THEORETICAL INVESTIGATION INTO SYSTEMS ANALYSIS

Systems analysis has been practiced by expert systems analysts or IT people in the third person perspective or objective one. We question this style of systems analysis and investigate into what it should be and who should practice it in an unpredictable, turbulent environment. The existing systems analysis methods such as UML help systems analysts ignore the differences of individual workers and pay attention solely to roles or functions played by them. However current companies depend more on individual knowledge workers and their experiences. Recently there have appeared a few methods with which business professionals or workers themselves reflect on their own knowledge and experiences, one of them proposing systems analysis in the first person perspective. The development of those methods is primarily based on the practical experiences and needs as consultants. Therefore there is still no theoretical background and support to the development. We made a theoretical investigation into this alternative discourse of systems analysis. Our study consists of an exploration into Stacey’s theory on organizations as a cue for systems analysis in a turbulent environment and two explorations into organization development literature for high performance in a less turbulent environment and the meanings of systems analysis

Rethinking Systems Analysis in A New View of Organizations

The effectiveness of IT investments is known to depend on intangible assets such as work practices. However current systems analysis has no concern about them due to the mindset of rational organization and functionalism. We rethink systems analysis in a new view of organizations proposed by Kay and colleagues who apply autopoiesis and complex theories to reconstruct the basis of organizational theories, and we make theoretical clarifications of the problems and issues of the current systems analysis. Among others, the absence of a frame has prevented people from seeing their work practices and at the same time made it practically difficult to take them into consideration in systems analysis, leaving rational systems analysis and design to be still in use. There is a need to develop a practical frame that business professionals can use to see their work practices

FIRST-PERSON PERSPECTIVE SYSTEMS ANALYSIS AND ACTIVITY THEORY

In empowerment, first-person perspective systems analysis (1ppSA) is a theoretical alternative to the conventional SA, since dissipative theory and others suggest that innovative ideas occur internally. Our previous research revealed that the basic theory of 1ppSA is phenomenology. For building the foundation of 1ppSA, we investigate whether it is possible to use Activity Theory (AT) as diagrammatic resources along phenomenology. In other words, we examine doing phenomenology with AT in SA. Although they take up consciousness, phenomenology and AT are not practical to use alone respectively. They are considered worth combining because they are complementary. Phenomenology provides a meta-methodology that helps us be conscious of the structures and conditions from which our conviction concerning a world is constituted. AT has a diagrammatic resource for visualizing them. This research shows that the use of AT diagram along the attitude and methods of phenomenology can realize the theoretical foundation of 1ppSA

SYSTEMS ANALYSTS IN CHAORDIC ORGANIZATIONS

The aim of this paper is to identify who is a systems analyst in organizations in a turbulent world. We see a need to radically rethink the way in which information systems are developed. There have appeared some efforts to create systems analysis methods for business professionals, for example, Alter (2002) and Bednar (2000). To promote the development of such methods, there is a need to theoretically validate the need for the development. From literature review, we derive a hypothesis that ‘analysis by external agents’ has been at the heart of the practice in organizations. In organizations that fit with the hypothesis, agency costs occur in the form of IS failures because business professionals could not forecast their future of business and are subject to bounded rationality not sufficient to control the agents. Having encountered complexity theory and the turbulent economy of globalism, some practitioners and researchers have recognized the increasing importance of creativity and sustainability of organizations, and started to use a term “chaordic organization” to describe a new type of organizations in contrast to the rationalistic one assumed in the dominant management discourse. We will show the inappropriateness of the hypothesis by revealing the built-in causality in the light of theoretical arguments made by Stacey et al (2000). They derived Transformative Teleology from the review of philosophical thinking, the purpose of which is the continuity and transformation of identity and difference. In chaordic organizations under Transformative Teleology, the future is unpredictable and under perpetual construction. This focuses attention on conversation as the central activity of organizing. This is inconsistent with the notion of ‘analysis by external agents.’ In a chaordic organization, its members create social realities under perpetual construction. Therefore, it is theoretically suggested that systems analysis becomes one of their ongoing activities. New systems analysis methods are required as the tools for sensemaking of their own practice and for interaction between the members. The methods are different from the conventional ones for IT professionals

Introducing Collective Identity into Information Systems Research: Collective Identity as a Bridge between IS Researches and Practitioners

In the turbulent economy an organization must often reconstruct itself with self-reference to its own practices. Many business and IS professionals need some approaches to understand their practices or social realities for self-reference. Researchers developed academic approaches or methodologies such as structuration theory and actor-network theory that enable people to make sense of their social realities. However, it is considered that the absence of some vocabularies has kept the practitioners away from the use of these approaches. On another front there are the increasing interest and use of collective identity in the related social sciences recently. We argue that a vocabulary “collective identity” can become a bridge between academic researches and the practitioners. Allowing the practitioners to look at multiple or alternative social realities among social forces rather than the single functional image of an organization, the vocabulary is expected to lead way to the possible use of existing approaches by the practitioners. To show its effectiveness we will incorporate collective identity into activity theory and apply it to a real case of IS implementation in an organizatio

THE SEMANTIC WEB AND TURNS OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

This research is a theoretical investigation of the semantic Web in light of the turns of social science. Social science has experienced several turns to have better understandings of social realities. If it is consistent with the turns, then the semantic Web is expected to have better representation of social realities than the conventional information systems. There are two major languages in the semantic Web: RDF and OWL. It is revealed that describing concepts by RDF conforms to the idea of phenomenology. Since RDF and OWL are based on the open-world assumption, the semantic Web is considered to be consistent with the linguistic turn. With the high consistency with social science, the semantic Web can be a good candidate of IS research topics. IS research is expected to contribute to the development of the semantic web, and the development of methodology in particula

PHENOMENOLOGY AS A BASE OF SYSTEMS ANALYSIS

It has been ten years since Truex et al. (1999) advocated the continuous development of information systems by business professionals or workers themselves. A few methods for systems analysis (SA) by business professionals have appeared during this time. However, systems analysis by business professionals has not gained widespread interest among researchers. One of the reasons is considered that there is no foundational theory or philosophical base of the systems analysis, thereby the development of the methods being still a low-key theme in IS related researches. We will take phenomenology as a candidate of a foundational theory of the systems analysis, and examine the roles and functionality expected to the systems analysis against phenomenology in terms of the problem of knowledge, the mode of knowledge, and the method. It is made clear from the examination that the systems analysis can be considered an instance or application of phenomenology because the roles and functionality of the systems analysis falls within the idea and scope of phenomenology. Phenomenology is, then, expected to show what the systems analysis is and how it should be. In our examination, in fact, phenomenology helped make us conscious of an unnoticed role of the systems analysis that is important but not articulated

Coherent transfer of light polarization to electron spins in a semiconductor

We demonstrate that the superposition of light polarization states is coherently transferred to electron spins in a semiconductor quantum well. By using time-resolved Kerr rotation we observe the initial phase of Larmor precession of electron spins whose coherence is transferred from light. To break the electron-hole spin entanglement, we utilized the big discrepancy between the transverse g-factors of electrons and light holes. The result encourages us to make a quantum media converter between flying photon qubits and stationary electron spin qubits in semiconductors.Comment: 4 pages. Submitted to Physical Review Letter

Detection of HBs antigen in routine paraffin embedded liver tissue by enzyme-labelled antibody technique

HB surface antigen (HBs Ag) was detected using the enzyme-labelled antibody technique on routinely processed liver biopsy material fixed in Bouin's fixative and embedded in paraffin. Of 85 examined specimens, 45 cases were HBs Ag positive by both the immunofluorescent test and the enzyme labelled antibody technique. The remaining 40 cases were negative by both techniques. The specificity of HBs Ag detected by the enzyme-labelled antibody technique was confirmed by the blocking test using guinea pig specific HBs antibody. The results indicate that the enzyme-labelled antibody technique may be useful for detecting HBs Ag on routine paraffin sections.</p