Dynamics of Use and Supply: An Analytic Lens for Information Systems Research

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Abstract:

This paper describes a dual focus on the dynamics of use and supply as an analytic lens for deconstructing and examining the IT artifact. It then gives an example of the use of this approach in empirical work. Over the last 20 years, most research has focused either on organizational use of information systems or on their development and supply. There is a need to bring these two pictures into combined focus to examine creation, definition, and modification of emergent systems. Building on work in the innovation studies tradition, an analytic lens is developed to examine the evolving IT artifact across the boundaries of use and supply. Its application is demonstrated in a study of virtual reality in the construction sector. Sensemaking in the software organizations that supply virtual reality applications to the sector and in the engineering, design, and construction organizations that use them is explored. The comparison exposed a mismatch of priorities, which poses a challenge to the establishment and continued validity of these applications. The paper concludes by reflecting on how this approach builds on, and may help us extend, existing theoretical understandings of information systems and how research that uses the approach may inform practice.

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