The Failed Implementation of the Electronic Prescription in Germany - A Case Study

Many countries worldwide are striving for improving the quality of care and for reducing costs in the health care sector by establishing large IT infrastructures. In Germany, the introduction of the electronic health card and the national telematics infrastructure is lagging years behind the original schedule. In this paper, we describe and analyze a case study of one selected part of this ultra-large intervention. The selected part is the failed implementation of the electronic prescription. The related activities started in 2003 and ended in 2010 when a decision was made to abandon this part of the intervention. We present a detailed analysis of the project and identify 14 reasons in five categories for the project’s failure. Furthermore, we provide a multi-layered overview of the episodes and sub-projects

Entrepreneurial Ecosystems in Life Science Industry : A study of start-ups, scale ups and resilience of Entrepreneurial Ecosystems

The Entrepreneurial Ecosystem (EE) literature has presented itself as promising in recent years, as it adopts a systemic network approach on entrepreneurship. Despite its popularity, scholars have also raised some serious concerns, showing it is yet a rather underdeveloped concept. This dissertation addresses some of critiques on the EE literature by proposing four research papers that consist of conceptual and empirical studies. The thesis contributes first and foremost to the development of the EE literature by combining insights from other literatures including the ones on entrepreneurship, regional studies, resilience and social capital.Conceptually, the dissertation takes stock of EE research based on a thorough literature review. The paper outlines the historical roots and antecedents of the EE concept, and it discusses the various definitions of EE, its constituent parts, and evolving trends in the EE literature. Most importantly, it critically assesses current findings and highlights a number of weaknesses of the EE literature. It comes to the conclusion that there is a lack of clarity with respect to a number of features of the EE concept. Based on this critical review, a future research agenda is presented that aims to tackle those weaknesses.Empirically, the dissertation addresses some of these critiques in three empirical papers. For instance, the thesis conducts a comparative regional study and applies a multi-scalar approach to outline the specific nature and structure of EEs in Life Sciences in five regions in two countries – the US and Sweden. The role of linkages and institutions both inside and outside EEs are examined not only in general but also specifically for the scale-up process of Life Science firms in EEs. Hence, the thesis shows how EEs in different regions differ in how they support or hinder the growth of firms, highlighting the factors important specifically to productive entrepreneurship. The relative importance of factors (firm-specific and external factors) and how they influence each other are also examined. Moreover, the thesis also accounts for dynamics in EEs and their resilience. It studies a closure of a big multinational firm in an EE to see what implications it had for the functioning and transformation of the EE.Finally, the dissertation offers a discussion on specific policies on EE that could improve the entrepreneurial performance of a region by (i) supporting an environment favorable to start-ups and growth of firms, providing basic conditions and stimuli (ii) supporting reinforcing mechanisms in EEs, and (iii) eliminating institutional and non-institutional obstacles

Literature Reviews in IS Research: What Can Be Learnt from the Past and Other Fields?

Literature reviews (LRs) are recognized for their increasing impact in the information systems literature. Methodologists have drawn attention to the question of how we can leverage the value of LRs to preserve and generate knowledge. The panelists who participated in the discussion of “Standalone Literature Reviews in IS Research: What Can Be Learnt from the Past and Other Fields?” at ICIS 2016 in Dublin acknowledged this significant issue and debated 1) what the IS field can learn from other fields and where IS-specific challenges occur, 2) how the IS field should move forward to foster the genre of LRs, and 3) the best practices to train doctoral IS students in publishing LRs. This paper reports the key takeaways of this panel discussion. We provide guidance for IS scholars on how to conduct LRs that contribute to the cumulative knowledge development in and across the IS field to best prepare the next generation of IS scholars

Internet of Things Adoption for Saudi Healthcare Services

Background: Recent studies in information systems have predicted that applications of the Internet of Things (IoT) innovations will revolutionise various sectors including healthcare. Besides the issues and opportunities of IoT based innovations, existing studies have shown limitations to advance the adoption of IoT-understanding and relevant interventions to benefit researchers and healthcare practitioners. Method: In this context, a systematic literature review study was conducted to re-position a qualitative, phenomenological investigation that could offer useful insights into the factors affecting IoT-adoption in a developing country’s healthcare service. In addition to it, five participants who worked in hospitals and clinics in Jazan, Saudi Arabia, took part in the semi-structured interviews developed based on the diffusion of innovation theory. Results: The study explored the relevant literature and evaluated how the outcome is used to identify the key delivers of IoT in healthcare. Conclusions: According to the findings, the capacity of the Saudi healthcare sector to accept and implement a new IT with IoT technologies is increasing and its integrations remains a debated issue

The agency and geography of socio-technical transitions: the case of urban transport innovations

The objective of this cumulative thesis is to gain deeper insights into the interplay of agency and structure through the empirical example of emerging technologies in the context of Industry 4.0. To achieve this goal, it enriches the theoretical background from evolutionary economic geography with insights from transition studies and management studies. Empirically, the analysis focuses on novelty creation toward intelligent transport systems in an urban environment. This encompasses software solutions such as big data platforms for traffic management, the Internet of Things to create a network of various objects and subjects within the city, or the development of autonomous vehicles. This thesis formulates four overarching research purposes: (1) comprehending socio-technical transitions during Industry 4.0 from an agency-based perspective; (2) understanding how agency facilitates or hinders innovation development; (3) identifying the impact of multi-scalar and cross-sectoral relations; and (4) integrating different theoretical approaches to gain a holistic understanding of the empirical domain. The thesis adopts a qualitative research design with a philosophical grounding in critical realism, drawing on semi-structured expert interviews, literature reviews, and document and network analysis. The main contribution of this thesis rests on four distinct research papers. A systematic literature review sets the conceptual basis for the analysis, identifying future research avenues based on the existing research body. The first case study analyzes the development of an app-based solution for managing urban logistics in Barcelona from a multi-level perspective. The other two case studies investigate the evolution of advanced air mobility in Germany and the city of Hamburg

Barriers and Enablers to Building Entrepreneurial Ecosystems as Perceived by Change Agents in the Workplace

This study explores factors that influence entrepreneurial ecosystems. Clifton (2010, 2015) recommends entrepreneurship, better business models, and new business startups as a solution for economic renewal in the United States and specifically identifies disengaged workers and low-energy workplaces as the starting point. The recommendation does not address how to make workplaces conducive to entrepreneurial activity, nor does the recommendation address how to engage entrepreneurial employees. Existing literature outlines the known tensions between theory, anecdotal evidence, and the professional practice of building entrepreneurial ecosystems. To date, the term entrepreneurial ecosystem exists as a metaphor in the extant literature. While scholars have not agreed upon a single definition, they seemingly coalesce around the societal, economic, and technological dimensions of an entrepreneurial ecosystem. Human capital theory, diffusion of innovation theory, endogenous growth theory, and knowledge spillover theory serve as the theoretical foundation for this study. The researcher identified participants for data collection through conversations and interactions with the Innovation Learning Network. The study results describe activities that facilitate (e.g., key people, inclusive processes, and knowledge spillovers) and hinder (e.g., lack of time, lack of commitment, and lack of motivation) workplace innovation programs. Study participants (N = 12) describe how the change agent’s role expands the workplace boundaries, enabling value-added connections and collaborations. Three interviews, used for triangulation, validated the study’s findings. Although barriers exist, study participants contend that workplaces are conducive environments to spark intrapreneurship, promoting innovation in an organization

Decolonial Epistemologies for Energy Planning in Brazil

This thesis opens up theoretical pathways for decolonial epistemologies for energy planning in Brazil. The critical analysis is verticalized from the 2015–2024 Brazilian Decennial Energy Expansion Plan (DEEP) to better highlight the epistemological problems in energy planning. Epistemological challenges demand a critical understanding of the ethical system we live in – the ethics of exhaustion – to enable a comprehensive radical transformation of the consideration of energy futures, since epistemology is part of the formalization of ethics. This thesis argues that energy planning in Brazil is based on the ethics of exhaustion to epistemically impose the colonial agenda of power. Energy futures are planned as necessary harm to achieve the fetishized good, normalized as the ethical intersubjective and human–environment relationships. Critically analysing the ethical system enables understanding the epistemologies for energy planning in Brazil as the formal moment of the ethics of exhaustion, which can only be challenged in an intersectional manner by framing the multilateral and collateral aspects of the violence consistent in planning energy futures regardless and to the detriment of the existence of life. Epistemic diversity is the first step towards decolonizing energy planning. It comprises: the inclusion of indigenous and communal perspectives when elaborating the energy plans; having persons directly affected by energy enterprises as the majority of the personnel involved in the activity of planning; setting the priority of energy planning as the production and reproduction of all lives in a non-hierarchized manner; recognizing the necessary balance in the human–environment relationship; privileging local needs in relation to transnational markets; and intentionally de-hierarchizing the benefits of energy exploitation by delinking energy studies, production, and distribution from financial capital. This work challenges colonial epistemologies, based on the ethics of exhaustion, from the standpoint of the colonial difference, proposing epistemic diversity as the impulse for decolonial energy planning in Brazil. It is an urgent academic task to perceive epistemic decolonization to transform the present in order to stop condemning the future to social and environmental catastrophes

Adaptive tension, self-organization and emergence : A complex system perspective of supply chain disruptions

The purpose of this thesis was to explore how microstate human interactions produce macro level self-organization and emergence in a supply disruption scenario, as well as discover factors and typical human behaviour that bring about disruptions. This study argues that the complex adaptive system’s view of complexity is most suited scholarly foundation for this research enquiry. Drawing on the dissipative structure based explanation of emergence and self-organization in a complex adaptive system, this thesis further argues that an energy gradient between the ongoing and designed system conditions, known as adaptive tension, causes supply chains to self-organize and emerge. This study adopts a critical realist ontology operationalized by a qualitative case research and grounded theory based analysis. The data was collected using repertory grid interviews of 22 supply chain executives from 21 firms. In all 167 cases of supply disruptions were investigated. Findings illustrate that agent behaviours like loss of trust, over ambitious pursuit, use of power and privilege, conspiring against best practices and heedless performance were contributing to disruption. Impacted by these behaviours, supply chains demonstrated impaired disruption management capabilities and increased disruption probability. It was also discovered that some of these system patterns and microstate agent behaviours pushed the supply chains to a zone of emergent complexity where these networks self-organized and emerged into new structures or embraced changes in prevailing processes or goals. A conceptual model was developed to explain the transition from micro agent behaviour to system level self-organization and emergence. The model described alternate pathways of a supply chain under adaptive tension. The research makes three primary research contributions. Firstly, based upon the theoretical model, this research presents a conceptualization of supply chain emergence and self-organization from dissipative structures and adaptive tension based view of complexity. Secondly, it formally introduces and validates the role of behavioural and cognitive element of human actions in a supply chain scenario. Lastly, it affirms the complex adaptive system based conceptualization of supply chain networks. These contributions succeed in providing organizations with an explanation for observed deviations in their operations performance using a behavioural aspect of human agents

Between Movement and Platform : Exploring the Sociomateriality of Accountability in Platform Organization and its Performative Consequences

Digital platforms represent a growing disruptive phenomenon. Platforms are engaging since they trace peers, consumers, and citizens, organize social movements, manage distributed innovation, and aid in the governance of cities in terms of distributed agency and autonomy. As different tracing and evaluative infrastructures form and disclose new forms of interaction and trust, platforms give shape to new subjectivities, properties, and relative positions that have not hitherto been defined. This dissertation investigates the emergence of this phenomenon, the accounting practices and infrastructures that underpin this new form of organizing, and possible consequences in terms of accountability that arise in platform organizing. This doctoral dissertation aims to contribute to the understanding of how and where accountability is performed in platform organization. The dissertation draws on different sources from a spiral case study to provide a body of empirical evidence about platformization and accountability. In terms of the approach, the dissertation works under what Orlikowski & Scott (2014) describe as the “broad banner of sociomateriality,” a perspective where materiality is seen as constitutive of all organizational practices. Thus, the dissertation introduces a practice theoretical approach focusing on practice as sociomaterial configuring. The empirical context of the first two papers is sharing economy practices and platforms in Finland. The first paper examines how disruptive activities emerge, while the second considers platform-mediated peer trust in the light of “nordic exceptionalism” and high trust societies. The empirical context of the third paper is Open Innovation platforms. This paper develops a performative theory of openness. Drawing on interview and ethnographic data from an empirical case study of the Smart and Wise City Turku spearhead project, the fourth paper explores the tendency in smart cities initiatives to invest in ICT as a means to “wire up” and make technology “do political work” (Woolgar & Neyland, 2013, p. 17). The paper’s central theoretical concept of “thinking infrastructure” highlights how new accounting practices (e.g., on digital platforms) operate by disclosing new worlds where the platforms and the users discover the nature of their responsibilities to the other. When a platform performs accountability, it enables new modalities of distributed agency and distributed authority. When someone or something does not count on a platform, one needs to think critically about the boundaries, constraints, and exclusions that operate through the particular sociomaterial practice of platformization. Through the four empirical research papers and a kappa, this dissertation contributes to understanding how, where and when accountability is performed in platform organization. The findings highlight the sociomateriality of accountability in platform organization and its performative consequences.Digitala plattformar representerar ett växande disruptivt fenomen. Plattformar är intressanta eftersom de gör allt från att spåra användare, konsumenter och medborgare, organisera sociala rörelser, hantera distribuerad innovation och hjälper till att styra städer. När olika spårande och evaluerande digitala infrastrukturer formar och avslöjar nya former av interaktion och tillit, ger plattformar form åt nya subjektiviteter, egenskaper och relativa positioner som hittills inte har definierats. Denna avhandling undersöker uppkomsten av detta fenomen, redovisningspraxis och infrastrukturer som ligger till grund för denna nya form av organisering och möjliga konsekvenser i termer av ansvarsskyldighet som uppstår på plattformar. Det övergripande syftet med denna doktorsavhandling att bidra till förståelsen av hur och var ansvarsskyldighet utförs i plattformorganisation. Avhandlingen bygger på olika källor från en spiralfallsstudie och tillhandahåller en mängd empiriska bevis i relation till begreppen plattform och ansvarsskyldighet. Avhandlingen placerar sig under det som Orlikowski & Scott (2014) beskriver som "sociomaterialitetens breda baner", ett perspektiv där materialitet ses som konstituerande för alla organisatoriska praktiker. Således introducerar avhandlingen ett praktikteoretiskt förhållningssätt som fokuserar på praktiken som sociomateriell konfiguration. Den empiriska kontexten för de två första artiklarna är delningsekonomi och plattformar i Finland. Den första artikeln undersöker hur disruptiva aktiviteter uppstår, medan den andra betraktar plattformsförmedlad tillit i ljuset av "nordisk exceptionalism". Den empiriska kontexten för den tredje artikeln är plattformar för öppen innovation. Denna artikel utvecklar en performativ teori om öppenhet. Med utgångspunkt i intervjuer och etnografiska data från en empirisk fallstudie av spjutspetsprojektet Smart and Wise City Turku undersöker den fjärde artikeln smarta städer och trenden att investera i IKT som ett sätt att "koppla upp" och få teknologi att "göra politiskt arbete” (Woolgar & Neyland, 2013, s. 17). Artikelns centrala teoretiska koncept "tänkande infrastruktur" belyser hur nya redovisningsmetoder (t.ex. på digitala plattformar) fungerar genom att avslöja nya världar där plattformarna och användarna upptäcker arten av deras ansvar gentemot den andra. När en plattform fördelar ansvar möjliggör den nya modaliteter för distribuerad handlingskraft och distribuerad auktoritet. När någon eller något inte räknas på en plattform, måste man tänka kritiskt på de gränser, begränsningar och uteslutningar som verkar genom den speciella sociomateriella praktiken plattformisering. Genom de fyra empiriska forskningsartiklarna och en kappa bidrar denna avhandling till att förstå hur, var och när ansvarsskyldighet uppstår i plattformsorganisation. Resultaten belyser den sociomateriella ansvarsfördelningen i plattformsorganisation och dess performativa konsekvenser