Toward an understanding of a computerized monitoring system failure: An interpretive approach

Abstract

CMS (Computerized Monitoring Systems) are prevalent in organizations and fulfill an important role to management. Often, new CMS implementations fail. A possible aspect of failures is the perception by employees of being "watched" by CMS. Since all information systems can inherently collect data, they can all monitor employees at some level, even if it's not their primary purpose. Therefore, users might sense they are being watched, triggering panoptic perceptions. This research in progress endeavors to understand the panoptic phenomenon and resulting CMS implementation failure via Actor Network Theory (ANT). Specifically, a published case study on a CMS failure within a medical organization is revisited to investigate organizational dynamics of misaligned interests between the cast of characters. Through ANT, the reader attains a better understanding of the technological and social factors that affected the CMS implementation and the underlying processes that led to its failure. Implications and future research are discussed. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.