Régis Meissonier

Toward an ‘IT Conflict-Resistance Theory’: action research during IT pre-implementation

Most empirical research on users’ resistance toward Information Technology (IT) has been conducted after implementation of IT in organisations. Little research has been done on the way individual and group resistance emerges and evolves during prior stages of projects. This focus on pre-implementation phases is important since Information Systems (IS) managers need to anticipate potential conflicts and users’ resistance that can involve project failure. While IS literature has separately developed theories on resistance and conflicts, we conceptualise a whole theoretic-system we call ‘IT Conflict-Resistance Theory’ (IT-CRT). This theory is used as driver for a 2-year action research project conducted at Netia Corporation (a worldwide leader in video and audio broadcasting) during preliminary phases of its Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation project. According to our findings, while conflicts toward IT implementation are often considered to have negative effects and require being actively managed by top managers, the case study delivers an alternative observation: a passive-like attitude of managers during the IT pre-implantation phase does not prevent the resolution of a socio-political oriented conflict between two groups of employees. Our observations illustrate how the avoidance management style invites team members to cope with conflict situations and to express tacit causes of resistance. While most Management Information System methods tend naturally to maximise users’ satisfaction and to reduce potential resistance, the IT-CRT theory developed in this article supports an alternative approach: enhancing resistance in order to anticipate and resolve latent conflicts that are directly or indirectly related to the project. The underlying message of this article for researchers and practitioners is to consider users’ resistance toward IT as a key process embedded into IT choices and IS design.

An Empirical Investigation of the Customer Knowledge Creation Impact on NPD Performance

New product development (NPD) projects require efficient strategies for reducing time to market and responding faster and better to the customer needs. While these strategies were mostly technology driven at the early stages, nowadays firms are adopting knowledge management systems (KMS) to enhance new customer knowledge creation and NPD performance. Despite their potential benefits, there is a variance in the extent of efforts that firms deploy for achieving NPD performance. This is because not all the firms can meet the KMS requirements to support the customer knowledge creation process. In this study, the authors develop a research model that identifies (1) the impact of KMS factors on customer knowledge creation process and NPD performance, (2) the elements that interconnects KMS factors, customer knowledge creation process, and NPD performance (3) the outcomes that are generated by this approach

The IT culture as an obstacle to the adoption of an ERP: Case of a high-tech SME

The firm’s IT experience is considered among the characteristics that influence the adoption of an ERP. Few authors assume that the firms IT experience act as a main risk factor for ERP implementation projects. In this paper, a literature review based on theories related to resistance and conflicts factors in ERP implementation is presented. Then we describe the outcomes that may be deducted from a high-tech SME which tried to adopt an ERP. We find in this case that IT expertise and culture turned out to be inhibitors of ERP adoption. In conclusion, we present a dual perspective on the firm’s capability to implement an ERP.

Capacité d'absorption des informations et pratiques de veille stratégique dans les PME : une étude sur des domaines vitivinicoles provençaux

La plupart des recherches sur la veille strategique se sont concentrees sur l’interpretation de signaux faibles, ou sur les problemes de surabondance signaletique, en laissant en arriere plan les usages des differents dispositifs de collecte d’information mobilises a cet effet. Ceci tend a negliger le fait que la veille strategique est souvent issue de plusieurs processus (formels et informels) auxquels les acteurs vont, en amont, accorder un niveau d’attention different. Cet article se fonde sur le modele de l’ACAP pour discriminer les mecanismes d’absorption d’informations strategiques au sein d’une filiere economique. La methodologie de recherche qualitative retenue a ete eprouvee, en particulier, par 20 entretiens semi-directifs effectues aupres d’autant de domaines vitivinicoles de la filiere des vins de Provence. Les resultats revelent que ces derniers accordent peu d’attention aux informations provenant de ces organismes de coordination. En revanche, ils privilegient les informations collectees, dans le cadre de leurs activites courantes, au gre des relations formelles comme informelles entretenues avec d’autres entreprises membres de la filiere. La partie discussion permet d’enrichir le modele de l’ACAP en montrant notamment, que la capacite d’absorption potentielle des informations est plus le fait de « l’experience » des entreprises et de la « similarite » avec les acteurs de leur environnement (fournisseurs, clients, concurrents, etc.) que celui des « mecanismes d’integration sociale » mis en place par les organismes de coordination. En termes de contributions manageriales, notre etude permet de preciser les concepts de similarite et d’experience en y integrant les notions d’appartenance territoriale et de proximite geographique qui apparaissent comme des soutiens a la capacite d’absorption des informations des entreprises.

Understanding Open Source Developers' Motivations from their Participation

A large part of the existing literature on Open Source projects identified the motivation factors predicting the participation of members. However, these incentives do not ensure a sustained participation level. Most of the members leave projects when their personal needs are satisfied and, as a consequence, a lot of projects are aborted or abandoned before the beta version software has been distributed Indeed, most of open source projects are aborted or abandoned because failing into keeping enough active members. So, the initial aforementioned research question worth to be reversed in order to apprehend how the participation level influences the way OS projects members make sense of their own motivations. The objective of this article is to use the enactivist approach and to consider that motivations are not simple antecedents to actions but are shaped by actions as well (here the participation). The quantitative analysis delivers the results of a survey administrated to participants of business OS projects. The results reveal that reputation, reciprocity and professional opportunities expected are the most influenced variables by the participation. However, learning motivations and ideology toward OS beliefs and values are the less influenced ones. This results counterbalance prior empirical researches which had observed a strong predicting power of both variables on expected participation level of participants. This is tends to show participation as making sense to motivations whom members have practical indicators for their self-assessment.