Being There and Doing IT in the Workplace: A Case Study of a Co-Development Approach in Helathcare

Abstract

While user involvement initiatives such as participatory design are welcome, in as much as they focus on design, they are only capable of advancing user control so far. We argue that more attention should be paid to building a partnership between IT specialists and users that extends over the whole system lifecycIe, and is grounded upon what happens as users grapple with the problems of applying IT, i.e., appropriating its functionalities and affordances into their work practices and relations. In this paper, we outline how we have been attempting to achieve a user-led development approach in the context of an IT project within a healthcare setting.