

Stim

ulatemeta-learning

proc

esse

sam

ongstud

ents

Introd

ucethepe

dago

gica

lframew

ork

andex

plaintheratio

nale

behind

itan

dho

witworks.

Increa

sethereflec

tions

amon

gstud

ents

andthelearning

abou

thow

they

learn,

which

may

increa

semotivationto

learn

moreeffectivelyan

din

new

way

s.

Refl

ectiveESprac

titione

rskills

Meta-learning

skills

N.A.,no

tapp

licab

le.



Figure 7. The learning context triangle.


Teaching ES implies pedagogical challenges for educators. We illustrate how we approachedthe pedagogical challenges related to providing this learning environment. Our goal was to teachstudents the skills needed to be proficient ES implementers and reflective practitioners. Complexlearning processes take place when organizations implement ES. Therefore, we need to preparestudents for the complex organizational processes and organizational learning processes involved.

The teaching framework was developed through iteratively designing graduate courses in ESfrom 2003 to 2011 in a Norwegian university. Our pedagogical approach resulted in an integra-tive approach to ensure a learning environment that provided a diversity of ES skills for ISgraduates. By combining different pedagogical principles, the aim was to stimulate deeperlearning processes that enhanced collaboration, creativity, analytical abilities, reflection andsensemaking processes among students.

We presented and utilized the learning context triangle in the lectures in ES in 2009–2011.We referred to the triangle each semester. The triangle was well received in class, wemaintained a very good class atmosphere, and students were well motivated to work withcomplex and challenging assignments. We believe that it created a meta-level of learning. Itmade students reason and learn about their learning processes. This made students activelyinvolved in shaping the learning arena and understanding the significance of the group projects.We believe that it increased student motivation and heightened student awareness about theinterplay between the learning contexts and the rationale behind our teaching model.

This study contributes to (1) DR in IS and (2) IS research with a particular focus on ES. Firstly,we have applied DR principles to develop a pedagogical framework for teaching ES courses,which also includes a set of DPs. This is a contribution to the body of IS DR because we areutilizing ADR – a specific DR method – for developing a pedagogical framework. We are



therefore extending the research application context of ADR to include development of artefactsother than IT systems only. We have defined the IS teaching frameworks as a class ofproblems, and our specific ES teaching framework, including the set of DPs and the learningcontext triangle, is a contribution to this class.

Secondly and most importantly, this study contributes to the body of IS research with aparticular focus on ES. We propose that the implementation of the DPs and learning contexttriangle may solve some important issues: How can IS students learn to tackle complex ESimplementations? How can students learn to deal with configuration issues? More importantly,how can faculty provide students with the required ES competencies to be reflective ESpractitioners? What is the most appropriate pedagogical approach? Teaching experiences inone setting provided the basis for the development of this model and a set of DPs; therefore,the model and the principles behind it could be tested and developed further in other universi-ties. Future research could empirically test and extend the framework. We propose, however,that other programs teaching ES could adopt our framework by applying the DPs developedand also test its applicability in other IS courses.

As discussed previously in the literature section, an ES is a very challenging context, involvingorganizational changes and a sociotechnical complexity that goes far beyond functional IS, usuallyconfined to one department or one functional area. This complexity leads to demanding require-ments for expertise and a diversity of skills from IS professionals and IS graduates. Therefore, ithas been a challenge to develop effective learning material for teaching ES. This researchperformed a challenging iterative process to create a pedagogical model in order to understandand deal with such a complex learning situation. The challenge compelled us to rethink basiceducational principles and to construct a framework that integrated various pedagogical principles,each important for this context. Some timely questions concerning the generalizability of themodelpresent themselves. Are the challenges outlined from the context of this study present in othercontexts as well? Are they, perhaps, less pronounced? Has this context forced us to articulateprinciples and relationships that are important in other contexts or in IS education in general?Could all IS courses benefit from adopting an artefact such as the learning context triangle? Weargue that most IS courses, wherever the focus of the course lies, could highlight and integratea particular IS topic into the three learning contexts of the artefact, stimulating student meta-levellearning processes in order to encourage development of reflective IS skills. Thus, future researchcould evaluate the general applicability of the framework in IS education.

In addition, we speculate that the pedagogical model could have relevance in learning contextsother than educational settings and universities. For instance, former research reports that compa-nies implementing ES experience organizational transformations thatmay constrain human action(Boudreau & Robey, 2005). Accordingly, they struggle to customize efficient training programs fordifferent user communities, which may cause users to avoid or work around the system inunintendedways, slowing down the adoption processes.We think ISmanagerswould benefit fromawareness of, and reflection upon, the complex learning processes and organization realignmentthat ES implementation involves. To establish proficient learning programs for different user com-munities, super-users and IS professionals, the developed DPs and learning context triangle canact as a point of departure – firstly, for establishing an understanding of meta-learning processes,and secondly, for outlining a roadmap for efficient training and learning in practice.



ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors would like to thank the editors and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful andconstructive comments. The authors are also grateful to Maung Sein for his valuable feedbackon methodological issues.

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Biographies

Eli Hustad is Associate Professor of Information Systems at

the University of Agder in Kristiansand, Norway. She holds a

PhD in Informatics from the University of Oslo in Norway. Her

main research interests are Implementation of Enterprise-

Wide Information Systems and Organizational Change,

Knowledge Management Systems and Learning. She has

presented her research at several international conferences

and published her work in journals such as Journal of Infor-

mation Systems Management, Journal of Integrated Design

and Process Science, International Journal of the Computer,

the Internet and Management, and Electronic Journal of

Knowledge Management. In addition, she has contributed

to several conference proceedings and book chapters.

Dag H. Olsen is Professor of Information Systems at the

University of Agder in Kristiansand, Norway. He holds a

doctoral degree from the Norwegian University of Science

and Technology in Trondheim, Norway. His main research

interests focus onEnterprise Systems and BusinessProcess

Management. He has published in journals such as Infor-

mation & Management, European Journal of Information

Systems, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management

and Scandinavian Journal of Information Systems.

, 445–473

educating reflective enterprise systems practitioners: a design research study of the iterative...

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