The complexities of electronic services implementation and institutionalisation in the public sector

This is the post-print version of the final paper published in Information & Management. The published article is available from the link below. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. Copyright @ 2013 Elsevier B.V.Electronic service implementation (ESI) in the public sector attempts to improve efficiency, effectiveness, and transparency of governmental departments. Despite having provided the necessary infrastructure and investment, many governments have struggled to realise such aims due to the various forces that challenge implementation and institutionalisation. Using institutional theory as a lens, we explored the forces influencing the implementation and institutionalisation of ESI in the public sector. While our results reinforced previous research in IT implementation and organisational transformation, they showed that the dynamic nature of technology poses unanticipated pressures, and that these can impede the implementation and institutionalisation process

Implementing e-Services in Lagos State, Nigeria: the interplay of Cultural Perceptions and Working Practices during an automation initiative : Nigeria e-government culture and working practices

Accepted for publication in a forthcoming issue of Government Information Quarterly.The public sector’s adoption of Information and Communication Technologies is often seen as a way of increasing efficiency. However, developing public e-Services involves a series of organisational and social complexities. In this paper, we examine the organisational issues of implementing an ERP system, which was designed and developed within the context of Lagos State’s e-Services project. By doing so, we showcase the impact of organisational cultural perceptions and working practices of individuals. Our findings illustrate the strong role of cultural dimensions, particularly those pertaining to religion and multi-ethnicity. Our study provides insights to international organisations and governments alike toward project policy formulation within the context of ICT-based initiatives and reforms that aim to bring forward developmental progress.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio

Institutional perspective on introducing enterprise architecture : The case of the Norwegian hospital sector

Paper I, II, and III are not available as a part of the dissertation due to the copyright.The findings from this thesis point to the incongruence between the characteristics of EA and the healthcare domain as specific tensions among the EA logic and different professional logics as a source of deviation. The incongruence comes from the long-term plan-driven EA approach versus healthcare traditions and needs for ad-hoc initiatives. Other themes stem from the EA logic of process standardisation, which poses challenges in gaining acceptance and trust that the processes dinscribe appropriate clinical knowledge and provide support for local variations. Moreover, the EA vision of data integration across organisational units and across IS has implications for concerns about privacy and protection of sensitive data, but this can collide with the healthcare view on patient safety and the need for mission-critical data. This dissertation makes several contributions to research and practice. First, it augments the EA research stream by offering rich insights and specific implications related to challenges of EA institutionalisation in healthcare. A description of the enterprise architects’ logics and the EA logic supplements the EA knowledge base. Likewise, it presents a model of a predicted evolution of the EA initiatives through the phases of optimism, resistance, decline and finally, reconsolidation of the most persistent ones, unless firm mandates are established from the start. Furthermore, the study provides a model that illustrates how coexisting institutional logics maintain their distinct character while allowing compromises that shape EA operationalisation. The model shows a set of scenarios for settling tensions in project decisions. In these scenarios, EA is foregrounded, blended with other available institutional logics or suppressed. Second, this dissertation contributes to an enhanced theoretical and empirical understanding of EA institutionalisation, where regulative, normative and culturalcognitive elements create and maintain EA as an institution, and unsurprisingly, the organisational response impedes the institutionalisation process. The organisational response can be explained by selective activated institutional logics among the actors. However, with targeted institutional work from the actors that want EA to be institutionalised, the process can be reinforced. This thesis also offers some practical suggestions at the national policy level. First, financial arrangements should be assessed to encourage broader involvement from the sub-organisations. Second, through active ownership, they can address the need for enhanced EA understanding and should secure the education of the actors, not the least at the executive level, together with the targeted hires. Furthermore, the need for organisational changes related to EA is under-communicated. The thesis also makes practical suggestions to deal with the challenges, the incongruence and the consequent tensions, mainly by finding solutions that balance between the institutional logics of EA and of healthcare.publishedVersio

Digitally enabled service transformation in UK public sector: A case analysis of universal credit

YesThe race against ‘Digital Darwinism’ in public sector had caused failures of several high profile large-scale Digitally Enabled Service Transformation (DEST) projects. While technical and managerial issues are often emphasised as the factors underpinning such failures, the vital role of key actors and the interplay between these actors and structures is underplayed when examining the causes of DEST failure. To enable a richer understanding of DEST, this paper proposes an analytical lens combining Institutional Theory (IT) and Structuration Theory (ST) to explore the case of ‘Universal Credit’, a very large and ambitious DEST project in the UK. Analysis reveals that the institutional actors and structures played significant roles in the transformation process. Albeit governing the actors’ actions, institutional structures are shaped through actions that are influenced by knowledge, power and norms. Hence, recognising and addressing these subliminal factors are critical to promote actions that can facilitate DEST success. The contributions of this case study are two-folds. Theoretically, it provides a distinctive conceptual approach to study DEST; and practically, the lessons help in signposting better managerial practices

Transparency in transatlantic trade and data law

Transparency continues to occupy a patchy and uneven place in EU and US relations in key economic and regulatory areas. This patchiness plays out in a variety of ways including in downgrading by the US of the EU in diplomatic and regional standing albeit non-expressly in recent times. The chapter explores the shifts in practices on transparency in EU-US cooperation from a legal perspective. It focuses on EU-US trade negotiations and data transfer cooperation. Transparency provides a useful point of departure as it is a common value and instrument for the US and EU, yet one that seems to be utilised very differently. Transatlantic relations increasingly show a tension between the government to government model of transparency. In the EU-US data protection regime of the Privacy Shield a complex constellation of subjects is emerging and its genuine enforcement appears open to significant doubt. In trade, the European Parliament increasingly attempts to participate and involve citizens’ rights in new EU-US negotiations and raise civil liberties, citizens’ mobility rights and public interest themes. In light of these developments, this chapter considers how EU and US are becoming divergent in how they handle both communication with each other and toward citizens. The EU is increasingly becoming an organised transparent actor toward the US and trying to increase transparency toward citizens through different instruments, whereas at the moment we see in the US a disruptive environment of information flows and an administration that disrupts the traditional lines of allies and non-allies in how it behaves

Embedding open data practice: Developing indicators on the institutionalisation of open data practice in two African governments

Final research report of the “Embedding open data practice: Developing indicators on the institutionalisation of open data practice in two African governments” project, which formed part of the World Wide Web Foundation’s "Emerging Impacts of Open Data in Developing Countries" Phase 2 initiative. In order to address the principle question of whether open data practice is being embedded, the project undertook a comparison of government open data in South Africa and Kenya, with a particular focus on open licensing as a key indicator of openness