The work to make a network work: studying CSCW in action

ABSTRACT

This paper reports on a field study of the procurement, implementation and use of a local area network devoted to running CSCW-related applications in an organization within the U.K.'s central government. In this particular case, the network ran into a number of difficulties, was resisted by its potential users for a variety of reasons, was faced with being withdrawn from service on a number of occasions and (at the time of writing) remains only partly used. The study points to the kinds of problems that a project to introduce computer support for cooperative work to an actual organization is likely to face and a series of concepts are offered to help manage the complexity of these problems. In so doing, this paper adds to and extends previous studies of CSCW tools in action but also argues that experience from the field should be used to re-organise the research agenda of CSCW.

REFERENCES

• 1: Benford, S., Bowers, J., Fahlen, L. and Rodden, T. 'Realising a spatial model for virtual environments'. In B. Pehrson and E. Skarb~ick (eds.) Proceedings of ERCIM: European Research Consortium for Information and Mathematics, June 1994. Swedish Institute of Computer Science, Stockholm, 1994.
• 2: R. Bentley , J. A. Hughes , D. Randall , T. Rodden , P. Sawyer , D. Shapiro , I. Sommerville, Ethnographically-informed systems design for air traffic control, Proceedings of the 1992 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work, p.123-129, November 01-04, 1992, Toronto, Ontario, Canada [doi>10.1145/143457.143470]
• 3: Bijker, W., Hughes, T. and Pinch, T. (eds.) The social construction of technological systems, MIT Press, Cambridge MA.
• 4: Bloomfield, B. 'Information systems in the U.K. NHS', Social Studies of Science, 21, 701-734, 1991.
• 5: Susanne Bødker , Kaj Grøbæk, Cooperative prototyping studies—users and designers a dental case record system, Studies in computer supported cooperative work: theory, practice and design, North-Holland Publishing Co., Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 1990
• 6: John Bowers , James Pycock, Talking through design: requirements and resistance in cooperative prototyping, Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems: celebrating interdependence, p.299-305, April 24-28, 1994, Boston, Massachusetts, United States [doi>10.1145/191666.191773]
• 7: Bowers, J., Pycock, J., Dean, G. and Rodden, T. 'Running the network: Supporting cooperative systems'. Submitted for publication.
• 8: John Bowers , Tom Rodden, Exploding the interface: experiences of a CSCW network, Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on Human factors in computing systems, p.255-262, April 24-29, 1993, Amsterdam, The Netherlands [doi>10.1145/169059.169205]
• 9: Bullen, C. and Bennett, J. 'Groupware in practice: An interpretation of work experience'. In Procecding~ of CSCW'90, ACM Press, New York, 1990.
• 10: Geoff Cooper , John Bowers, Representing the user: notes on the disciplinary rhetoric of human-computer interaction, The social and interactional dimensions of human-computer interfaces, Cambridge University Press, New York, NY, 1995
• 11: Cooper, R. 'Organization/disorganization', in The theory and philosophy of organizations, J. Hasard and D. Pyre (eds.), Routledge, London, 1990.
• 12: Jonathan Grudin, Why CSCW applications fail: problems in the design and evaluation of organization of organizational interfaces, Proceedings of the 1988 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work, p.85-93, September 26-28, 1988, Portland, Oregon, United States [doi>10.1145/62266.62273]
• 13: Grudin, J. 'Groupware and cooperative work: Promises and problems', in The art of human computer interface design, B. Laurel (ed.), Addison-Wesley, Reading MA, 1990.
• 14: Richard H. R. Harper, Looking at ourselves: an examination of the social organisation of two research laboratories, Proceedings of the 1992 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work, p.330-337, November 01-04, 1992, Toronto, Ontario, Canada [doi>10.1145/143457.143542]
• 15: John Hughes , Val King , Tom Rodden , Hans Andersen, Moving out from the control room: ethnography in system design, Proceedings of the 1994 ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work, p.429-439, October 22-26, 1994, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States [doi>10.1145/192844.193065]
• 16: John A. Hughes , David Randall , Dan Shapiro, Faltering from ethnography to design, Proceedings of the 1992 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work, p.115-122, November 01-04, 1992, Toronto, Ontario, Canada [doi>10.1145/143457.143469]
• 17: Jirotka, M., Gilbert, G.N. and Luff, P. 'On the social organisation of organisations', Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 1,95-118, 1992.
• 18: Latour, B. Science in Action, Open University Press, Milton Keynes, 1987.
• 19: Law, J., 'Technology and Heterogeneous Engineering: The Case of Portugese Expansion', in {3}, 1987.
• 20: M. Lynne Markus , Terry Connolly, Why CSCW applications fail: problems in the adoption of interdependent work tools, Proceedings of the 1990 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work, p.371-380, October 07-10, 1990, Los Angeles, California, United States [doi>10.1145/99332.99368]
• 21: Wanda J. Orlikowski, Learning from Notes: organizational issues in groupware implementation, Proceedings of the 1992 ACM conference on Computer-supported cooperative work, p.362-369, November 01-04, 1992, Toronto, Ontario, Canada [doi>10.1145/143457.143549]
• 22: Star, S. L. and Griesemer, J., 'Institutional Ecology, "Translations" and Coherence" Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-1939', Social Studies of Science, 19, 387-420, 1989.
• 23: Thurow, L. C. 'Foreword' in The Corporation in the 1990s, M. S. Scott Morton (ed.), Oxford University Press, New York, 1991.
• 24: Woolgar, S. 'Configuring the User: The Case of Usabjility Trials', in A Sociology of Monsters: Essays on Power, Technology and Domination, Law, J. (ed), Sociological Review Monograph 38, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1991.
• 25: Shoshana Zuboff, In the age of the smart machine: the future of work and power, Basic Books, Inc., New York, NY, 1988

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)

Additional Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.4 INFORMATION SYSTEMS APPLICATIONS

General Terms:
Management, Theory