Striking the professional pose : professional identity in the development and utilisation of information systems

Burns, BJ

Abstract

This thesis explores how professional identity figures in the enactment of IS and
focuses on groups of professionals as users and developers of information systems
and investigates how they relay their professional knowledge via the system to retain
identified aspects, in this case autonomy, of their professional identity. The study
looks at how these professional groups of staff control, tailor and maintain important
modules within an information system and how this facilitates the appropriation of it
into their everyday working practices.
It has been argued that the rise of professions in society has been such that they
are seen as integral to post-industrial society. Yet, within information systems,
minimal research has considered users as professionals and moreover users as
developers. Instead, professions, professionalism and users as developers as units of
analysis have usually been intertwined with discussions of IT/IS
workers/professionals and codes of conduct via systems development. Additionally,
many still propose the technologically deterministic route of rolling out information
and communications technologies (ICTs) expecting that users will, and indeed can,
'download' what they know into a system. This approach is usually underpinned by
the predominant assumption that the system will be developed by one group
(developers) and used by another group (users). Therefore this study focuses on two
professional developer-user groups within environments populated with skilled
professional workers and considers the implications of the deployment of IS in such
contexts.
In particular, the author attends to the influence of technology on a central feature of
professional identity - autonomy. The melding of professional workers, who often
enjoy a particularly autonomous status in organisations, with information systems that
have the potential to erode this, offers a fruitful site for investigation. This study looks
at contact centre and academic environments and therefore, investigates how
professional identity figures in situations where it would be expected that officially
sanctioned autonomy, is as a rule minimal, within a contact centre environment and
typically normal practice within an academic environment. In order to do this, the
author draws on case study data, which provides insights into the deployment of a module of an enterprise-wide student information system in a department of a UK
university and a scripting module in a HR contact centre.

Citation

Burns, B. Striking the professional pose : professional identity in the development and utilisation of information systems. (Thesis). University of Salford

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Oct 3, 2012
• Award Date: Jan 1, 2008