Anna-Liisa Syrjänen

From system development toward work improvement: developmental work research as a potential partner method for EUD

The dominant strategy within the field of EUD has been to improve end-user activities within a single software system. This approach has some limitations. First, the work environment often consists of a number of different systems and tools that form an information ecology with which users must cope. Second, the use of computers is embedded in organizational practices that may also need to be changed. Thus, there is a need to combine EUD with a parallel development of work practices. However, common work-development approaches, for example, process improvement, usually adopt a top-down managerial point of view that relies on expert modeling, and are therefore incompatible with EUD ideas. This paper suggests that a work improvement method developed in Finland since the 1980s, developmental work research, is a good candidate for partnering with EUD, because it takes the potential of local grassroots innovation and the development of work practices seriously.

Human-to-human interfaces for remote service kiosks: the potential of audiovisual communication

Face-to-face service, implemented as a fully automatic remote self-service, is a common way to digitalize public and private services. Continually diversifying user groups have repeatedly challenged this strategy and the user-centeredness in the systems design. Interface personalization has been used to improve web services but service production still suffers from complex interaction processes, trust, and security problems. One solution for the problems would be a human-to-human interface-based remote system via the Internet. When designed to utilize audiovisual communication in the online interaction of real people, a kiosk interface remains simple, enables the personalization of the actual customer service with the trust, security, and ease of use ensuing from the need of the service and the individual facilitating the interaction.

Service Interaction Flow Analysis Technique for Service Personalization

Service interaction flows are difficult to capture, analyze, outline, and represent for research and design purposes. We examine how variation of personalized service flows in technology-mediated service interaction can be modeled and analyzed to provide information on how service personalization could support interaction. We have analyzed service interaction cases in a context of technology-mediated car rental service. With the analysis technique we propose, inspired by Interaction Analysis method, we were able to capture and model the situational service interaction. Our contribution regarding technology-mediated service interaction design is twofold: First, with the increased understanding on the role of personalization in managing variation in technology-mediated service interaction, our study contributes to designing service management information systems and human-computer interfaces that support personalized service interaction flows. Second, we provide a new analysis technique for situated interaction analysis, particularly when the aim is to understand personalization in service interaction flows.

Boundaries between Participants in Outsourced Requirements Construction

The concept of the boundary is a powerful analytic tool for analyzing the challenges in collaboration between participants in outsourced requirements construction. Through an ethnographic study in a requirements construction project, where participants came from the client and vendor organizations, and represented varying expertises and organizational positions, we found professional boundaries between users and external software developers, and between external software experts and in-house information system (IS) experts. The authority boundary between the client’s manager and operatives was evident. Findings were discussed within the knowledge areas that are needed in the professional IS development. In order to help IS experts, participatory design (PD) practitioners and IS researchers in their attempts to develop the user-designer and client-vendor relationships, PD for outsourced IS development should be developed and further researched.