An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User
Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of
Information Systems Implementation
Antonio Ghezzi
Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering, Politecnico di Milano,
Via Lambruschini 4B, 20156 Milan, Italy
Keywords: Information Systems, Alternative Genre, Enterprise Resource Systems, Allegory, User Engagement, Change
Management, Action Research.
Abstract: Genres of communications significantly influence the evolution of a field of research. In the Information
Systems (IS) domain, a debate has recently emerged on the chance to implement alternative genres to
generate unconventional ways of looking at IS-related issues. This study hence proposes to apply allegory
as an alternative genre to write publications accounting IS research. To exemplify the use of the allegory
genre, the study tackles the role of the action researcher to enable user engagement and change management
in the early phases of Information Systems implementation. The allegory is applied to the case of a Small-
Medium-Enterprise undergoing ERP implementation. Reflecting on the allegory and its interpretation, it is
argued that the action researcher can take a paramount role in IS change management as “user engagement
enabler”; from a writing genre perspective, it is claimed that allegory is particularly suitable for writing
action research accounts.
1 INTRODUCTION
The evolution of a field of research like that on
Information Systems (IS) inherently relates not only
to the content of investigation in either its
theoretical or empirical forms and to the
methodologies applied to conduct the research
endeavor; it is also significantly shaped by the
writing genre traditionally applied as a vehicle to
report its content and findings.
In the last years, an intriguing debate has
emerged with regards to the genres to be applied
when writing academic publications (Rowe,2012).
IS scholars and practitioners are currently discussing
the opportunity to apply alternative genres in IS
research representation. According to Mathiassen et
al (2012), the term “alternative genres” refers to
unconventional forms of thinking, doing, and
communicating scholarship and practice. In
particular, it is related to innovation with respect to
epistemological perspectives, research methods,
semantic framing, literary styles, and media of
expression.
Provided that alternative genres are not valuable
per se, but they become significant once they are
fruitfully applied to writing studies on relevant IS
issues, propose the adoption of alternative genres to
tackle a significant problem in IS research: user
engagement and change management in the early
phases of Information Systems implementation
with specific reference to Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP) systems. To address this problem, I
take the methodological perspective of an action
researcher directly involved in the problem’s
observation and solution, and propose to employ the
alternative genre of “allegory” to allegorically
describe the role action researchers can play in
enabling user engagement and change management
in the early phases of ERP implementation.
Reflecting on the allegory and its interpretation,
this study argues that the action researcher can take a
paramount role in the IS change management
process as “user engagement enabler”; from a
writing genre perspective, the study also proposes
that allegory can be beneficially applied as a genre
to write action research accounts, due to the genre’s
peculiar characteristics.
Ghezzi, A.
An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of Information Systems Implementation.
In Proceedings of the 18th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (ICEIS 2016) - Volume 1, pages 29-39
ISBN: 978-989-758-187-8
Copyright
c
2016 by SCITEPRESS Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved
29
2 THEORY: CHANGE
MANAGEMENT AND USER
ENGAGEMENT IN IS
IMPLEMENTATION
Change is an ever-present feature of organizational
life both at an operational and strategic level
(Burnes, 2004), and since information technology
and organizational change show an inherent strong
relationship (Markus and Robey, 1988), the issue of
managing change determined by the introduction of
new IS within an organizational setting has been a
core theme in Information Systems (IS) research and
practice (e.g. Aladwani, 2001; Lim et al., 2005)
In general terms, change management could be
defined as “the process of continually renewing an
organization’s direction, structure, and capabilities
to serve the ever-changing needs of external and
internal customers” (Moran and Brightman, 2001).
Both Organizational and IS theories widely
recognize how Information Technology (IT)
influences the nature of work, thus catalysing
innovation while forcing incremental or radical
organizational redesign (Thach and Woodman,
1994).
Through implementing IT, organizations aim at
increasing process efficiency and effectiveness (with
a possible beneficial impact on outward
performance), although they also trigger inward
organizational effects that mostly reflect on
employees’ routines, practices, habits and
perceptions (Thach and Woodman, 1994): these
non-trivial, subtle effects require dedicated effort to
be understood and handled.
Focusing on the IS field, change management
hence tackles the problem of how to govern the
organizational transition determined by the
introduction of new information technologies and
systems (Markus and Robey, 1988).
Several studies have tackled the issue of user
engagement in IS implementation, finding that such
engagement is influenced by different factors. In his
seminal work “Psychology of innovation
resistance”, Sheth (1981) argued that there are two
main sources of resistance to IS innovations:
perceived risk, which refers to one’s perception of
the risk associated with the decision to adopt the
innovation; and habit, which refers to current
practices that one is routinely doing. Joshi (1991)
applied equity theory to IS implementation and
found that individuals attempt to evaluate all
changes on three levels: (i) gain or loss in their
equity status; (ii) comparison between personal and
organizational relative outcomes; and (iii)
comparison between personal and other user’s
relative outcome in the reference group. They only
resist to changes they see unfavourable, while
changes that are favourable are sought after and
welcomed. Gefen (2002) identified users’ trust as a
key determinant for their engagement in the complex
process of ERP system customization: trust was
increased when the vendor behaved in accordance
with client expectations by being responsive, and
decreased when it behaved in a manner that
contradicted these expectations by not being
dependable. Lim et al. (2005) investigated user
adoption behavior and motivation dynamics of ERP
systems from an expectancy perspective, and
claimed that managerial actions shall target different
levels of motivational factors to avoid counter-
productive dissonances. Wang and Chen (2006)
found that assistance of outside experts in ERP
implementation is inevitable: competent consultants
can facilitate communication and conflict resolution
in the ERP consulting process and assist in
improving ERP system quality.
Beyond identifying the factors behind user
engagement, particularly relevant to this study are
also two process models designed to obtain and
enhance engagement.
According to organizational theory, change
management aimed at cognitive redefinition of
users’ attitude and behaviour should follow a
process model called the force field model, made of
three stages (Schein and Bennis, 1965; Schein,
1999): (i) unfreeze the existing condition and apply
a force to it in the attempt to motivate users to
change; (ii) change and movement to a new state, by
focusing on training and communication; and (iii)
re-freeze to make new behaviours become habitual
or institutionalized routines.
In assessing the complex social problem of
users’ resistance to ERP implementation, Aladwani
(2001), elaborates on Sheth’s (1981) model and
proposed a process-oriented conceptual framework
consisting of three phases: (i) knowledge
formulation (where insight is gathered on needs,
values, beliefs and interests of future IS users); (ii)
strategy implementation (where change management
leverages tools such as communication, endorsement
and training to create awareness, stimulate feelings
and drive adoption, by constantly confronting habits
with perceived risks; and (iii) status evaluation
(where the progress of ERP change management
effort is monitored).
ICEIS 2016 - 18th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems
30
3 RESEARCH SETTING
The company this study considers is a Small
Medium Enterprise (SME) operating as an artistic
exhibition designer and manufactured, run and
owned by a Chief Executive Officer who inherited it
from his father. The company began operations in
the early fifties and in 2012 it had gained worldwide
recognition, being involved in several projects with
renown institutions, such as the British Museum, the
Tower of London Museum, the Louvre in Paris, the
Museum of Modern Arts and the Metropolitan
Museum in New York.
As the company grew globally, however, it was
shaped by two diverging thrust: on the one hand, the
CEO aimed at maintaining the company’s
inheritance of a SME and its craftsman approach
towards each activity and work; on the other, a
compelling need for organic development and
structuration was perceived by the management. As
a result, the organizational evolution was to some
extent convoluted and not fully consistent: while
some functions (e.g. design and manufacturing)
operated with a high degree of structuration and
technology support, others (e.g. administration,
procurement, project management and marketing)
were almost completely unstructured. Furthermore,
Information Technology did not evolve alongside
the company’s manufacturing technologies. The
little IT function was largely focusing on
maintaining the computers used for running
Computer Aided Design and Computer Aided
Manufacturing software; data analysis and storing
was either based on mere spreadsheets, or more
frequently, on paperwork.
In late 2012, when the action research process
began, it was time to make a strategic decision about
IT. The management team had been consulting a
shortlist of IT vendors for three months, and the
most promising solution proposed was that of
implementing an Enterprise Resource Planning
(ERP) system to centralize and support information
management and workflow throughout the
functions. However, the CEO had profound doubts
about this change, and his worries were somewhat
justifiable. The CEO foresaw the introduction of
such a pervasive system would determine radical
modifications in several areas, with unpredictable
results; he also he expected some of his employees
to eventually resist to or impair the IT project. On
top of this, he held a Philosophy and Literature
background, which gave him an anti-conformist and
original perspective on many strategic or
organizational issues, including technology: he had
contrasting feelings concerning IT, which he liked to
philosophically define as a robot with huge
potential to enhance human’s capabilities, but after
all, a robot with no will and no creative value in
itself other than that of the human utilizing it”.
The CEO’s and his top management’s primary
concern was hence to adequately set and manage
this IS transition.
4 ACTION RESEARCH
METHODOLOGY
Action Research (AR) was primarily developed
from the work of Kurt Lewin and his colleagues, and
is based on a collaborative problem-solving
relationship between the researcher and the client
system, aiming at both managing change and
generating new knowledge (Coghlan, 2000).
As a form of qualitative research (Myers, 1997),
AR is described as a setting in which a client is
involved in the process of data gathering, which is
prevailingly under the charge of a researcher.
Avison et al. (1999) define AR as an iterative
process involving researchers and practitioners
acting together on a particular cycle of activities,
including problem diagnosis, action intervention,
and reflective learning. According to Rapoport
(1970), “action research aims to contribute both to
the practical concerns of people in an immediate
problematic situation and to the goals of social
science by joint collaboration within a mutually
acceptable ethical framework”. Indeed, action
Research is perhaps the most widely discussed
collaborative research approach (see Baskerville and
Wood-Harper 1998, Davison et al. 2004).
The collaboration this study depicts by means of
the allegory alternative genre is set in an artistic
exhibition design Small Medium Enterprise (SME)
and began with the identification of a problem, i.e.
the need to support the SMEs CEO and Project
Manager in enabling and managing change from a
basic and piecemeal approach towards technology to
the implementation of a broader ERP system. More
specifically, the CEO and the Project Manager were
concerned with user engagement, resistance to
change and communication issues that could burden
the early implementation phases.
This complex problem brought together multiple
participants, all of whom had an interest in solving
it. The set of participants included: Chief Executive
Officer; the management team; the internal Project
Manager; the SME’s employees (also referred to as
An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of Information
Systems Implementation
31
users); the IT Vendor’s Marketing Manager; and the
team of three Action Researchers.
The problem that needed a solution was not
easily solvable within the current community of
practice inside of the company, who lacked specific
IS and change management competencies, and
furthermore called for the combination of
knowledge from multiple perspectives, expertise,
and disciplines (Mohrman et al., 2008). Hence, a
problem-focused research approach like AR could
provide a natural home for and evoke a need for
collaboration that brought together multiple
perspectives, including those of theory and practice.
In part, this is because problems represent
anomalies, and present a need to step outside of the
daily reality that is driven by implicit theories, and
to try to achieve a detachment that enables the
search for new understandings that can guide action
(Coghlan, 2000).
In order to solve the previously identified
problem, from December 2011 to March 2012, the
researchers who are authoring this study where
directly involved in the early stages of the
implementation process of an Enterprise Resource
Planning system within the SME (thus following the
direct involvement principle of the action research
methodology), with the planned overarching
objective to apply change management and
organizational communication practices supporting
the early phases of ERP implementation with a
focus on enhancing user engagement. Although the
whole implementation project lasted till April, 2013,
this study focuses on allegorically describing its first
four months, where change management practices
and user engagement dynamics where at the heart of
the discussion.
The AR process was organized through a series
of weekly meetings (for a total of 21 meetings, each
lasting 2 hours 40 minutes on average) that the
action researchers alternatively held with all the
actors involved (including users). The content of
such meetings was previously planned with and
agreed upon by the CEO and the Project Manager,
and these actors were open to the researchers’
proposed lines of intervention. In the meetings, the
action researcher set a flexible agenda, checked the
progress status of previously identified actions,
gathered insights from the participants, provided
new content for discussion, set and explained new
action points and assignments and instructed
participants on how to act upon them.
In parallel, action researchers were involved in
supporting the change management and
communications activities and observing the user
engagement process almost of a daily basis, in order
to gather further information relevant to the
research; they also operated “shoulder to shoulder”
with the CEO and the Project Manager, and the
result of this was that the researchers not only gained
a deeper understanding of the company, its culture
and its management’s approach, but also gradually
became accepted as a non-threatening and legitimate
presence (Coghlan, 2000).
5 ALLEGORY AS ALTERNATIVE
GENRE: DEFINITIONS,
STRUCTURE AND
PRINCIPLES
An allegory is “the representation of abstract ideas
or principles by characters, figures, or events in
narrative, dramatic, or pictorial form”, and “a story,
picture, or play employing such representation”
(American Heritage Dictionary, 2011), where “the
apparent meaning of the characters and events is
used to symbolize a deeper moral or spiritual
meaning” (Collins English Dictionary, 2003).
The term derives from the Greek allēgoría,
derivative of allēgoreîn, i.e. to speak so as to imply
something other. As a rhetorical device, an allegory
is a figure of speech that makes wide use of
metaphors (i.e. “a figure of speech in which a word
or phrase is applied to an object or action that it does
not literally denote in order to imply a resemblance”
Collins English Dictionary, 2003) and symbols
(i.e. “something that represents or stands for
something else, usually by convention or
association, especially a material object used to
represent something abstract” Collins English
Dictionary, 2003), though extending them to a
complete and sense-making piece where complex
ideas are illustrated by means of text or images that
can be understood by the reader or viewer.
The very definition of allegory as a genre may be
controversial. As the concept of genre represents a
meaningful pattern of communication which consists
of a sequence of speech acts (Yetim, 2006), and
provided that “a genre is a category of art
distinguished by a definite style, form or content”
(American Heritage Dictionary, 2011), allegory is
hard to fix since its convention are less formal or
external, they are rather informal, skeletal or
structural.
However, Quilligan (1979) in her book “The
language of allegory: Defining the genre” argued
that allegory is a genre, i.e. “a legitimate critical
ICEIS 2016 - 18th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems
32
category of a prescriptive status similar to that of the
generic term ‘epic’”. Quilligan identifies the four
main features that define the genre of allegory and
its structure:
i. Text the textual nature of the allegorical
narrative, which unfolds as a series of punning
commentaries related to one another;
ii. Pretext which addresses the question of
that source of which always stands outside any
allegorical narrative and becomes the key to its
interpretability (though not always to its
interpretation). The relation between the text and the
pretext is necessary slippery, yet by gauging its
dimensions, we can begin to articulate the affinity of
allegory as literary criticism to allegory as literary
composition;
iii. Context which addresses the question of
formal evolution by tracking the cultural causes of
allegory (allegories from different period may differ,
since linguistic assumptions differed as well);
iv. Reader which represents the final focus
of any allegory, and the real action of any allegory is
the reader’s learning to read the text properly.
“Other genres appeal to readers as human beings;
allegory appeals to readers as readers of a system of
signs, so it appeals to them in terms of their most
distinguishing characteristics: as readers of, and
therefore as creatures finally shaped by, their
language” (Quilligan, 1979: 21).
The text and pretext hence focus on what the
texts themselves say about the genre; the context
provides the historical milieu out of which the
author may write an allegory; and the reader is the
ultimate producer of meaning (Nelson, 1968).
Considering that the primary characteristic of
allegory as a genre is to separate the representation
meaning from the inner and implied meaning, a
mode of analysis for allegory can rely on
hermeneutics (Myers, 1997). Hermeneutics is a
classical discipline primarily concerned with the
meaning of a text, and provides approaches to
interpret it. The most common of such approaches is
known as the “hermeneutic circle”, which refers to
the dialectic between the understanding of the text as
a whole (a theory) and the interpretation of its details
(single words), where the two dimensions are
reciprocally validating and help deciphering the
hidden meaning from the apparent meaning of
narrative (Gadamer, 1976).
In the allegory this study presents, the whole
story should be hermeneutically interpreted from the
theoretical lenses of change management and user
engagement in ERP implementation, while the
details refer to specific aspects that influence and
make sense within such context.
6 ALTERNATIVE GENRE
APPLICATION: THE
ALLEGORY OF THE SMALL
VILLAGE
A small village was located in a wood and
surrounded by a barriers of trees. The barrier was
so thick nobody could actually see what was beyond
it, and although it could be trespassed, no one had
ever been bold enough to make the attempt. Rays of
light made it through the ceiling of trees’ branches,
but branches were so many and intricate that the
village was most of the time dark and surrounded by
shades.
In the village lived a small community, who
gathered to follow the lead of one whose visions
were so fascinating and original that their heart was
captured by them: he believed that human beings
were meant to create works of art, and
craftsmanship was mankind’s deepest and essential
virtue. The people from the village called him the
Father, and once they stopped wandering in the dark
of the wood to share his vision, the Father welcomed
them in his community and taught them his idea of
art as a form of beauty all men should pursue. From
that time on, the Villagers’ highest aspiration hence
became to put such beautiful vision into practice.
They began collecting or even manufacturing
tools they could use from what the wood offered
them, and gathered into smaller groups of people
whose abilities lied in one piece of art or another. As
time went by, the Father selected a few chosen to
help him lead his community that was growing, he
called them the Wise Men and placed them at the
lead of those smaller groups. The results of all their
efforts were extraordinary, and notwithstanding the
hardship they were confronted with, their masterful
hands created objects of rare beauty.
Passers-by who were wandering nearby the
village through the thick woods were fascinated by
their works of art, and started asking for them: in
return, they offered rewards coming from outside of
the village they had been collected, and the village
grew richer.
Word of the beauty of the crafts the community
created spread, and soon many passers-by reached
to the village to demand for the Villagers’ pieces of
art. At first, the Father and the Wise Men met these
requests with joy, but soon they all realized the
requests could not be met: the tools and instruments
An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of Information
Systems Implementation
33
their Villagers assembled to craft their art were
incapable to perform the complex activities passers-
by started asking for; and the wood, with his almost
perennial darkness, was a difficult place to work in.
In the long nights in the wood, the Father tried to
find a solution: however, his wisdom and art lied
elsewhere, and the problem remained unanswered.
Then came the Wizard. He wore a cloak who
concealed his figure, and he spoke a language no
one in the village could understand. But he brought
light: a light he could control, he could lit and stop
at his will; a light Villagers could use to assemble
new tools, to perform new works of art, and to
illuminate the gloomy darkness of their village.
Still, the Wizard’s mysterious light was met with
doubt, or even fear: Villagers did not know where it
came from, how to use it, and they were frightened
by it. The Father perceived an inner power in that
light, but it was something he could not fully
comprehend himself: so he decided to host the
Wizard in the village until he could unveil his
mystery.
Some time passed, and a small group of
Travelers, packed with big rucksacks on their
shoulders, reached the village. These Travelers had
seen some of the outer world and visited other
villages before: but most shockingly, they seemed to
understand part of what the Wizard was saying.
While all other passers-by just came and went, the
Father asked the Travelers to stay and help him
disclosing the power of light.
The Travelers spent their days with the Father,
to learn about the Villagers’ habits; soon, they
sympathized with them, and began understanding
their fear for the new source of light, as well as their
frustrations for the way they had been performing
their activities till that day. The Travelers also
attempted to speak with the Wizard, to understand
his light’s potential.
Villagers were afraid of relating with the Wizard,
and were ashamed to talk to their Father about their
dissatisfaction, but they felt they could confide in the
Travelers and be open with them: after all, the
Father introduced them, and it seemed a
comfortable aura surrounded them.
Since the Father had many duties to perform as a
leader of his community, he entitled a Wise Man to
accompany the Travelers for all the time of their
stay. The chosen Wise Man made sure all Villagers
paid attention to the Travelers’ questions and
requests, and eventually learnt to understand some
of the things the Wizard said or did.
It took many days to the Travelers to see,
understand, reflect and learn; often, they were also
seen walking around the village with awkward
objects they pulled out of their rucksacks; but
eventually they told the Father and his Wise Men
that there was nothing to be feared about the light,
although they needed them and all the Villagers to
see this with their own eyes. And the Father agreed.
First, the Travelers convinced the Wizard to
remove his cloak, to show everyone in the village he
was a man like all the others; then, they helped him
showing how the light could be used in the village to
help or change what Villagers currently did. A big
brazier was placed in the center of the village, and
the light coming from it was strong and warm; the
brazier could be a main source of light, but many
other lights could be lit from it, and they could be
used by the smaller groups of Villagers to perform
their specific activities, shining from darkness; also,
that light could alter forever the way the Villagers
crafted their beautiful objects.
The Villagers were indeed impressed, but many
of them were still frightened. The light could burn,
they were used to darkness, and they had been using
their skills in a certain fashion since they first joined
the community. The Travelers hence knew that
demonstrating the light’s power was not enough:
they needed to stay longer.
Almost each day since the brazier of light was
brought in the village, the Travelers met with each
Villagers, and then with the smaller groups of
Villagers, reminding them of how dark their days
were before the light came; they once again pulled
some of their awkward objects out of their rucksacks
and explained they came from their previous travels
– many of them they even inherited form Travelers
who lived in the past – and used them to show how
the light helped others before the Villagers, and, by
applying small changes to the objects, they could
also show how the light could possibly help their
own village. Then they asked the Villagers to tell
stories on how the light could change their activities,
the art they craft, and their lives, exposing their
fears but also their hopes, and although several
Villagers and even a few Wise Men were reluctant
or shy to make up their own story, eventually the
Father and the Travelers could convince them; and
all these stories were reported to the Father and the
Wizard, to make sure no voice would be left
unheard. The Wizard was himself reluctant, as he
could not see the reason why he should listen to the
Villagers stories told in a different language than his
own, but once again the Travelers were able to
persuade him to change his perspective of reality
and see it with the Villagers’ eyes.
When a Villager complained or seemed to be left
ICEIS 2016 - 18th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems
34
apart, the Travelers spent time with her or him to
understand the reasons, and all were treated the
same way. The Travelers also got the Wizard to
share his knowledge, and they translated while he
taught the Villagers how to employ the light in many
different ways. Those who proved remarkable skills
at the new activities were also rewarded and
indicated as examples to follow; some Villagers even
passed from one smaller group to another. The
Father and the Wise Men themselves showed
passion and interest in these new activities, and took
part to many of these gatherings.
Although the Villagers were still afraid of talking
to the Wizard alone, they trusted the Travelers, since
they never disguised themselves, they spoke a
language similar to theirs, they listened to everyone
and they had always treated everyone equally and
fairly.
Once the lights were used everywhere in the
village, the Father gathered all his community and
said the dark age was over and would never return.
A new era had started for those who lived in the
village: craftsmanship had eventually found a new
and more sophisticated instrument to be pursued.
The Travelers could hence leave the village,
towards another endeavor.
7 DISCUSSION
7.1 Contribution to IS Practice
Applying the hermeneutical mode of text analysis
(Gadamer, 1967) to the allegorical representation of
ERP implementation allows to individuate two
layers of meaning: (i) the apparent meaning, i.e., the
way the narration is presented and appears as such;
and (ii) the hidden meaning, i.e., the implied sense
of the narration in the light of the IS issue tackled.
Table 1 shows the apparent and hidden meaning
for each of the allegory’s characters and elements.
Table 1: Apparent and hidden meanings in the small
village allegory.
Apparent meaning Hidden meaning
Allegory characters
The Father The CEO
The Wise Men The Top Management
The chosen Wise Man The Project Manager
The Villagers The Employees
The Passers-by The Customers
The Wizard The ERP Vendor’s
Marketing Manager
The Travelers The Action Researchers
Allegory elements
Small village SME
Wood Environmental complexity
Barrier of trees Closed approach
Darkness Lack of technology
Works of art SMEs products
Craftsmanship Working skills
Smaller groups of
villagers
SME’s division of
labor/functions
Rewards Revenue streams
Wizard’s language IT language
Wizard’s cloak IT Professionals’ different
background
Villagers’ language Natural language
Light Technology
Travelers’ rucksacks Action Researchers’
theoretical background
Travelers’ aura Academic credibility
Travelers’ objects
pulled out of the
rucksack
Action Researchers’
theoretical models
Father’s community
duties
CEO’s managerial tasks
Big brazier at the
center of the village
ERP system
Smaller sources of
light springing from
the brazier
ERP modules supporting
SME’s functions
New instruments New technological
applications
Villagers’, Wise
Men’s and Wizard’s
reluctance and
shyness
Communication resistance
to storytelling
The action research methodology and the change
management theory provide the theoretical framing
to decipher the hidden meaning of the allegory,
whose implications for IS practice are various.
The allegory shows how action researchers acted
in the empirical setting of a SME where the
introduction of an ERP system was determining
significant changes in the way users organized and
performed their work and interpreted their
organizational self.
The company was held together by the CEO’s
passion and eclectic leadership, although it started
encountering significant issues as demand increased
and became varied; moreover, the technological
skills at hand were insufficient to govern a
growingly complex company, but the CEO and his
Top Management had little or no knowledge of IT.
They perceived the opportunity represented by the
ERP system, but were not capable of grasping it and
a management-vendor leap appeared: this situation
was similar to what Wang and Chen (2006) reported,
where the lack of internal IT skills makes way for
An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of Information
Systems Implementation
35
external support. However, instead of looking for
external consultancy firms or vendors to obtain such
support, the company’s CEO turned to action
researchers. The involvement of action researchers
in the project hence came with several advantages,
and their role was crucial in key stages of the change
management and user engagement process.
Action researchers first acted to demystify the
new IS, by supporting the IT vendor in translating
the IT language into natural language users could
understand; by being almost ever-present they were
responsive, and made sure the IT vendor removed
his cultural “cloak” to become dependable and
trustworthy (Gefen, 2002). Because of their
academic status, an “aura” of credibility surrounded
them from the managements and the users
standpoint, so they were seen as a much more
reliable listeners than the IT vendor himself or any
external consultancy firm could ever be: this aspect
paved the way for open discussion, communication
and sharing, all key elements in change management
(Schein and Bennis, 1965; Gallivan and Keil, 2003).
Action researchers also played an intermediate
role between the CEO, the Project Manager and
users. They received endorsement from the CEO and
worked shoulder to shoulder with him and the
Project Manager to govern the change, so that the
management could keep indirect control over the IS
implementation’s early stages without the risk to
either abandon other managerial tasks supporting the
business as usual (the “community duties”) or be
perceived as poorly committed to the innovation
taking place; the researchers also had the CEO and
the Top Management be involved in milestone steps
of the project (e.g. kick-off meeting and regular
meeting) and play as committed “ERP champions”
to boost motivation for user adoption (Lim et al.,
2005; Brown and Jones, 1998). Users did not enjoy
complaining with their managers, and appreciated
the role of the action researchers as trusted third
parties they could rely on, as they perceived the
researchers could collect their thoughts and feelings,
relate them, add their own expertise and present
them to the CEO and Project Manager in an
organized, sound and apparently impartial mode.
Action researchers performed in a way that
aimed at closing all the communication leaps and
lapses (Gallivan and Keil, 2003) at three levels: (i)
users-management; (ii) users-IT vendor; and (ii) user
group-user group. In this process, action researchers
became a sort of central buffer between the “Father”
and the “Wise Men”, the “Villagers” and the
“Wizard”, to solve all possible controversies arising.
Consistently with the tenets of the equity-
implementation model (Joshi, 1991), action
researchers took the role of “organizational
equalizers” and used communication devices to
support the idea that no inequalities or loss of
equities were perpetrated, so that the transition could
be accepted and welcomed, rather than resisted.
User engagement was a priority in the change
management process, and action researchers acted
following a contingent approach that mixed
rationalism (e.g. IS and change management theories
and models) and experiments (e.g. hands-on
training, exemplification, learning by doing and
trial-and error approach) on the basis of their
acquired knowledge of the specific research setting
(Saarinen and Vepsäläinen, 1993) to enable it. They
based their actions on the constant confrontation of
users’ habits and perceived risks (Sheth, 1981) to
drive ERP adoption.
They were eventually the main actors to trigger
and govern the unfreezing, change, re-freezing
stages of the force field process model (Schein and
Bennis, 1965; Schein, 1999), by: (i) sympathetically
and empathically gathering knowledge on the needs,
values, beliefs and interests of future IS users
(Aladwani, 2001), feeding dissatisfaction over the
“dark days” when IT was not available while clearly
illustrating the benefits of the new solution; (ii)
providing constant communication support to the IT
Vendor as he tangibly started introducing the ERP
system in the company, while listening to the voices
of the internal customers and taking an active role on
training; and (iii) setting the basis for a re-freezing
of the newly acquired routines into institutionalized
practices that the top management agreed upon.
Most originally, this study illustrates how the
CEO and action researchers made use of
“storytelling” as a communication device to create
shared consensus on the IS transition:
employees/users were requested to express their
working expectations and feelings related to the new
IS, and this made for better interiorizing of change
and reduced long-term resistance. By doing so, the
CEO and the action researchers performed an
interesting paradigm shift in the classical approach
to change management (Kettinger and Grover,
1995): they created and inflated an initial
“communication resistance” aimed to lessen the
impact of any future “user resistance”. As the
allegory discloses, the process of approaching ERP
implementation through personal stories created
early inter and intra-organizational tensions, which,
however, in the short term eased participation,
involvement and commitment to use the newly
introduced system. Storytelling could hence become
ICEIS 2016 - 18th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems
36
part of IS change management practice, as a
valuable communication device to support the early
unfreezing and knowledge formulation phases where
information on the users’ habits and perceived risks
should be gathered.
7.2 Contribution to IS Publication
This study also suggests to employ allegory as an
alternative writing genres in IS publication.
An allegory can contain several layers of
meanings, thus making the narration
multidimensional and flexible and allowing to hide a
deeper moral behind a literal interpretation of the
text. The work of the IS action researcher/writer to
add these layers to the traditional representation of
her or his studies (as commonly reported in IS case
studies) certainly requires and additional narrative
effort: however, such work also forces the writer to
dialectically move from the meaning to its symbol,
from the symbol to a whole metaphor and then to the
extended metaphor represented by the allegory itself.
In this dialectic and iterative process, the
researcher/writer has the chance to: deeply elaborate
and reflect on the field data he collected; resort to a
combination of expertise, intuition and creativity to
develop an enlightening sensitivity towards the IS
problem investigated (e.g. IS change management);
describe such problem in a lively way where the
explicit and the implicit perspectives coexist and
both add to the account; and encourage the reader to
empathically embark in the same interpretation
process.
Thus, the allegory genre stimulates the
construction of many apparently different though
integrative narrations that can help the reader in the
gradual activity of disentangling multifaceted and
multidimensional IS problems and discover the
action researchers findings. A sense of empathic
“discovery” will then permeate the allegory and
accompany the reader during the interpretation
process, and this will make for better interiorizing of
the inner meanings – that is, the study’s findings.
Paradoxically, an allegory could hence tell more
of a writer’s insight, understanding and perspective
on a given IS phenomenon than a plain case
description would: the allegory has the power to
manage and convey the action researcher’s intended
meaning and personal insights which would have
largely been “lost in translation” in traditional
scientific writings. By properly framing the allegory
in a methodological and contextual background (like
this study attempts to do, by presenting the IS
change management and user engagement theory
and the action research methodology), the
researcher/writer could offer an hermeneutical tool,
a key to help the reader to translate metaphorical
concept into real-world IS phenomena and elements.
The theoretical and methodological frame would
hence serve as the allegory’s pre-text and con-text to
stimulate a profound understanding of the literal text
(Quilligan, 1979).
Due to its peculiarity, the alternative genre of
allegory could show further characteristics. It could
provide a narrative language that is appealing for a
wider range of readers (other than researchers or IS
specialists), possibly enlarging the target audience of
IS studies towards different disciplines like
Management; it could leverage symbolism and
metaphors to nuance critical messages (e.g. IT
vendor’s scarce dependability) and convey positive
or negative messages (e.g. “light” and “darkness”
equated to the presence or absence of technology)
that stay with the reader; and it could eventually
place the reader into a position of self-denying self-
consciousness (Quilligan, 1979), where he is more
open to discovery and learning of the allegory’s
moral.
This study contends that allegory as an
alternative genre could be most indicated to report
action research endeavors, considering this research
methodology’s inner characteristics. Action
researchers’ activity is inherently multi-layered (as
the allegory is): action researchers mix observation
and action, detachment and involvement, description
and normativity; they need to craft a narrative that
draws from multiple perspectives and possibly
unifies them into a single narrative; and their role is
intimately hermeneutical, as they strive to help
interpreting details in the light of the whole and
validate the whole by means of details. The
“Travelers” undertake journeys not only from
company to company, but also cross-domain travels
from theory to practice (and back to theory), from
literal meaning (i.e. empirical events) to hidden
revelations (theoretical and practical implications).
Eventually, they can provide the sound theoretical
and pragmatic key to read the allegory, always
keeping in mind that an invisible thread shall relate
the metaphor and the case they experienced (see
Table 1).
Exploiting allegory as an alternative genre would
constitute a normative breach that enables IS
publications based on action research cases to
overcome the limitations of canonical scientific
writing (i.e. constraints on figures of speech,
rhetorical devices and styles available; structural
rigidity; limited accountability of internal responses
An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of Information
Systems Implementation
37
and motives, and limited perception of the
intentional state vs. external response dualism;
limited empathy and involvement evoked in the
reader), thus providing a truly multifaceted account
of the “organizational drama” (Avital and
Vandenbosch, 2000) behind IS adoption.
8 CONCLUSIONS
This study’s possible contribution is twofold.
Concerning IS practice, the allegory shows that a
contingent approach that combines communication,
endorsement, cognitive understanding and training
can enable change management where change is
caused by IS implementation. The study also
proposes to include “user storytelling” as a valuable
communication device to help the management and
the researchers reveal employees’ habits and
perceived risks related to technological change,
while buying them in in an emotional and empathic
way that helps leapfrogging traditional resistance to
change.
The first core claim from this study is that Action
Researchers can play a paramount role in enabling
and governing IS change management and users
engagement. The mediation between theoretical
detachment and professional involvement that
characterizes action researchers, together with the
“aura” springing from their academic background,
make them a trusted and dependable party users can
refer to in the often painful change process. Action
researchers can support the key stages of the change
management cycle by means of proper instruments
like communication, managerial endorsement and
training supervision, combined with their theoretical
and practical IS endowment, to create a comfort
zone for users where awareness is increased,
empathy is stimulated, conflicts are resolved and
adoption is driven.
The second core claim this study presents is that
allegory is an alternative genre that could be
beneficially employed to account for action research
endeavors. Allegory as a genre shows similarities
with the action researcher’s multi-layered and
multidimensional activity, and could force the
researcher/writer into a reflection, abstraction and
transposition cycle that could support his elaboration
of his study’s findings. The risk action researchers
run is to be so involved in the project they observe
and operate in that they eventually become incapable
to get detached from it and grasp its deeper findings
(that may be hiding below the surface of the
operational activities performed). Writing the action
research account in the form of an allegory demands
to reinterpret a factual case in the light of symbols
and metaphors that should connect to reality, while
offering the reader a set of interpretation lenses
borrowed from IS theory and practice. The positive
result of this process is an enhanced ability to
highlight the story’s findings. And the hidden
meaning of the allegory, once revealed and made
apparent to the reader through an hermeneutical text
analysis, could also allow deeper interiorizing of
such findings and meanings.
REFERENCES
Aladwani, A. M. (2001). Change management strategies
for successful ERP implementation. Business Process
management journal, 7(3), 266-275.
American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language,
Fifth Edition (2011). Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Publishing Company.
Avison, D. E., Lau, F., Myers, M. D., and Nielsen, P. A.
(1999). Action research.Communications of the
ACM, 42(1), 94-97.
Baskerville, R., and Wood-Harper, A. T. (1998). Diversity
in information systems action research
methods. European Journal of Information
Systems, 7(2), 90-107.
Boje, D. M. (2001). Narrative methods for organizational
& communication research. Sage.
Boland, R., and Schultze, U. (1996). Narrating
Accountability: Cognition and the Production of the
Accountable Self", in R. Munro and R. Mouritsen
(eds), Accountability: Power, Ethos and the
Technologies of Managing. London: International
Thomson Business Press, 1996.
Brown, A., and Jones, M. (1998). Doomed to Failure:
Narratives of Inevitability and Conspiracy in a Failed
IS Project. Organization Science (19:1), pp. 73-88.
Burnes, B. (2004) Managing Change: A Strategic
Approach to Organisational Dynamics, 4th edn
(Harlow: Prentice Hall).
Coghlan, D. and Brannick, T. (2005) Doing Action
Research in Your Own Organization, SAGE
Publications, London.
Coghlan, D. (2000). Interlevel dynamics in clinical
inquiry. Journal of Organizational Change
Management, 13(2), 190-200.
Coghlan, D. (2011) Action Research: Exploring
Perspectives on a Philosophy of Practical Knowing.
The Academy of Management Annals 5(1), 53-87.
Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged
(2003). HarperCollins Publishers, 2003.
Cortimiglia, M., Ghezzi, A. and Frank, A. (2015) Business
Model Innovation and strategy making nexus:
evidences from a cross-industry mixed methods study.
R&D Management, DOI: 10.1111/radm.12113.
Czarniawska, B. (2004). Narratives in social science
ICEIS 2016 - 18th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems
38
research. Sage.
Davison R., Martinsons, M. and Kock, N. (2004)
Principles of Canonical Action Research. Information
Systems Journal 14(1), 65-86.
Gadamer, H.G. (1976). Philosophical Hermeneutics.
Berkeley: University of California Press.
Gallivan, M., and Keil, M. (2003), The user-developer
communication process: a critical case study.
Information Systems Journal 13 (1), 37–68.
Gefen, D. (2002). Nurturing clients’ trust to encourage
engagement success during the customization of ERP
systems. Omega, 30(4), 287-299.
Ghezzi, A., Cortimiglia, M. and Frank, A. (2015) Strategy
and business model design in dynamic
Telecommunications industries: a study on Italian
Mobile Network Operators. Technological Forecasting
and Social Change Vol. 90, Part A, 346-354.
Ghezzi A., Georgadis M., Reichl P., Di-Cairano Gilfedder
C., Mangiaracina R. and Le-Sauze N. (2013)
Generating Innovative Business Models for the Future
Internet. Info 15(4), 43-68.
Ghezzi, A., Mangiaracina R. and Perego, A. (2012)
Shaping the E-Commerce Logistics Strategy: a
Decision Framework, International Journal of
Engineering Business Management, Wai Hung Ip
(Ed.), ISBN: 1847-9790, InTech.
Ghezzi, A., Renga, F., and Balocco, R. (2009) A
technology classification model for Mobile Content
and Service Delivery Platforms. In Enterprise
Information Systems (pp. 600-614). Springer Berlin
Heidelberg.
Joshi, K. (1991). A model of users' perspective on change:
the case of information systems technology
implementation. Mis Quarterly, 229-242.
Kettinger, W. and Grover, V. (1995) Toward a Theory of
Business Process Change Management. Journal of
Management Information Systems 12(1), 9-30.
Lanzara, G. F. (1991). Shifting stories. Learning from a
reflective experiment in a design process. In The
reflective turn: Case studies in and on educational
practice (pp. 285-320). Teachers College Press New
York.
Lim, E. T., Pan, S. L., and Tan, C. W. (2005). Managing
user acceptance towards enterprise resource planning
(ERP) systems–understanding the dissonance between
user expectations and managerial policies. European
Journal of Information Systems, 14(2), 135-149.
Markus, M. L., and Robey, D. (1988). Information
technology and organizational change: causal structure
in theory and research. Management science, 34(5),
583-598.
Mathiassen, L., Chiasson, M. and Germonprez, M. (2012)
Style Composition in Action Research Publication.
MIS Quarterly 36(2), 347-363.
Mohrman S.A, Pasmore W.A., Shani A.B. (Rami),
Stymne B., Adler N. (2008) Toward Building a
Collaborative Research Community, in: Shani A.B.
(Rami), Mohrman S.A., Pasmore W.A., Stymne B.,
Adler N. (Eds.) Handbook of Collaborative Ma-
nagement Research, Thousand Oaks (CA): Sage.
Moran, J. W. and Brightman, B. K. (2001) ‘Leading
organizational change’, Career Development
International, 6(2), pp. 111–118.
Myers, M. D. (1997). Qualitative Research in Information
Systems. MIS Quarterly (21:2), June 1997, pp. 241-
242.
Quilligan, M. (1979). The language of allegory: Defining
the genre. Cornell University Press.
Rapoport, R. (1970) Three Dilemmas of Action Research.
Human Relations 23(6), 499-513.
Rowe, F. (2012) Toward a richer diversity of genres in
information systems research: new categorization and
guidelines. European Journal of Information Systems
21, 469-478.
Saarinen, T., and Vepsäläinen, A. (1993). Managing the
risks of information systems implementation.
European Journal of Information Systems, 2(4), 283-
295.
Schein, E. and Bennis, W, (1965), Personal and
Organizational Change Through Group Methods: The
Laboratory Approach, New York: Wiley.
Schein, E. H. (1999). The corporate culture survival guide:
Sense and nonsense about culture change. San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
Sheth, J. (1981), “Psychology of innovation resistance”,
Research inMarketing, Vol. 4, pp. 273-82.
Thach, L., and Woodman, R. W. (1994). Organizational
change and information technology: Managing on the
edge of cyberspace. Organizational Dynamics, 23(1),
30-46.
Wang, E. T., and Chen, J. H. (2006). Effects of internal
support and consultant quality on the consulting
process and ERP system quality. Decision Support
Systems, 42(2), 1029-1041.
Yetim, F. (2006) Acting with genres: discursive-ethical
concepts for reflecting on and legitimating genres.
European Journal of Information Systems, 15(1), 54–
69.
Zwickl, P., Reichl, P. and Ghezzi, A. (2011) On the
quantification of value networks: a dependency model
for interconnection scenarios. In Economics of
Converged, Internet-Based Networks (pp. 63-74).
Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
An Allegory on the Role of the Action Researcher to Enable User Engagement and Change Management in the Early Phases of Information
Systems Implementation
39