“I love the system—I just don't use it!”

This paper addresses how studies of work can provide the basis for redesigning existing information technology (IT). The paper reports on a field study of the differences in work practices of hospitaIs using a computer system and hospitals not using the system. We shall present the variety of strategies healthcare workers have adopted to coordinate their widely distributed activities, and discuss the consequences for these strategies when using the computer system. The paper concludes that the design of groupware should recognize the multiplicity of artifacts in the workplace (both manual and computational) and the need for interconnecting groupware with Information Systems.