IDENTIFYING AND DISTINGUISHING MANIFEST AND LATENTEFFECTS OF IT: A CASE STUDY OF PACKAGEDSOFTWARE IMPLEMENTATION
Meral Binbasioglu, Elaine R. Winston · 2002
In small businesses, IT often results in end-users having increased responsibility in multiple aspects of a business process and across functional areas. End-users may prefer the autonomy they gain by having more control over their business responsibilities, however, at the same time they may feel isolated. As a result of “end-user isolation” the need for social interaction becomes more pronounced creating “end-user distraction”. This is counterproductive to the intended goals of the IT investment. Qualitative data from a case study are used to demonstrate the importance of identifying both intended and unintended consequences. The paper employs a systems dynamics approach to explain how inadvertent second-order (latent) effects such as unproductive social habits can be predicted and prevented. A key result of the study is that, ironically, endusers discover ways to use IT as a social mechanism. Managerial implications of this study are discussed that can help both IT practitioners and management when implementing commercial packaged software in small businesses.