Collaborative Design: An SSM-enabled Organizational Learning Approach

Within the context of a three year applied research project conducted from 2003-2006 in a North American university library, staff were encouraged to reconsider organizational assumptions and design processes. The project involved an organizational leader and an external consultant who introduced and collaboratively applied Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) practice. Project results suggest the efficacy of using ‘soft’ systems thinking to guide interaction (re)design of technology-enabled environments, systems, and tools. In addition, participants attained insights into their new roles and responsibilities within a dynamically changing higher education environment. Project participants also applied SSM to redesign ‘in house’ information systems. The process of employing systems thinking practices to activate and advance organizational (re)learning, and initiating and elaborating user-centered interaction (re)design practices, culminated in a collaborative design (co-design) approach that readied participants for nimble responsiveness to continuous changes in the dynamic external environment.

[1]  Petter Gottschalk,et al.  Knowledge Management Systems in Law Enforcement: Technologies and Techniques , 2006 .

[2]  本田 敏明,et al.  ラーニング・エコロジー概念に関する文献解題 : John Seely Brown 「Growing Up Digital : How the Web Changes Work, Education and the Ways People Learn」より , 2011 .

[3]  C. Maybee.  Undergraduate Perceptions of Information Use: The Basis for Creating User-Centered Student Information Literacy Instruction , 2006 .

[4]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Process and content: two ways of using SSM , 2006, J. Oper. Res. Soc..

[5]  Bela H. Banathy,et al.  Dialogue as a means of collective communication , 2005 .

[6]  C.J.H. Mann,et al.  Systems approaches to management , 2002 .

[7]  P. Greenaway.  Making the change. , 2001, The Journal of audiovisual media in medicine.

[8]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  A user-centered and evidence-based approach for digital library projects , 2009, Electron. Libr..

[9]  Michael Jackson,et al.  Systems Thinking: Creative Holism for Managers , 2003 .

[10]  Anita Mirijamdotter,et al.  Systems Thinking and Information Literacy: Elements of a Knowledge Enabling Workplace Environment , 2006, Proceedings of the 39th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS'06).

[11]  Frank Stowell,et al.  Client-Led Design: A Systemic Approach to Information System Definition , 1995 .

[12]  Jorgen P. Bansler.  Systems Development Research in Scandinavia: Three Theoretical Schools , 1991, Scand. J. Inf. Syst..

[13]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  Collaborative design: a learner-centered library planning approach , 2008, Electron. Libr..

[14]  C. Bruce.  Seven faces of information literacy , 1997 .

[15]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  Collaborative co-design: The Cal Poly Digital Teaching Library user centric approach , 2006 .

[16]  Peter Checkland,et al.  From Optimizing to Learning: A Development of Systems Thinking for the 1990s , 1985 .

[17]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  Constructivist workplace learning: An idealized design project , 2004 .

[18]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  Rethinking what we do and how we do it: Systems thinking strategies for library leadership , 2005 .

[19]  Gabriele Jacobs,et al.  Imagining the flowers, but working the rich and heavy clay: participation and empowerment in action research for health , 2006 .

[20]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  A User-Centered Content Architecture for an Academic Digital Research Portal , 2005 .

[21]  Ann Taket,et al.  Creative Problem Solving: Total Systems Intervention. , 1991 .

[22]  P J Lewis,et al.  Rich picture building in the soft systems methodology , 1992 .

[23]  K. Lyytinen,et al.  Research on information systems development in Scandinavia—unity in plurality , 1998 .

[24]  Edward A. Fox,et al.  Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education ( AACE ) . Distributed via the Web by permission of AACE . Shared User Behavior on the World Wide Web , 2000 .

[25]  Christine S. Bruce,et al.  The relational approach : a new model for information literacy , 1997 .

[26]  Brian Wilson,et al.  Soft Systems Methodology: Conceptual Model Building and Its Contribution , 2001 .

[27]  G. Midgley.  Systemic Intervention: Philosophy, Methodology, and Practice , 2000 .

[28]  L. Pereira,et al.  International Journal of Knowledge-Based Organizations , 2011 .

[29]  G. Susman,et al.  An Assessment of the Scientific Merits of Action Research. , 1978 .

[30]  Donald A. Schön,et al.  Participatory Action Research and Action Science Compared , 1989 .

[31]  John Mingers,et al.  Pluralism, Realism, and Truth: The Keys to Knowledge in Information Systems Research , 2008, Int. J. Inf. Technol. Syst. Approach.

[32]  Jeremy Rose,et al.  Interaction, transformation and information systems development - an extended application of Soft Systems Methodology , 2002, Inf. Technol. People.

[33]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  From Information Commons to Learning Commons and learning spaces: an evolutionary context , 2008 .

[34]  Bob Dick,et al.  Action research literature , 2004 .

[35]  Russell L. Ackoff,et al.  Idealized design : creating an organization's future , 2006 .

[36]  Tony Ghaye,et al.  Building the Reflective Healthcare Organisation , 2007 .

[37]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Learning For Action: A Short Definitive Account of Soft Systems Methodology, and its use for Practitioners, Teachers and Students , 2007 .

[38]  Mary H Nino,et al.  Collaborative co-design: A user-centric approach for advancement of organizational learning , 2007 .

[39]  Anita Mirijamdotter,et al.  Dynamic action inquiry : a systems approach for knowledge based organizational learning , 2005 .

[40]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Systems Thinking, Systems Practice , 1981 .

[41]  Robert L. Flood,et al.  Contours of diversity management and triple loop learning , 1996 .

[42]  Sharon Poggenpohl,et al.  Thoughtful Interaction Design: A Design Perspective on Information Technology , 2007 .

[43]  P. Checkland,et al.  Action Research: Its Nature and Validity , 1998 .

[44]  Sir Geoffrey Vickers.  Human Systems Are Different , 1984 .

[45]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  Learning our way to change: improved institutional alignment , 2006 .

[46]  Louise Limberg.  Three conceptions of information seeking and use , 1999 .

[47]  R. Rapoport.  Three Dilemmas in Action Research , 1970 .

[48]  Max Elden,et al.  Cogenerative Learning: Bringing Participation into Action Research , 1991 .

[49]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Information management and organizational processes: an approach through soft systems methodology , 1993, Inf. Syst. J..

[50]  C. West Churchman,et al.  The Systems Approach , 1979 .

[51]  R. Flood.  Action Research and the Management and Systems Sciences , 1998 .

[52]  Sylvia L. Edwards.  Panning for Gold: Information Literacy and the Net Lenses Model , 2006 .

[53]  Peter Checkland,et al.  Soft Systems Methodology in Action , 1990 .

[54]  Russell L. Ackoff,et al.  Re-Creating the Corporation: A Design of Organizations for the 21st Century , 1999 .

[55]  Donna Champion,et al.  Validating Action Research Field Studies: PEArL , 2003 .

[56]  Maria Jansson,et al.  Participation, Knowledges and Experiences Design of IT-Systems in e-Home Health Care , 2007 .

[57]  Anita Mirijamdotter,et al.  Systems thinking in the workplace: Implications for organizational leadership , 2004 .

[58]  P. Checkland.  Soft Systems Methodology: A Thirty Year Retrospective a , 2000 .

[59]  Frank Stowell.  Do We Mean Information Systems or Systems of Information? , 2008, Int. J. Inf. Technol. Syst. Approach.

[60]  Sue Holwell,et al.  Information, Systems and Information Systems: Making Sense of the Field , 1998 .

[61]  Richard Baskerville,et al.  Diversity in information systems action research methods , 1998 .

[62]  Anita Mirijamdotter,et al.  The Cal Poly digital learning initiative , 2007 .

[63]  Anita Mirijamdotter,et al.  Building on what we know: staff development in the digital age , 2005, Electron. Libr..

[64]  Mary M. Somerville,et al.  Systems thinking: an approach for advancing workplace information literacy , 2008 .

[65]  Mandy Lupton.  The Learning Connection. Information Literacy and the Student Experience , 2004 .