ENEDOS 2023 week 51
Digital transformation and productivity; dynamic and stable teams; the meaning of service design + expectations from IT professionals, psychological safety among volunteers at war
Digital transformation and productivity
WHAT? NTNU-study of the digital transformation of the Norwegian court system to figure out the productivity paradox, the phenomenon that digitalization does not appear to improve productivity.
It’s INTERESTING that:
Three factors were examined: digital adoption, digital learning, and managerial dynamic capability
It turned out that digital learning improved productivity, and that managerial dynamic capability was essential for digital learning.
AND SO?
It’s often thought that digital transformation is about putting to use technology, but these findings suggest that good technology use follows from good leadership.
So it may be that organizations should prioritize leadership development and learning over “pure” technology investments. What this means, needs further exploration.
Small, whole, and stable/dynamic teams
WHAT? Swedish study about the trade-offs between dynamic and stable teams in software development.
It’s INTERESTING that:
The premise is that teams perform best when they are small, stable enough to evolve, and “whole,” i.e., self-sufficient. These three suggest an “iron triangle” for teams: you can not change one without affecting others.
While this study showed that small teams were efficient and whole teams assured quality, stability was more of a mixed bag. Dynamism is often needed.
A key points was that stable (psychologically safe) teams are resilient when organizations are changing, that stability becomes a “hygiene factor.”
AND SO?
The term “team” is used in many contexts, but in software development, they typically mean temporary organizations to complete projects. It is harder to imagine durable teams as something separate from the organization.
This suggests that tasks and problems need to be defined at a size the teams can manage and that they learn to use resources outside the team. Stability and dynamism are something to balance over time.
What service design really means
WHAT? Results from in-depth interviews by MIT researchers to learn from experts in service design
It’s INTERESTING that:
Service design is offered as an approach for solving complex socio-technological problems that determine our future
The purpose of this study was to help clarify what service design is all about — finding that is context-driven, has the purpose of communication and alignment, has durable quality, and that its use in the public sector must be related to private services.
This raises a framework that puts technology-based product-oriented solutions in the rearview mirror and experience-based human-centered solutions ahead of us.
AND SO?
Complexity and uncertainty are cognitive challenges that require disciplined approaches, but what these disciplines entail is still under development.
The findings place high demands on the practitioners, and it will take time to master these skills.
Bonus:
Brazilian study about IT managers’ expectations from newly educated IT professionals, that a great deal of versatility is needed.
From Ukraine: study about psychological safety among volunteers in war.
Next week: Barriers to an agile public sector; Megaproject managers; when ideas meet institutions + infection tracing, productivity in the non-profit sector, digitalization of manufacturing