Coordination and control in project-based work: digital objects and infrastructures for delivery

A major infrastructure project is used to investigate the role of digital objects in the coordination of engineering design work. From a practice-based perspective, research emphasizes objects as important in enabling cooperative knowledge work and knowledge sharing. The term ‘boundary object’ has become used in the analysis of mutual and reciprocal knowledge sharing around physical and digital objects. The aim is to extend this work by analysing the introduction of an extranet into the public–private partnership project used to construct a new motorway. Multiple categories of digital objects are mobilized in coordination across heterogeneous, cross-organizational groups. The main findings are that digital objects provide mechanisms for accountability and control, as well as for mutual and reciprocal knowledge sharing; and that different types of objects are nested, forming a digital infrastructure for project delivery. Reconceptualizing boundary objects as a digital infrastructure for delivery has practical implications for management practices on large projects and for the use of digital tools, such as building information models, in construction. It provides a starting point for future research into the changing nature of digitally enabled coordination in project-based work

The BlackBerry veil: mobile use and privacy practices by young female Saudis

Privacy concerns in the digital economy are increasingly a global matter. The possible revival of the Communications Data Bill in the UK amidst fears over the vulnerability of the nation to terrorism highlights the topicality of this piece and the potential risks associated to ceding individual-to-government privacy for the sake of national security. In this post, Sunila Lobo presents the summary of an award winning paper coauthored with LSE Tech Silvia Elaluf-Calderwood, which suggests that Saudi Arabian female youth share similarities with youth around the world in their use of mobile phones, but negotiate privacy in a unique way. Therefore, universal notions of privacy are challenged

Aligning and reconciling: building project capabilities for digital delivery

Digital delivery of complex projects, using integrated software and processes, is an important emerging phenomenon as it transforms relationships across the associated ecology of project-based firms. Our study analyses how a project-based firm, ‘Global Engineering’, builds new project capabilities for digital delivery through work on three major road and railway infrastructure projects. We find that it seeks to: (1) align the project set-up with the firm’s existing capabilities; and (2) reconcile differing agendas and capabilities in collaborating firms across the project ecology. Here, aligning involves influencing the set-up of digital delivery and renegotiating that set-up during project implementation; and reconciling involves managing across multiple digital systems; accommodating and learning other firms’ software and processes; and using digital technologies to create shared identity across the firms involved in delivery. We argue that creating relative stability enables firms to use existing, and build new, project capabilities, and hence aligning and reconciling are important to project-based firms in environments where there is high interdependence across heterogeneous firms and rapid technological change. We find that building these capabilities involves both ‘economies of repetition’ and ‘economies of recombination’; the former enabling the firm to capture value by mobilizing existing resources and the latter, requiring additional work to re-combine existing and new resources. Our study thus provides insight into how project-based firms build project capabilities for the digital delivery of complex projects in order to remain competitive in their existing markets, and has broader implications for learning in the project ecologies associated with these projects

The BlackBerry veil: mobile use and privacy practices by young female Saudis

Purpose – Qualitative and quantitative research on mobile phone use by youth worldwide has been a recurrent theme for social scientists since the early 1990s in the USA, Europe and some parts of Asia. However, very little work is known about this subject contextualized in the often more conservative Arab societies of the Middle East. The purpose of this paper is to provide a foundation for discourse in this area through the study of mobile phone use patterns of a highly educated group of young Saudi women vis-à-vis privacy. Design/methodology/approach – A mixed interpretative approach was used with a quantitative survey initially conducted to gain a broad idea about the social practices around mobile use, followed by the use of a qualitative method (focus groups), aimed to focus the discussion on the concept of privacy and how the participants negotiate their use of mobile services in light of this. Findings – Variable user behaviour was found with regards to privacy, as their own individual view or societal view is driven not only by the capabilities of the technology, but how it is provided, particularly when there is indication of government monitoring of data content. It was also found that there is a duality between individuals' view of privacy with regard to other individuals and their perception of privacy with regard to their own government. Research limitations/implications – The sensitive nature of the context (Saudi female participants in case study) makes this research unique but had its own challenges, which the researchers attempted to address by using an interpretative and qualitative collection of data. Unfortunately, it was not possible to gather similar data from male youth for comparison, due to the completely segregated nature of this society. Future research will attempt to address this. Practical implications – This research provides information that could be used by mobile phone manufacturers, marketers, content and application providers and telecommunication companies in the process of designing, marketing and providing relevant products and services for this increasingly important population segment. Especially in light of the fact that they share some similarities with youth around the world in their attachment to their mobile phones, but the way it is used to negotiate their various work, home and social domains vis-à-vis privacy, is unique. Originality/value – The paper presents key findings on an under-researched group of Saudi youth; its practices and motivations for mobile use, the particular domain of privacy and how this is negotiated in an Islamic social and cultural context. It also shows there are at least two distinct levels of privacy, and one has a greater influence than the other, on how Saudi Arabian women negotiate their lives in various domains within their society. In fact, the evidence would lead us to believe that one of these privacy levels (individual-government) has almost no influence on these women's consumption of mobile technology. These young women place importance on their individual-individual privacy space and are negotiating this privacy boundary among their peers, thereby defining in use, their own particular notion of privacy

Digital infrastructure and changing practices in engineering design

New skills are needed to compete, as integrated software solutions provide a digital infrastructure for projects. This changes the practice of information management and engineering design on next generation projects