Human factors in information technology: The socio-organisational aspects of expert systems design

Abstract

This paper looks beyond the mostly technical and business issues that currently inform the design of knowledge-based systems (e.g., expert systems) to point out that there is also a social and organisational (a socio-organisational) dimension to the issues affecting the design decisions of expert systems and other information technologies. It argues that whilst technical and business issues are considered before the design of Expert Systems, that socio-organisational issues determine the acceptance and long-run utility of the technology after it has been implemented. It shows how four issues within the organisation can affect the design or the after-effects of the design and implementation of the technology. It also shows how the four issues can be considered within the structured phases of expert system development.

The organisational impact of knowledge-based systems: a knowledge perspective

“…The use of the KBS has led to de-skilling [10] 0 Tactical level: conditions/characteristics at the workgroup level 45 The composition of the workgroup has changed, the degree of lower qualified personnel has increased [3] Agree…”

“…On the positive side, KBS have, for instance, been credited for enhancing their processing capacity [3], for steepening their learning curves [4,5], and for increasing the decision consistency and confidence [4,6,7]. On the negative side, they have, among other things, been blamed for lowering the job satisfaction by introducing more boring work [3,8], for dehumanising the organisation [4], and for de-skilling the workforce [9,10].…”

“…Trewin [17] quotes Benbasat and Nault who, in 1988, stated "…that there is a lack of studies that investigate…how [knowledge-based] systems influence the organisations in which they are installed" (a view reiterated by Duchessi et al in 1993 [18]). Since then a stream of empirical assessment studies has begun to flow [3][4][5][6][7]12,17,[19][20][21][22][23][24], although somewhat hesitantly and still outnumbered by the speculative or theoretical studies [8][9][10][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39]. Although the number of empirical studies is clearly increasing, these studies still paint a rather cluttered image of what the impact of KBS is.…”

Boundary Disputes:

“…This notion is played out in formulations such as “the human dimensions of IT”, “human computer interaction”, human factors engineering etc. (Sutcliffe and Macaulay, 1989; Woherem, 1991). Countless studies have examined the impact of IT on employment patterns, the distribution of skills, decision making, task allocation, information flows and competitiveness.…”