USER PSYCHOLOGICAL APPRAISAL

OF ENTERPRISE WEB 2.0-DEPLOYMENT

Sacha Helfenstein

Agora Human Technology Center, University of Jyväskylä, Finland

Keywords: Enterprise Web 2.0, User Psychology, Technology Adoption.

Abstract: Effective exploitation of emerging Web-based social information and communication tools has become the

new mandate in contemporary enterprise IT-strategy. However, current assessments and recommendations

are generally biased in favouring normative considerations from a technical and business angle; and

deficient in their emphasis of the implementation- over the adoption-perspective on technology deployment.

The current paper propagates the enhancement of Enterprise Web 2.0-research, discourse, and practice by

placing it into the focal point of a multi-disciplinary scientific approach comprising services, design, and,

importantly, user science. User psychological insight serves as basis for contending essential human

adoption barriers and arising dissonances between technical and human use-related promises of Web 2.0;

both of which need to be recognized and productively dealt with in the organizational context of Enterprise

Web 2.0.

1 INTRODUCTION

In the wake of the industrial “going online”-era a

new competitive arena has arisen with regard to

leveraging the value of emerging social information

and communication technologies (also: social

software) for advantageous and creative business

conduct. Web 2.0, and with it Enterprise 2.0, have in

the last 5 years become the associated buzz terms

and guiding paradigms to capture modern enterprise

IT strategy and development. This awareness is

already widely developed with large enterprises

(e.g., Lamont, 2007), however, it is safe to predict

that the new wave of the Web will reach all of use

(McCormack, 2002).

In spite of the many identified success factors

(e.g., Carter), there is a genuine risk in the context of

fast-pace base capability and mobility development

of social ICTs, that Enterprise Web 2.0-

opportunities remain ill-exploited. The most

compelling threat in the author’s judgement pertains

to two mutually related concerns. The first entails a

discrepancy between business- and computing-

related visions of technology implementation on the

one hand versus the socio-psychological reality of

adoption and use on the other hand. And the second,

more general concern relates to an implicit

divergence between technical and human

assessments and promises of the future of the Web,

including its industrial and business implications.

What is needed to support successful and sustainable

enterprise Web 2.0-innovation is (1) the

establishment of an appropriate academic evaluative

frame, (2) an understanding of the essential human

barriers regarding effective adoption and use of

novel tools and practices, and (3) the carving out of

core conflicts, i.e., dissonances, between technical

and human use-related promises of Web 2.0.

The current position paper briefly addresses

these aspects, however, without reiterating in detail

the properties of Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0

regarding their various components and business

argumentations (see e.g., McCormack, 2002; Carter,

2007). The implicit focus is on organizational

adoption by workers and employees themselves, as

this is assessed to be the prerequisite of any

Enterprise Web 2.0 endeavour.

2 ACADEMIC EVALUATIVE

FRAME FOR ENTERPRISE

WEB 2.0 ADOPTION

The matters implicated by Enterprise Web 2.0

naturally relate to a variety of traditional fields and

concepts, involving the disciplines of information

systems, computer science and software engineering,

business science and economics, human and social

sciences, as well as arts and others. Condensed to

424

Helfenstein S. (2008).

USER PSYCHOLOGICAL APPRAISAL OF ENTERPRISE WEB 2.0-DEPLOYMENT.

In Proceedings of the Tenth International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems - HCI, pages 424-427

DOI: 10.5220/0001727404240427

 SciTePress

essential perspectives the study and implementation

of Enterprise 2.0 necessitates the alliance of three

key scientific approaches. These are services

science, design science, and, importantly, user

science (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Multidisciplinary Approach to Enterprise Web

2.0 Research.

At the interjunctions of these scientific fields we can

define on a more fine-grained level a variety of

research areas that are concerned with information

system development (ISD), group work and

collaborative technologies (including CSCW, CVE,

computer-mediated communication etc.), business

models, management and leadership, and industrial

and organizational functioning with focuses on

change and development, and finally, user

psychology (including Human-Computer Interaction

[HCI], ergonomics, human factors, usability etc.).

The main current appeal concerns the valuation

of user scientific concepts, methods, and

intervention knowledge in order to effectively

understand and manage enterprise Web 2.0-

deployment. With technological inventions as driver,

organizational learning and enterprise IT-

management models as enabler, the propagated

focus roots in the conception of humans as the actual

executers and consummators of progress and

innovation.

In order to understand the idiosyncratic contents

and paths of technology use adoption, normative

scientific approaches are deficient. An empiricist,

stochastic user scientific approach is needed. Hereto

the user psychological approach (Saariluoma, 2004)

is proposed as appropriate research frame, which

simultaneously reasserts the need to enhance the

applied scientific impact of psychology in the areas

of services businesses and design (Landauer, 1987;

Moran, 1981; Münsterberg, 1913).

3 USER PSYCHOLOGICAL

ADOPTION HURDLES

Micro-level (individual) adoption and effective use

is the natural prerequisite of organizational

spreading and enterprise level technology

exploitation. This perspective is believed to fit the

credentials of Enterprise Web 2.0 all the more as the

therein involved technologies and practices

emphasize the core principles of user involvement

and participation.

Adoption of any new technology use-related

behaviour is always a dynamic user need and

experience-driven socio-psychological process.

Under- and ill-use are its direct antipodes. By

focusing on these antipodes, and thereby

complementary to the majority perspective that

concentrates on the attractive side of technology, it

is the distinct intention of this paper to highlight

distracting adoption factors. In fact, it is contended

that not just instead, but in spite of available positive

values of new technologies, their adoption can be

hampered by several use antagonists. Below is a list

of the six core hurdles that need to be overcome in

the course of any successful service or tool adoption

process. They are absence or lack of: (1) awareness /

knowledge; (2) understanding / comprehension; (3)

interest / motivation / belief; (4) need / use fit; (5)

capability / opportunity / resources; (6) prior

success / satisfaction.

In short, considering for instance a particular

application software tool, potential users must be

aware of the availability of the new tools and they

must have a primary conception of what the tool is

for and how it is used (irrespective of how apt this

conception is), from which they develop further

attitudinal beliefs about value of the product. Next,

in order to translate adoption attitudes into use

intention and actions, the utility and interaction

requisites must fit the users’ intrinsic or extrinsic

(e.g., corporate decree) needs and customs or

generate according ones and users must be equipped

with the necessary opportunity, resources, and

capacity to acquire, explore, and apply the tools.

Finally, users will evaluate the triggered experiences

and effects of interacting with the tool, including

past ones that a user deems to see related to the

current tool and its use, and accordingly recalibrate

their tool conception and attitudes toward it. This is

a very important point relating to positive and

negative use transfer effects (Helfenstein, 2005).

Traditionally, a user’s willingness to adopt any

new technology is seen as connected to user’s

judgment of their potential benefits (Ajzen &

Fishbein, 1980; Davis, Bagozzi & Warshaw, 1989).

Here, the frequent neglecting of two critical issues

related to user needs and motives is contemplated.

First, tools and practices that are placed in the focus

of user adoption are commonly not unique or

original, neither with respect to users’ learning and

USER PSYCHOLOGICAL APPRAISAL OF ENTERPRISE WEB 2.0-DEPLOYMENT

425

use biographies, nor with respect to purpose-

equivalent alternative means to satisfy the same

needs. And secondly, the accustomed user practices

often provide a series of competing (factual or

imagined) spin-off benefits: Taking care of banking

deeds at the counter in town instead of in the

Internet may provide an elderly with a reason to

leave the own four walls. It is very frequently

exactly these alternative sources for behavioural

justification that unveil themselves as real stumbling

blocks when introduced to novel practices.

Finally, the most basic of all reasons for not

discontinuing a use habit is our innate reluctance

toward change (e.g., Toffler, 1970), the innate

antagonist to the human exploration instinct and a

long debated phenomenon also in organizational

settings (e.g. Leavitt & Whisler, 1958).

Considering enterprise adoption of Web 2.0-

tools it is quite intuitive that organizational context

(business nature, size, heterogeneity etc.) and IT

deployment management play essential roles in

promoting or inhibiting adoption and use. Creating

and sustaining a “highly receptive culture” (McAfee,

2006) is seen as crucial to best support Enterprise

Web 2.0-technology adoption in on organizational

context. Therefore, executives should be concerned

with minimizing the above mentioned adoption

hurdles through a set of governance measures and

the nurturing of a constructive use breeding

environment. In doing so, they further should be

aware of impending dissonances between

technology- and human-oriented assessments of

Enterprise Web 2.0.

4 DISSONANCES BETWEEN

TECHNICAL AND HUMAN

USE-RELATED PROMISES OF

WEB 2.0

Based on the user psychological contemplations and

in reviewing a wide range of literature, surveys, and

case studies

on the state and prospects of Enterprise

Web 2.0 development, a set of general dissonances

between technical

and human/social use-related

Nearly two dozens case studies from openly accessible

Web-resources were included.

The notion of technical promises does not refer to the

technical layer of Web 2.0 in terms of programming

and software engineering but only to the nominal

utility of Web 2.0-technologies (applications and

services) involved.

promises were distilled, which potentially burden

effective Web 2.0 technology deployment and

adoption. They pertain to the mutually overlaying

issues of utility, design and innovation paradigm,

deployment and control, and outcome expectation.

Utility Dissonance. While technological solutions

become more quick to develop and sophisticated,

they inevitably get also increasingly numerous and

heterogeneous. This suggests that in future we suffer

no longer from a lack of technology or use skills, but

from the mass as well as partial redundancies and

incongruities of systems and related user

experiences. This utility trade-off addresses a lack of

transfer between interaction settings as well as

deficient system unity and use consistency, all of

which jeopardizes rather then assures ease-of-use

and value of the available tools in people’s every-

day interaction.

Because businesses are fundamentally people-

based, the ability to capitalize on technological

innovation will depend directly on the employment

of standards and platforms that ensure a ready and

smooth use management of new tools available.

Design Approach/Innovation Dissonance. Web-

tools are all-too-often developed mainly for a

technically inventive and commercial end; less to

encourage organizational work innovation in a

feasible way. This disparity between a technology-

and a use-driven design paradigm reflects a critical

shortage of action-oriented research efforts, resulting

in naïve conceptions of intuitivity in design.

In order to overcome this gap, innovation must

be distinguished from invention, and appreciated as

socially constructive process of adoption and use,

closely tied to incumbent user work practices and

experiences on the individual and organizational

level of business operations. Further, a soothing

counterforce to the disruptive impact of IT

inventions is needed; one that accentuates

conformities and emphasizes deep-seated user

conceptions.

Deployment and Control Dissonance. The

participative and democratic mandate of Web 2.0

makes firm top-down introduction and

implementation obsolete and raises the vital question

of how private user involvement and expertise

among employees can be turned to advantage in the

organizational context (i.e., bottom-up deployment).

A key question is therefore how to successfully

combine formal and informal technology roll-out by

effectively atuning change leadership and IT-

governance measures. On the other hand, increased

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426

egalitarianism and user emancipation in IT-

deployment also put to the test traditional

organizational and business process structures as

well control expectations of managing officers;

frequently surfacing in security concerns of

Enterprise Web 2.0. Indeed, successful business

alignment and integration of IT may just mean to

substitute dogmatic information structures with

organic ones (e.g., so called “unstructured” tools).

Outcome Expectation Dissonance. Dealing with

over-laden expectations by concentrating on

rudimentary application needs and goals is essential

both on the individual user as well as on the

enterprise (business) level. Not everything is greener

on the other side of the Web 2.0-fence. Blogs, for

instance, risk even to broadcast the already evident

problem of local link and bookmark-management

into a wider web-user arena.

Compelling web-applications or services are

further scarce – an obvious side-effect of the current

Web 2.0-development boom that lifts quantity over

quality. Skimming through hundreds of Firefox

extensions, for instance, one can find only a handful

that would truly converge existing services into an

integrated browsing experience.

The conjecture is warranted, that much of the

industrial promises associated with novel web-usage

does not reflect the superiority of emerging tools as

such, but merely (a) the inapt and therefore inferior

internet technologies used extensively in business

today (e.g., e-mail, Intranets; Davenport, 2005), and

(b) their potential when aligned successfully with

business processes and servicing nature.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Although contemplations about technology adoption

are not exclusive to the case of Enterprise Web 2.0,

they are very timely, of clear economic value, and of

unique relevance in the context of the participative

technology use and development paradigms.

Research and discussions on the matter needs

therefore to be re-stimulated and enriched with

insights and arguments stemming from a user

scientific approach.

In order to understand the socio-psychological

dynamics of the adoption process the paper proposed

a model comprising six, interdependent adoption

hurdles or barriers that need to be overcome. This

hurdle-conception, although appearing simply

antagonistic to the adoption benefit view serves a

complementary theoretical purpose. It further

incorporates technology use transfer issues that are

especially vital in the context of the current second

wave of Web-effects.

Finally, various arguments about broad conflicts

between technical and human use-oriented promises

of (enterprise) Web 2.0-adotpion were ordered into

four dissonances (utility dissonance, design

approach dissonance, deployment dissonance, and

expectation dissonance).

It is the insight into this climate of dissonances,

which is claimed to constitute the ground for

comprehending user challenges and managerial

significance concerning enterprise Web 2.0-

adoption.

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