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Coevolution of technology and organization: A case study of BrokerHouse

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Coevolution of technology and organization: A case study of BrokerHouse

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Content COEVOLUTION OF TECHNOLOGY AND ORGANIZATION:
A CASE STUDY OF BROKERHOUSE
Copyright 2003
by
Rebecca Dawn Heino
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(COMMUNICATION)
May 2003
Rebecca Dawn Heino
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UMI Number: 3103899
UMI
UMI Microform 3103899
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UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY PARK
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90089-1695
This dissertation, written by
under the direction o f /z€ / ^ dissertation committee, and
approved by all its members, has been presented to and
accepted by the Director o f Graduate and Professional
Programs, in partial fulfillment of the requirements fo r the
degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Director
Date May 1 6 , 2003
Dissertation Committee
3! ‘Hi 03,
9£
i /( Chair
3 hl/o:s
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DEDICATION
To my parents who continue to support me
far beyond my childhood years. Without you,
I would not be at this place in life.
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ili
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To my committee, Patti Riley, Doug Thomas and Tom Cummings - thank
you for your advice, feedback, wisdom and last, but not least, those precious
signatures that are worth more than the lottery! A special thanks to all the other
wonderful people in my life that have helped me finish - to Travis Kalanick who
gave me a needed kick from behind, to Rebecca Weintraub, my official
“dissertation nag,” who helped me see where I was going, and to my dissertation
support group, Jennifer Gibbs and Mark Latonero, who held my hand along the
way.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. Dedication ii
II. Acknowledgements iii
III. Abstract v
IV. Organizations Adopt Information and Communication 1
Technologies: An Introduction
V. ICTs and the Organization: Literature Review 8
VI. Methodology 45
VII. Coevolution of Environment, Organization and Technology 63
VIII. Communication Technology, Privacy & Organizational Policy 87
IV. Discussion and Conclusion 123
X. References 133
XI. Appendices 145
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ABSTRACT
v
The relationship between information and communication technologies
(ICT) and organizations can be understood through the theoretical lenses of
coevolution and structuration. This case study takes a multilevel and
multitheoretical approach to focus on BrokerHouse (BH), a large financial
company, as it evolves with changing access to the Internet and e-mail. The
coevolutionary paradigm accounts for the environment, the organization and ICTs
as they evolve and affect each other. Institutional pressures, as well as changing
access to information, people and technology shape the coevolutionary process.
The interaction of different institutional pressures affects selection and retention
choices for new technologies. The changing access landscape in the environment
also pushes BH to adopt its own business by changing revenue models, offering
new services, and reconceptualizing the role of its brokers. From a structuration
perspective, the adoption and use of new ICTs within the organization are affected
by the perceptions of the technology and the policies developed around it. In turn,
how ICTs are used affect individual’s perceptions and influence new policy. The
specific area of policy which most strongly influenced e-mail use was the practice
of active monitoring and the user’s perceptions of lack of privacy. The privacy
debate around technology, in the United States, is being played out at the
organizational level as each organization develops its own policies.
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1
Organizations Adopt Information and Communication Technologies:
An Introduction
IM giants told to work it out. As Wall Street begins to embrace
instant messaging, some financial giants are putting a squeeze on
the technology's famously fractious service providers.
- Olson, CNET News.com (2002)
Apparent from this recent headline, the financial industry is not waiting for
information and communication technology (ICT) to develop- they are demanding
that it be developed for them now! Six top financial companies met with top
producers of instant messaging, including IBM, Microsoft and AOL Time Warner,
and ‘urged’ them to develop a standard which could successfully allow disparate
IM systems to work together. This proactive stance by the financial community
shows the importance of ICTs to their industry and their business. This social
shaping of the next generation of IM technology is an example of the interaction
between production, organizations, and technology.
ISD, a technology research company, predicts that by 2006 total spending
worldwide for IT will reach $572 billion. Despite the recent downturn, spending is
predicted to increase by an annual growth rate of 10.6%. According to analyst Ned
May, "The fear that this (downturn) is the demise of the industry is unfounded. IT
spending still represents competitive advantage to many companies." (Joyce, 2002)
These numbers might even be conservative. According to Morgan Stanley Dean
Witter research, IT spending in the U.S. alone in 2000 reached $532 billion, a 23%
increase over the previous year. (Meeker & Cascianelli, 2001). IT spending is a
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broad category, but it includes all ICTs such as servers, databases, PCs, Internet,
and increasingly popular wireless technologies. IM seems to be the latest in a
string o f important ICTs that organizations are not only quickly adopting, but
demanding.
Another recent ICT that has been transformative to business and
organizations is the Internet, with the development of organization Intranets and the
use of e-mail. At an external level, the Internet has spawned e-commerce in
business-to-business (B2B) sectors and business-to-consumer (B2C). In the United
States in 2000, e-commerce accounts for $1,056 trillion of business, of which 94%
is B2B (vs. B2C) (2000 E-commerce Multi-sector Report, 2000). It also has
allowed organizations to advertise and market themselves in new ways (e.g. using
the Internet to spread rumors about The Blair Witch film before it was released).
On an internal level, the development of corporate Intranets, which use
Internet technologies but only allow limited access with firewalls, affect the work
processes and information available within an organization. Intranets can allow for
provision of static information electronically (newsletter), interaction with
databases (‘best practices’ database), communication with other people or to share
document files (electronic bulletin boards), and an advanced Intranet may support
decision-making by offering additional tools for teamwork and shared tasks (shared
whiteboards and conferencing tools). They have become an integral part of many
large organizations (Fulk et al., 2003-revise & resubmit). A third area of
technology affecting organizations is group decision support systems (GDSS),
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which aids in meetings and group decision making. Research in this area has shown
how the technology affects participation and outcomes of meetings (Poole &
DeSanctis, 1990).
An aspect of the Internet, e-mail, allows for interpersonal communication
between individuals and groups. It has constituted a large part of research as a new
form of communication usually embedded in ICTs. Much of the initial research
covers adoption and actual use of e-mail (Fulk, 1993) and its effects on
communication and organizations. In the early days of e-mail, adoption was fast
and companies encouraged its unbridled use. As the ‘honeymoon period’ has ended
for e-mail, it has now become a crucial part of most organizations, or else
purposefully ignored. Organizations are increasingly creating stricter policy around
its use. E-mail has become the new battle ground for issues of privacy in the
organization. As a recent LA Times article proclaims, “Workers Lament Loss of E-
Mail Privacy on Job” ("Workers Lament Loss of E-Mail Privacy on Job," 1999).
The regulations, both Federal and Corporate wide, affect the use of e-mail and how
people conceive of these new communication technologies.
As companies continue to spend more money to incorporate the latest
technology with their business, it is important to understand how these decisions
are made and to understand respective outcomes. Few question that information
and communication technologies have had a significant impact on organizations.
The question is from which perspective to best understand the change that it
produces. The effects are much more far-reaching than an ‘increase in production’
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paradigm. Often the changes that occur transform how business is done, with
whom it is done, and the procedures and structures internal to the organization
itself. These cannot be understood by just looking at the bottom line; rather, they
seem to be effects that can be tied together under the coevolutionary paradigm,
which accounts for the technology, human influence and the organization. To
understand how organizations adopt and implement new technology, the social and
environmental factors around and within that organization must be understood.
Also, the technology itself must not be taken for granted. Its development and use
is also a result of social factors. Finally, the organization is situated within a
specific industry and must respond to external pressures and is also shaped by its
own structures and culture. This research attempts to add to this literature by
focusing on the implantation of an ICT in BrokerHouse, a large financial
corporation.
Chapter 2 focuses on a review of relevant literature and theory around this
topic. Information and communication systems have been an important area of
study in the last 15 years. At an environmental level, I review the literature around
the coevolutionary relationship between organization and technology, the
paradigmatic changes in access with new ICTs, and the effect of institutions on
each other in adopting new technologies (Scott, 1995). A large amount of research
has been conducted using the structuration approach (Giddens, 1984) to understand
the process relationship between organizations and ICTs (S. R. Barley, 1986;
Orlikowski, 1992). At an organizational level, the effects of ICTs on
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organizational form (G. DeSanctis & Fulk, 1999) as well as the aspect of social
influence (Fulk, 1993) on the use of technology are relevant. Finally, policy issues
around new technology, specifically in regard to privacy, have not been thoroughly
researched and offer new areas of exploration.
In chapter 3, the methodology, as well as the specifics of the case study, is
explicated. This research employed a case study of BrokerHouse (pseudonym), a
large financial institution, which was implemented a new communication and
information technology system, ComputerSystem (pseudonym). CS allowed for
Internet access and the use of e-mail to BH employees for the first time. I gathered
data, using focus groups, interview, and observation, before and after the rollout in
two offices of BH. The analysis of these data used a grounded theory approach to
unearth important themes. The case is set within the financial industry and a time
when technology was changing access for clients. It is also a highly regulated
industry with intense competition between organizations and within the
organization.
The first representation of themes, in chapter 4, focuses on the broader
environment in which BH participated; specifically, the coevolution of organization
and technology due to institutional pressure to adopt and use new technologies.
Conflicting institutional pressures of legitimation versus regulation resulted in
adopting Compsys but creating strict policy around its use to lessen the legal risks.
Second, it focuses on the new Internet capabilities which affected the access of
functionality and information for clients, specifically the availability of online
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trading. This transformed how brokers defined their profession as one of trading to
one of knowledge workers. New access to information within BH through the
Internet also leveled the playing field for brokers. Previously, they had to
individually justify costs for different information sources, (e.g. Bloomberg).
Finally, overall the perception of Compsys was that of an information source and
tool, but not a medium in which to build relationships within the office or with their
clients.
From the environment level, I focus on organizational themes in chapter 5.
This represents the specific interpretations and reactions to the implementation of
CS in two offices of BH. Employees reactions are influenced by power structures,
those they interact with, their perception of their job, as well as policy developed
by BH. One of the most important influences on the use of e-mail was the lack of
privacy in regard to their e-mail. In the United States, legislation does not protect
communication privacy within private corporations. Therefore, organizations can
create their own policy about privacy and communication. In BH, the active
monitoring of e-mail produced a negative response in most users and resulted in
limited e-mail use; only about 10% used it 2 months after implementation. This
presents important questions about the negotiation of privacy and policy within
organizations.
Finally, chapter 6 concludes with a discussion about the opposing
institutional pressures affecting the coevolution of technology and organizations.
The perception of the technology, as an information source and its lack of privacy,
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were two of the biggest factors that affected the use of Compsys. Implications for
this research include the importance of aligning the structure of the organization
with ICT goals. It also stressed the social and environmental factors that must be
taken into account when implementing technology. Of these factors, the
structuration of technology and policy was an important interaction that needs more
research. More broadly, the negotiation of privacy across organizations is an area
for future research. Furthermore, studies around the implementation and use of
ICTs in organizations should be long term as effects might change over time.
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ICTs and the Organization - Literature Review
The computerization of the workplace confronts us with an apparent
paradox. On the one hand, everyone agrees that the fusion of new
information and communication technologies (I/CT) is radically
transforming modes of work and the organizational contexts where work
goes on. ..Yet, on the other hand, the actual result of any single I/CT
implementation is often disappointing when benchmarked against the usual
standards of contribution to efficiency and organizational performance. The
technologies, it repeatedly has been found, fail to deliver at the level that
people expected, either singly or in aggregate. (Taylor, Groleau, Heaton, &
Van Every, 2000)
The above quotation presents the apparent paradox: implementing new
ICTs brings change to the organization but it is not necessarily in terms of the
productivity or efficiency that decision makers predicted. The question becomes:
how do we understand the implementation, adoption and consequences of new
information and communication technologies (ICT) within organizations?
Organizational change, as a process, refers to “sequences of individual and
collective events, actions, and activities unfolding over time in context” (Pettigrew,
Woodman, & Cameron, 2001, p.700). Many scholars have studied the
implementation of ICTs as a process of change within the organization (S. R.
Barley, 1986; G. DeSanctis & Fulk, 1999; Gerardine DeSanctis & Poole, 1994;
Heracleous & Barrett, 2001; O'Mahoney & Barley, 1999; Tyre & Orlikowski,
1994). Some have focused on the choice and adoption of new technological
innovations (Jenkins & Floyd, 2001; Rosenkopf & Nerkar, 1999) while others
focus on the actual implementation processes (Bar, Kane, & Simard, 2000; S. R.
Barley, 1986; Fulk et al., 2003-revise & resubmit; Lewis & Seibold, 1993). This
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process of organizational change can vary between incremental change, defined as
small changes in process or function, to “quantum” change, which involves larger
organizational dimensions such as culture, structure and work design (Cummings
& Worley, 1997). Generally, most change is incremental rather than quantum (e.g.
J. E. Dutton, Ashford, O'Neill, & Lawrence, 2001). Change can be dictated from
the top-down or encouraged from the bottom-up (J. E. Dutton et al, 2001; Lewis
& Seibold, 1998). Also, the focus can be on ‘routines and competencies within the
organization’ or the larger organization as a whole (Aldrich, 1999).
The overall process of change is cyclical in nature (Bar, Kane et al., 2000;
S. R. Barley, 1986; Orlikowski, 1992) and must be understood as an ongoing
interaction between technology and organization. To understand the organizational
aspects of this continuous interaction a number of different change agents must be
taken into account. According to Lewis and Seibold (1996), “outcomes of the
intraorganizational adoption process can be accounted for both by the planned
implementation activities of organizational leaders and decision makers, as well as
by individual users’ responses to those activities” (p. 132). Therefore, the focus on
implementing new technology must include those who support and implement the
change as well as the end users responding to the change in this inherently political
process. The management perspective is important because it will influence
strategic action (Ginsberg & Venkatraman, 1995) as well as users’ perceptions of
the technology (Fulk, Schmitz, & Steinfield, 1990). Politics can either contribute
to or block the implementation of ICTs depending on the distribution of power and
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the way in which change is managed (Pichault, 1995). Studying the
implementation from the agents’ perspective must also include the communication
practices such as information sharing, vision and motivation, social support and
evaluation/feedback (Lewis & Seibold, 1998). There is also a finite ‘window of
opportunity’ after the initial implementation in which it is easy to make changes
surrounding the adaptation of new technology within the organization. After that,
it becomes more difficult to initiate change (Tyre & Orlikowski, 1994).
To understand technology-related change within an organization both the
technology and the organization must be examined and understood. This research
takes an overarching social constructivist perspective: both technology and
organization are constructed, enacted upon and understood with the influence of
social factors. Neither aspects are set entities. Technology can be broadly defined
as anything that extends our abilities as humans. This research focuses on a more
narrow type of technology: electronic information and communication technologies
(ICTs). These are technologies used primarily to communicate information and to
connect people. In the last couple of decades, two of the most widely adopted of
these technologies in the United States are the Internet and electronic mail. As
mentioned in the introduction, organizations are adopting a wide variety of ICTs
including many Internet technologies. Much of the research cited in this paper
focuses on the use of these technologies in organizations. While it’s easy to narrow
the definition, technology is not just the hardware, it also includes the social
practices around its use.
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One temptation is to take a technological deterministic standpoint toward
new technology which asserts that technology is the most important cause of social
change (MacKenzie, 1996). This would assume that certain technology will cause
certain changes that are predictable and predetermined. Secondly, this perspective
assumes that there is a path or trajectory that technology follows that is linear and
always progressive. As Dutton explains in Society on the Line (1999), the criticism
of arguments based on deterministic assumptions is that, “The public is often told
that technology is on a predetermined trajectory, but different scientists forecast
different trajectories” (p. 26). Rather, effects of new technologies should be
viewed as “the outcome of an indeterminate social and political process rather than
being set on a predetermined technological trajectory” (p. 27).
Orlikowski (1992) explains the duality of technology as both an objective
force and a socially constructed entity. From a social constructionist perspective,
technology can be influenced by the meanings assigned to it by social groups (Van
den Ende & Van Oost, 2001) as well political forces. This perspective on
technology avoids a simplistic approach to technology and organizations.
“...technology has not caused change alone because it is embedded in a larger
system of relationships. In short, new technology must be adopted and used by
organizations, firms, and individuals that participate in relationships, markets, and
cultures that predate the innovation, and these players are likely to have stakes and
investments in the status quo” (Bar, Richards, & Sandvig, 2000, p.6). Heracleous
and Barrett (2001) study the implementation of new ICTs through analysis of the
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deep structures within the discourse around the technology. It is important to
understand what users and adopters say about new ICTs but also “attempt to
understand the deeper values and beliefs of these stakeholders that are enshrined in
the groups’ discursive structures because these are what persist over time and guide
actors’ interpretations and actions” (p. 774)
Similar to technology, organizations are not static entities. They are
socially constructed through the interaction, communication, and behaviors of its
members. The influence of human agency affects the structure of the organization
and vice versa (Giddens, 1984). The organization is a dynamic entity involved in
the structuring process.
One challenge in studying organizational change is to include the
surrounding context, content and process over time (Pettigrew et al., 2001). There
are two levels to explore: the interaction of environment and organization, and the
change within the organization itself. “A business does not react solely to changes
in the environment. Quite apart from then, it also reacts to changes within itself’
(Gebert & Boerner, 1999, p.535). Coevolutionary theory and structuration, as
overarching perspectives, both help to contextualize the change and offer
frameworks that are time and process oriented. Although they are related in certain
ways, coevolutionary theory is suited to study the evolution of environment and
organization together, specifically in regard to ICTs. Structuration, with a focus on
the cycle of structure and human agency, is well suited to understand the context
and factors within the organization around new ICTs.
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Coevolution o f Technology and Organization
Coevolution is an overarching world view applied here to
understand change associated with ICTs in an organization. Coevolution focuses
on the mutual evolution of different entities as they affect each other and change or
evolve over time. Campbell (1965) explained that evolution exists if three
requirements were met: “the occurrence of variations,” “consistent selection
criteria,” and “a mechanism for the preservation, duplication or propagation of the
positively selected variants” (p. 27). This can apply to both social and biological
systems (Aldrich, 1999). There has been a significant amount of research applying
coevolution to different aspects of organizational evolution - both within and in
relation to its environment (Aldrich, 1999; Baum & Singh, 1994; Rao & Singh,
1999; Rosenkopf & Nerkar, 1999; Rosenkopf & Tushman, 1994; Van de Ven &
Garud, 1994). Aldrich (1999) defines organizations as “goal-directed, boundary-
maintaining and socially constructed systems of human activity” (p. 2) which affect
and are affected by the environment in which they operate. Socially constructed
implies that human processes, perceptions and behaviors are important factors. It
means the social interaction itself is constitutive of the organization. How new
ICTs affect this interaction and therefore the organization is important to
understand. Hence, dualistic thinking about organizations or technology as
separate, unchanging entities must be avoided (Taylor et al., 2000). Boundary
maintenance, a second part of the definition, manifests itself around issues of
control and control structures within the organization. They regulate the direction,
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evaluation and rewards of individuals within the organization (Aldrich, 1999).
These control structures become important to understand in the implementation of
new ICTs in the organization.
Coevolutionary processes can occur both within the organization and
between the organization and its environment. The interaction between
organization and environment can be understood from the feedback approach.
Change can be driven by feedback from the larger environmental system or by
direct interaction between communities within the environment. This can be
viewed as a circular view of ‘mutual causality’ in which organizations influence
their environment while the environment affects the organization(s) within it.
(Baum & Singh, 1994)
Coevolutionary theory is not deterministic but rather allows for the
‘indeterminancy’ in life (Aldrich, 1999). It is flexible enough to work with other
theories that help explain more specifically how some of these larger processes
work at a more micro level. There are four general processes in evolutionary
theory: variation, selection, retention and struggle. If these are applied to
organizational settings, they can be defined in the following ways. Variation is any
sort of change in current organizational processes, regulations or forms (Aldrich,
1999). It can also be a new technical or institutional form with in a population. The
origins of variation specifically in technology are not a result of rare circumstance
or ‘chance’ but often a result of small changes and recombinations of technology
over time (Van de Yen & Garud, 1994). Selection is the elimination of certain
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variations either between organizations or within an organization. The selection
occurs after competition between rival variations to best suit that organization or
environment. Selection can be understood by examining the events and policies
that create or modify existing rules or routines within the organization. (Van de
Ven & Garud, 1994). Retention is preserving or duplicating selected variations.
Once selection has occurred, rules, routines and policies are created to retain the
chosen selection. Finally, according to Aldrich (1999), struggle is the “Contest to
obtain scarce resources because their supply is limited” (p.22). This struggle can
occur over varying resources, such as capital, legitimacy or knowledge.
These stages of evolution have been analyzed as macrostages of evolution
as well as micro or individual events (Van de Ven & Garud, 1994). At the macro
level, coevolution of technology and organization can be applied to the design of
technology itself as a larger story of evolution (Jenkins & Floyd, 2001; Rosenkopf
& Nerkar, 1999; Rosenkopf & Tushman, 1994). At the micro or individual level,
technology and organizational evolution can be explored within the context of a
specific organization. These ‘stages,’ whether macro or micro, are usually
described linearly, but Van de Ven and Garud (1994) see them as simultaneously
progressing in a number of different areas: “To describe and explain how
innovations emerge we argue that social evolutionary processes are better viewed
as a cumulative progression of numerous interrelated acts of variation, selection,
and retention over an extended period of time” (p. 427). An organization could
select a variation and then return to variation if they change their minds.
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Rosenkopf and Nerkar (1999) and Jenkins and Floyd (2001) establish three
levels o f analysis in understanding the trajectory of technology development within
a coevolutionary framework: system, firm and component-specific levels. First, at
the system level, a number of organizations can be identified around a community
within an environment. Within this community, industry -wide standards tend to
be adopted, specifically in regard to technology. To understand variation, selection
and retention at the system level, institutional and access theories offer more
insight. At the firm level, which will be referred to as the organizational level of
analysis, actors and forces within an organization are identified in that specific
community. Decisions tend to be affected by managers, structure and culture. A
number of perspectives can further explain the coevolution within an organization,
including structuration, social influence, organizational form, access and policy
development. Third, component-specific communities are external to the firm and
include groups and individuals focus on development of ideas and lead to creation
of technology. Analyzing component-specific communities is outside of the scope
of this study but could be better understood through the social shaping theory in
future research.
Component-specific communities
This level of analysis focuses on the creation and design of technology and
the process in which a dominant design is chosen and retained. Although this is out
of the realm of the data in this research, some interesting theoretical connections
can be made. Rosenkopf and Tushman (1994) explain the coevolution of
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technology and organizations as alternating periods of social constructionism, with
organizational coalitions affecting technology choices and periods of technological
determinism, in which dominant designs of technology constrains community
dynamics. “Social, political, and organizational factors are brought to bear on the
process of technological selection; the influence of these nontechnical factors is
accentuated because a greater variety of organizations are involved in the evolution
of complex technologies” (Rosenkopf & Tushman, 1994, p.404). The period they
refer to as ‘social constructionism’ is similar to the theoretical literature of ‘social
shaping. ’ The social shaping of technology incorporates how technologies
themselves, as they were developed and chosen, were shaped by social forces. It
focuses on two aspects: the innovation process and the content of technology
(Williams & Edge, 1996). Social shaping fights against the conception of
technology as a ‘black box’ - technology as a part of the theory but never theorized
about or problematized itself. Often it is assumed that the technology itself is
chosen or comes into existence because it is the most efficient or best for the job.
As history has shown, this is not often true. Bijker & Hughes (1987) explain how
the bicycle has evolved into its current forms. They argue that there were many
designs of different types of bikes that had to take into account different social
groups and norms. For example, bikes were developed with lower crossbars to
allow for feminine propriety. This distinction between male and female bicycles
still remains today, even if the social norms have evolved.
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The research in this area has focused on a wide range of technologies from
the Bakelite (Bijker, 1987) to the mill (Holt, 1996) to textiles during the Industrial
Revolution (O'Brien, Griffiths, & Hunt, 1996). The same theory used in historical
applications to a variety of technologies has been applied to information and
communication technologies in modern society; for example, the influence of
Xerox PARC in the 1970s on computers and the computer industry (W. Dutton,
1999). Garud & Kumaraswamy (1995) research the development of a specific
microprocessor and suggest a dualistic process in which “the technical environment
continually shapes, and is shaped by, the larger institutional environment of
architectural standards” (p. 239).
The social shaping of technology fits in the coevolutionary framework by
giving accounts of variation and selection at a historical and sociological level.
While it is important to understand how social forces shape the creation of
technologies, they also continue to affect how ICTs are appropriated and used
within an organization and within a broader environment such as industries. These
two areas are analyzed in this research at the system level, referring to the
coevolution of organization and environment, and at the organizational level,
referring to the coevolution of technology and organization.
System level community
The system level of community is concerned with the coevolution of
organization and environment in relation to ICTs. Within this framework, the
selection of certain technologies can be understood through institutional theory,
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forces of other institutions in the same community. The organizational and
technological evolution within that environment can be understood through the
paradigm of access. At this level, community is defined as “multiple, diverse, and
interdependent populations of organizations” (Rosenkopf & Tushman, 1994,
pp.410-411). In Organization-Environment Coevolution, Baum and Singh (1994)
explain that the interaction between organizations creates a community which is
affected by the environment but also influences the environment. One area of
environmental influence is the creation and adoption of a particular technology that
is created and adopted across a community of organizations (which can be referred
to as an industry).
Institutional theory. From the coevolutionary perspective “organizations
change when forced to do so” but “institutionalization makes many kinds of change
unimaginable" (Aldrich, 1999, p.49). One way to understand the variation of
technologies available, and why some are selected in an organizational community,
is based in institutional theory. In the early 1950s the general area of institutional
research began to connect to organizational research, specifically to understand
how organizations become ‘institutionalized’ (Scott, 1995).
One area of institutional theory attempts to understand why a group of
organizations, perhaps in a similar field or area, tend over time to become more
similar to each other (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983; Flanagin, 2000). This isomorphic
trend results from institutional agents or forces, in the form of social pressures,
which affect organizational decisions. Scott (1995) defines institutions as
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“cognitive, normative, and regulative structures and activities that provide stability
and meaning to social behavior. Institutions are transported by various carriers-
cultures, structures, and routines- and they operate at multiple levels of
jurisdiction” (p. 33). Parsons (1956) posits that organizations are always a part of a
larger subsystem or comprehensive social system and must be understood in those
conditions.
“Rules and belief systems are coded into structural distinctions and roles;
structures incorporate-instantiate- institutional elements. As with cultural carriers,
some structural forms are widely shared across many organizations, creating
structural isomorphism (similar forms) or structural equivalence (similar relations
among forms)” (Scott, 1995, p.54). Structural forms are produced by repeated
human activity over a period of time (Berger & Luckman, 1966; Giddens, 1984;
Mouritsen & Skaerbaek, 1995). Social order exists as individuals take action,
interpret those actions and create a shared social reality with others (Berger &
Luckman, 1966; Scott, 1987). At the same time, the structures become
institutionalized and affect the decisions of those leading organizations (Parsons,
1956).
A community of organizations coevolve in relation to their environment.
“New institutional theory argues that, by belonging to or entering into an
organizational field, an organization becomes exposed to pressures to adopt certain
patterns of behavior in order to achieve legitimacy and obtain resources” (Borum &
Westenholz, 1995, p. 114). Borum and Westenholz (1995) argue that the models
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within an organizational field can be varied and contradictory. The effect of
institutionalized practices on organizations or organizational fields has been
explained in terms of congruity of financial reporting practices (Mezias, 1995),
adopting web sites (Flanagin, 2000), creating norms in venture finance (Suchman,
1995), and adoption of civil service reforms (Tolbert & Zucker, 1983).
Two broad levels of institutional agents are the nation-state, or government
that represents it at various levels, and professional occupations (DiMaggio &
Powell, 1983; Scott, 1987, 1995). The State exercises power over organizations in
a number of ways: laws, distributing key resources, imposing taxes, and enforcing
regulations. DiMaggio & Powell (1983) term this as ‘coercive isomorphism’
because it results from formal pressures exerted by other organizations, in this
instance the government, on which they are dependent. “The existence of a
common legal environment affects many aspects of an organization’s behavior and
structure” (p. 150).
The second level is the professions, which influence through normative
control and cognitive processes. These processes define not only what is
acceptable, but also the nature of reality and the meanings assigned to it (Scott,
1995). The professions influence organizations within their organizational field.
DiMaggio and Powell (1983) define organizational field as “those organizations
that, in the aggregate, constitute a recognized area of institutional life: key
suppliers, resource and product consumers, regulatory agencies, and other
organizations that produce similar services or products” (p. 148) or another way to
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define organizational field is a “set of interacting groups, organizations and
agencies rooted around a common substantive interest” (Aldrich, 1999, p.49). This
organizational level of isomorphism can happen for three reasons: uncertainty
causes the organization to mimic other organizations, second, the need to
professionalize a field creates defined conditions and methods of work, and, finally,
an organization is seeking legitimization in its field.
So, change in organizations often occurs because of isomorphic forces:
"... highly structured organizational fields provide context in which individual
efforts to deal rationally with uncertainty and constraint often lead, in the
aggregate, to homogeneity in structure, culture, and output" (DiMaggio & Powell,
1983, p. 147). Early adopters of innovations might choose to adopt for
organizational effectiveness or improvement, but later those innovations are
adopted by other organizations for reasons of legitimacy rather than performance
measures. Tolbert and Zucker (1983) found that “as an increasing number of
organizations adopt a program or policy, it becomes progressively institutionalized,
or widely understood to be a necessary component of rationalized organizational
structure. The legitimacy of the procedures themselves serves as the impetus for
the later adopters” ( p. 35). For example, Flanagin (2000) found that social
pressures from other similar organizations were important distinctions between
organizations that had adopted web sites versus those who were nonadopters.
“Legitimation justifies the institutional order by giving a normative dignity to its
practical imperatives” (Berger & Luckman, 1966, p.93). It is important for an
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organization to be legitimate within its “subsystem” or organizational field
(Parsons, 1956; Tolbert & Zucker, 1983).
At the same time, how organizations respond to the institutionalized
environment is not always mimetic. It can be dependent on the varied
characteristics of the organization (Scott, 1995), their willingness for risk (Kondra
& Hinings, 1998) or the novelty of the problem facing them (Suchman, 1995). The
differences between individual organizations in a given field might have stronger
influence in earlier stages of adoption than later (Scott, 1995; Tolbert & Zucker,
1983). Oliver (1991) explains that organizations can respond to institutional
pressures by acquiescing or they can buffer their response by other forms of
avoidance, manipulating and compromising. This bottom-up approach shows how
organizations have agency to affect the institutionalized norms or processes; the
organization is empowered in its response to the pressures (DiMaggio & Powell,
1991; Kondra & Hinings, 1998; Lant & Baum, 1995; Suchman, 1995).
Besides organizational agency, individuals can also have agency within the
organization. What role does the individual have within the institutionalized forces
of an organization? This debate can be broadly defined between economic models,
which believe individuals have a lot of agency to make choices while they work for
productivity and efficiency, and sociological models, which view human behavior
as a result of social structures which shape and limit their behavior (Knudsen,
1995). Beckert (1999) explains the dilemma between institutional theory and the
place of interest-driven behavior such as ‘ strategic agency’ within an organization.
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He reconciles the institutional forces with human agency with the mitigating factor
of uncertainty. If institutional forces are strong, and uncertainty is low, then
organizational actors feel more freedom to promote change or to be strategic. On
the other hand, if uncertainty is high and outcomes are unknown, actors will be
more likely to follow institutional norms for the stability. Many use structuration
theory, developed by Giddens (1979; 1984), to show how individuals can still have
agency within a structure (Beckert, 1999; Mouritsen & Skaerbaek, 1995; Scott,
1995). Social identity “... helps explain the basis for agency - individuals
purposefully acting in pursuit of their interests - rather than meekly submitting to
the constraints of the surrounding social structure” (Scott, 1995, p.24).
Structuration will be discussed in more detail in later sections.
Institutional theory can explicate some of the nuances of coevolution,
especially in the areas of variation, selection and retention. Aldrich (1999) explains
a number of these connections. First, variations can be introduced from external
origins, such as the environment or other organizations, and then copied or
imitated. Variations are “generated as organizations are forced to respond to,
adapt to, or imitate the ebb and flow of normative and regulatory currents in their
environments” (p. 49).
Selection forces are a result of regulatory influences, established norms, and
cultural elements. They “involve conformity to external norms, constituted and
sustained by political actors in organizational fields” (Aldrich, 1999, p.49). This
leads back to the argument of mimetic and normative forces that influence the
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organization to select similar options to other organizations within their field which
decreases uncertainty and increases legitimacy.
These selections will then be retained through the “transmission of shared
understandings” that are often taken-for-granted. Organizational “forces such as
socialization and charismatic leadership promote the transmission of shared
meaning, increasing the likelihood of the successful daily reproduction of the
organization” (p. 51). This retention often seems as if it is the only choice due to
institutional forces. Flanagin (2000) found that the single most important factor in
separating organizational adopters from nonadopters, relating to web sites, was
institutional pressure. If the organization believed other organizations in similar
fields had a web site, than they were more likely to have a web site. The
institutionalism is then perpetuated as decisions are made to retain certain
structures, processes or technologies. For example, Van de Ven & Garud (1994)
found that institutional rules were persistent after retention (or rule-following
events) happened in the development of the cochlear implant, a device to restore
hearing. This leads to the first research question.
Research Question 1: At the system level, how do institutionalfactors affect the
coevolution of organization, environment and technology?
Access. Another way to understand the coevolution of environment,
organization and technology is the changing access landscape. Dutton (1999), in
Society on the Line, argues that ICTs shape access to information, people, services
and technologies. In most cases, it is broadening access in new ways, which relates
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to offering more variations to choose from in the coevolutionary process. New
variations are a result of changing access at a number of levels. First, these
changes can be examined at the community level, i.e. evolving levels of access
across an industry, which affect overall industry practices or norms. It can also be
examined at the organizational level, e.g. new levels of access to people and
information within an organization.
At the system level, the use of ICTs has the potential to restructure an
industry based on the changing access to information, people, services, and
technology. First, access to information can drastically change overcoming barriers
of time and space. Dutton critiques the idea of the ‘Information Society’ by Bell
because the need or importance of information has not changed, it is the access to
information that has changed. For example, in the finance industry information
about company forecasts and ratings has always been important. With new ICTs,
such as the Internet, people outside of the finance sector could also have access to
that information. The importance has not changed, but rather access. The ability to
have access and control the information is key and ‘information politics’ develop
around the negotiation between producers, distributors, and users of information.
The second area of change involves the ability for people to use ICTs to not only
provide access to more people, but also to “change patterns of interaction between
people, communities, and organizations” (p. 6). It can influence whom we meet,
stay in touch, or with whom we disconnect. We are also influenced to either
consume new services and products (e.g. Mp3s) or to consume them in new ways.
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Finally, access to particular technologies evolves. For example, we need a
computer and connection to use the Internet to have access to other computers.
Factors that shape teleaccess include “economic resources and constraints,
ICT paradigms and practices, conceptions and responses of users, geography of
space and place, and institutional arrangements and public policy” (p. 8). This can
be a reciprocal process. These larger environmental factors shape teleaccess, but
teleacces reshapes the environment. Rifkin (2000), in the Age of Access, attempts
to explain the effect of new communication technology on the larger environment.
He argues that society is restructuring itself from a relationship with property to
that of access. Technology is increasingly important because it can provide access
to the commodified experiences that are becoming our culture. “Access is, after all,
about distinctions and divisions, about who is to be included and who is to be
excluded” (p. 15). Beyond that, it is also about types of experiences that one has
access. Access is a paradigm that accounts for both technological and social
dynamics of new communication technologies.
Research Question 2: At the system level, how does the changing access landscape
in the finance industry affect the coevolution of organization, environment and
technology?
At the system level, chapter four will focus on larger environmental,
industry and institutional issues in the finance industry. I will expand on the
evolving industry as it responds to new technologies. But, this is only half the
story. Coevolution can also happen at the organizational level in relation to ICTs.
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Organizational level
At the organizational level, the coevolution of ICT adoption and
implementation can be understood through its effect on organizational form and
access. The adoption and use of ICTs, or selection and retention of a specific ICT,
at this level are influenced by social factors including actors (e.g. management) as
well as organizational policy. The structuration perspective offers a compelling
framework to understand the coevolution of these factors.
Structuration. The structuration perspective (Giddens, 1979; 1984)
explains society as a structuring process between human action and the structures
they interact with and recreate. “The concept of structuration involves that of the
duality of structure, which relates to the fundamentally recursive character of social
life, and expresses the mutual dependence of structure and agency” (Giddens, 1979,
p.69). Duality of structure means that the properties of structure are both the
medium and outcome of the practices. Structures are not viewed as static entities
that confine actors, but rather as “rules and resources” which affect human action
but are also being reinvented or reinforced through this action. They are both
enabling and constraining at the same time. Rules are general ‘formulae’ or
conventions which “specify constitutive features of conduct to which they relate”
and they are also sanctioned (Giddens, 1989, p.255). So, they relate to both the
construction of meaning and the “normative sanctioning of conduct” (p. 255).
Action is situated in time-space intersection: “’Action’ or agency, as I use it, thus
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does not refer to a series of discrete acts combined together, but to a continuous
flow of conduct” (Giddens, 1979, p. 55).
Giddens (1984) distinguishes three structural ‘dimensions’ of social
systems: signification, domination and legitimation. Structures of signification deal
with symbolic orders and modes of discourse. Structures of domination and
‘power’ are inherent in social associations, as well as dealing with resource
authorization (people) and allocation (goods). Political and economic institutions
are the domain of structures of domination. Third, structures of legitimation are
built around normative regulation and deal with legal institutions. Signification is
always connected to both domination and legitimation.
Although not initially an organizational theory, structuration offers a
lens to view the interplay between organizational structures, ICTs and human
agency (S. R. Barley, 1986, 1990; Gerardine DeSanctis & Poole, 1994; Orlikowski,
1992). Barley and Tolbert (S. Barley & Tolbert, 1997) propose linking
institutionalism with structuration to further both theories. They see
institutionalization as a structuring process that can be empirically studied through
charting actions and recording scripts. Banks and Riley (1993) argue that
structuration theory can be used as an ontology for all communication research.
Within the organization, examples of rules and resources include established
communication patterns, organizational knowledge or norms of a specific industry.
These affect the action of individuals in the organization who then reproduce these
structural practices. ICTs within the organization are an ‘occasion for structuring’
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(S. R. Barley, 1986) the interaction of human agency and organization. Barley
(1986; 1990) found that when medical imaging devices were implemented in
different radiology departments, social factors influenced differing structural
outcomes. He proved that technology does not have direct, predictive effects on
organizations; rather the effects are mediated by social factors including patterns of
action, interaction and organizational structures.
In relation to this, the implementation of ICT can be viewed as part of the
structuration process, while the technology is also affected by the structures
(Gerardine DeSanctis & Poole, 1994). DeSanctis and Poole (1994; Poole &
DeSanctis, 1990) develop adaptive structuration theory based on Gidden’s original
work as an approach to understand the role of ICTs in organizational change. They
take a ‘soft-line deterministic’ approach in which technology has structures but
their effects are moderated by social action. Both technology and organizations
have structures which interplay with human action. They make the distinction that
technologies can be used faithfully, in line with the original intent, or ironically,
using them in unintended ways. Others have used this theory to understand
individuals’ adoption of group decision support systems (Contractor, Seibold, &
Heller, 1996).
Orlikowski (1992) complicates the model by offering the insight that
beyond a duality of structure, there is also a duality of technology. By this she
means technology is physically constructed but also socially constructed by actors
through different meanings applied to the technology or varying uses of it. Over
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time, technology tends to become reified and joins the structural properties of the
organization. In her model, technology is a product of human action which also
facilitates human action. There are institutional or organizational properties which
influence human action in these realms while the interaction with technology
influences institutional properties.
In later work, Orlikowski proposes a continuation of this perspective by
proposing “an extension to the structurational perspective on technology that
develops a practical lens to examine how people, as they interact with a technology
in their ongoing practices, enact structures which shape their emergent and situated
use of that technology” (Orlikowski, 2000, p. 404). She develops the idea that
human action should be the place to start in understanding use of technology.
Users enact emergent structures, sometimes contradictory to the inscribed ways of
using technology, by repeated interactions.
It might seem initially that coevolutionary theory and structuration cannot
work together. Giddens was openly critical of evolutionary theories which place
too much emphasis on structures which are constraining to human agency
(Giddens, 1984). In the debate about the relative strength of structure versus
agency, Giddens attempts to resolve this by moving from a static theory to a
dynamic theory - one in which action is structured and reproduced through the
action (Thompson, 1989). Aldrich (1999), in Organzations Evolving, addressed
Gidden’s criticisms. He wrote that Giddens was referring to older Darwinistic
evolutionary theory. New ‘coevolutionary’ theory also takes a dynamic approach in
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which outcomes are not predictable. It allows for agency, from the organization or
individual, in response to variation by selecting and retaining one option over
another. Mutual interdependence is a characteristic of both theories - institutions
influence each other. These theories actually work well together because
coevolutionary theory is very broad and can be applied at a macro level.
Structuration helps to explicate the specifics of mutual influence within a specific
situation. Windeler and Sydow (2001) use structuration to build a coevolutionary
approach to understand the changing German Television Industry. From this
perspective, organizational forms (e.g. networks) coevolve with industries (such as
the TV industry). Organizational form is also important at the organizational level;
structural aspects across organizational forms offer insight into the structuring
process of organization and technology.
Organizational Form. Organizational forms are structures that are
consistent across organizations (Fulk & DeSanctis, 1995). There has been a new
focus on the transformation of traditional bureaucratic forms to post-bureaucratic,
post-industrial, global networked organization, virtual organizations, and
adhocracies, to name a few. Some of the key similarities between these new forms
are a decrease in hierarchy, an increase in horizontal coordination (Fulk &
DeSanctis, 1995), more interactive dialogic processes (influence rather than power)
(Heckscher, 1994) and diffuse boundaries (Monge & Contractor, 2000). Many of
these factors are automatically associated with new communication technologies,
not that ICTs predictably cause these but rather as enabling. In response to varied
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environmental pressures, including an increasingly global environment, economic
pressures, quicker business cycles, and rapidly evolving business environments
new organizational forms need to be more flexible and responsive.
Dutton (1999) characterizes the literature around technology and
organizational form with three perspectives: technological, organizational and
emergent. The technological perspective focuses on the ways in which
technologies enable change in organizational form, e.g. telephone enables
distributed form of organizing. While this is a popular line of research, Winter &
Taylor (1996) strongly caution against taking technological deterministic views
with organizational forms. Given that the research in technology and
organizational structure seem to point to strong social influences, this should also
be taken into account for organizational forms. They also suggest looking at
political, economic and social causes. These would all affect how ICTis
incorporated into the organization and then conversely how it affects organizational
form through access to different people, information and services.
An example of ICTs allowing for a new organizational form is the
‘networked’ organization (Monge & Fulk, 1999). Networks can also emerge
within the organization rather than being imposed by formal organization. External
network ties to organizations often transcend national boundaries and are more
flexible in their development and dissolution. They rely heavily on the availability
of ICTs. Both internal and external networks are governed by mutual trust, respect
and mutual investment in outcome rather than power or reward systems.
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Networked organizations are based on sophisticated information technology
infrastructure.
From the organizational perspective, the focus is on how new ICTs are
designed or customized to match organizational forms. For example, to support a
matrix structure of organizing dual reporting and workflow systems were created.
More examples of this will be presented in the discussion of the ‘knowledge
company’ and knowledge management.
The third perspective is labeled ‘emergent’ and fits in with a structurational
approach: new ICTs create new options for organizational design, and new designs
affect technology adoption and design. Change unfolds in unpredictable ways due
to organizational and technical factors. This interplay involves the structuring of
form by technology and vice versa.
The design of an organization influences the use of ICTs since managers
often implement systems that promise to strengthen existing structures and
processes. However, ICTs also create a variety of new options for radically
redesigned organizations and interactions between organizations, such as
the ‘virtual organization’... (p. 9)
These general theoretical underpinnings become more concrete by exploring
specific aspects of organizational form that are affected and affect ICTs.
According to Fulk and DeSanctis (1995) ICTs can affect four dimensions of
organizational form: organizational size, scope and product, vertical control,
horizontal control, and types of connection. The first dimension is organizational
size, scope and product. Examples of potential technology effects include reduced
size of the organization, outsourcing certain functions or the rise information
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products. Organizations of larger size need increased coordination. “One of the
effects of an increase in size of an organization is that the benefits of enhanced
synergy and greater specialization come at the cost of increased management, co
ordination and communication overhead” (White, Deakin, Gouma, & Rada, 1997,
p.203). Although, increased size does not have predictable effects (Daft, 1992).
The trend in downsizing, often associated with new forms, is an attempt “to
combine the flexibility of small organizations with the resource base of a large
organization” (White et al., 1997, p.204).
The second dimension of form is vertical control. Often power is debated in
terms whether ICT centralizes or decentralizes decision making and power.
Research in this area seemed to support both perspectives. After there were no
clear signs either way, some hypothesized that technology actually just reinforced
the power structure that already existed.
Bloomfield and Coombs (1992) summarize the research and debate in this
area and posit that it is not a question of technology encouraging only
decentralization or centralization. Basically, ICTs have the capability of doing
both in the organization simultaneously. For example, new information technology
could allow for the dispersion of information that allows for more local decision
making, but also provide a way for headquarters to monitor all of the activity. It
both decentralizes and centralizes. The dynamics within the organization and the
capabilities of the technology must be taken into account to understand how and
where it might centralize or decentralize activities.
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Others have found that management will actually choose technology that already
supports or reinforces the form or power structure in place (Danziger, Dutton,
Kling, & Kraemer, 1982).
Tied in with the idea of centralization/decentralization is that of control.
The debate between ICTs as extensions of control and increasing surveillance
(Beniger, 1986) versus ICTs as democratizing forces, usually errs by giving too
much credit to the technology itself, invoking deterministic arguments. These
outcomes are not predictable because there is unequal ability for different actors’
attempt to shape ICTs to serve their interests, social choices are usually made or
influenced by a number of different actors or groups, and the ability for technology
alone to bring about these changes is probably over exaggerated (W. Dutton, 1999).
In The Control Revolution, Shapiro (1999) explains that while the Internet gives
individuals more control over information and other aspects of their life, those in
power will resist this revolution. “Politicians and companies extol the new
individual control, yet act instinctively in ways that deprive us of it” (p. 64).
Communication networks, historically, were infrastructures of control (for
example, the postal network of the Roman Empire). The information society,
based on the exchange of information through networks, instigates central
questions of control over ‘processes and flow’ of information (Mulgan, 1991).
ICTs are potential conduits as well as outcomes of control within organizations.
The third dimension deals with horizontal coordination. This includes
working electronically in increasingly virtual environments, ranging from meetings
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supported by ICTs (Poole & DeSanctis, 1990) to distributed work (W. Dutton,
1999) to telework (Riley, Mandavilli, & Heino, 2000). Because of these types of
organizing, trust has become a renewed area of research (Brown & Duguid, 1998;
Fulk et al., 2003-revise & resubmit). In any work team, trust is important, but it is
developed differently in virtual groups. Also, trust in the technology system itself
becomes important.
An aspect of horizontal coordination is collaboration, both within the
organization and inter organizationally. Many have looked at ICTs as a way to
increase information and collaboration within the organization (Fulk et al., 2003-
revise & resubmit; White et al., 1997). Collaboration is an important aspect of
group work and involves communication and sharing. “Computer-supported
cooperative work... .emphasizes issues such as interpersonal communication and
co-ordination” (White et al., 1997, p.207).
Coordination is not just about coordinating activity but also information and
knowledge. Often this is referred to as knowledge management. Ideally, “existing
structures are eventually reorganized so that new knowledge is integrated better. In
the metaphor, organizational productivity is challenged by innovation, which,
following transformation, will eventually lead to greater productivity” (White et al.,
1997, p.201).
Knowledge management literature supports a technological and
organizational view of ICTs and organizational form. The technological view
shows how new technologies allow for a ‘networked’ organization in which people
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can share information, best practices, and communicate with each other more easily
(Brown & Duguid, 1998; Teece, 1998). Drucker (1998) explains in The Coming o f
the New Organization, that information technology lies behind the changes of the
flatter, empowered organization. On the other hand, organizations who want to
become a “knowledge company” seek out technology that will support this, such as
information decision systems, best practices databases and so on (Davenport &
Klahr, 1998; O'Dell & Grayson, 1998; Ruggles, 1998). For example, John Seely
Brown (1998), director of the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC),
documents how researchers at PARC create new technologies to support innovation
and learning at all levels.
Many of the examples and case studies have focused on communication
technologies to add to knowledge sharing/management, but these studies have
focused on more collaborative environments in which companies are actively
supporting knowledge sharing. For example, O’Dell and Grayson (1998) share that
Chevron created a Best Practices Sharing Database and TI changed reward
structures to support collaboratioa When new communication technologies are
implemented into internally competitive environments, especially within the
organization (e.g. the finance industry), the perception and use of these ICTs is
different. The management goal might be to share information and increase
coordination but individualistic reward structures and other social factors affect
how the technology is truly used. There is a need for further research to understand
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the competitive individualistic environment and its reaction to new ICTs within the
organization.
The fourth dimension of organizational form is the types of connection
available, particularly between organizations (Fulk & Desanctis, 1995). An
increase in strategic alliances, electronic connections along the value change
(enabled by EDI) and increased collaboration in research and development are
examples of potential transformations in organizational forms.
Research question 3: At the organizational level, how do aspects o f organizational
form and ICTs structure each other?
Access. Dutton’s (1999) theory of access can also be understood at the
organizational level. A combination of organizational form and dualistic aspects of
technology affect how people access people, information, services and technology
through the organization. It not only affects how access changes, but the
interpretation and perception of this change. For example, is access to a more
diverse set of people viewed as enabling (more resources), or as a burden, (more
people to whom you must respond)? Is access to more information empowering or
a part of information overload?
Research question 4: At the organizational level, how do issues of access and ICTs
structure each other?
Social influence. As the implementation of technology offers the
opportunity to restructure organizational forms, it is also structured by
organizational forms and the members within the organization. One way to
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understand how the implementation and use of ICTs is affected by social factors is
through the theory of social influence. Fulk et al. (1990) develop the social
influence model of technology and organizational change. They focus on the idea
that actors choose to use or not to use media in certain ways based on the social
influence of others around them. The way people view ICTs is socially
constructed; rationality can be subjective and retrospective. The influence could be
direct communication about the technology or learning by observing others. They
also might act and then justify their behavior later, using retrospective sensemaking
(Weick, 1995).
Fulk (1993) and Fulk, Schmitz and Schmidt (1990) conducted research on
the social influence model on the use of e-mail in a petrochemical company. In the
first study they use the exogenous variables of technological experience (measured
as computer experience, e-mail experience and keyboard skills) and social
influence (measured as supervisor’s and coworkers’ use and usefulness) to predict
their perceptions of media richness which mediates employees’ e-mail use. They
found that there were variances on the perception of media richness due to
keyboard skills but not because of amount of e-mail use. The social influence of
coworkers and supervisor was for the most part found to be significant in media
usefulness, media use and perceptions of media richness.
In a second study, they found that influences of the workgroups (all the
people who reported to the same supervisor) were still significant above and
beyond the influences of the ego network (5 people that the individual
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communicated most with using any media). She attributes this to a different form
of social pressure, specifically conformity to the work group. Flanagin (2000)
furthered this research by looking at social influence on the organizational level in
regard to organizations that did or did not adopt web sites. Social influence was
important for adopters, but not for those who had not adopted a web site yet.
Perhaps they had already resisted that pressure, so the other social factors are more
important to them. Flanagin posits that social influence might be most important
when the situation is still ambiguous and the innovation is really new - after that,
perceived benefits might be a better predictor or organizational behavior.
Research question 5: At the organizational level, how does social influence affect
the structuration of ICTs within the organization?
Organizational policy is another social factor influence the implementation
of new ICTs.
Policy. Finally, policy can be seen as both a structuring aspect of the
organization and social influence on its members. They are a specific part of the
rules that structure organizational activity. “Rules generate - or are the medium of
production and reproduction - of practices” (Giddens, 1979, p. 67). Rules expressed
overtly are ‘codified interpretations’ of rules (Giddens, 1984). Policy development
within an organization falls under 'rules' as something that builds the structure.
Policy around ICTs can be understood at two levels: public/national or
organizational. At the national level, much research has been done to understand
the influence of public policy on ICTs (Bar, Cohen et al., 2000; W. Dutton, 1999;
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Mansell, 1996; Stein & Sinha, 2002). Using the coevolutionary approach, Baum
and Singh (1994) explain the mutual influence between public policy and
regulation and organizations. “Public policy is intended to, and does, shape
organizational actions but is, in turn, shaped by the lobbying efforts of
organizations and their agent.” (p. 399). This level of analysis focuses on the
interplay between environment and organizational use of ICTs.
The second level of analysis is policy created within organizations.
Obviously, this policy has very direct effects on the organization, but is also more
varied between organizations and more difficult to understand all of its
consequences. This is the arena in which many issues are actually played out within
the organization. Therefore, it is important to understand the process of developing
technology policy, implementing policy and its affects on the perception and use of
communication technologies within the organization. This process is often
recursive, in which policy affects users and users then affect changes in the policy.
As opposed to research in public policy, the development of organizational policy
has not been thoroughly researched or developed theoretically.
Creating technology policy within organizations is usually strongly connected to
the overall strategy of the organization (Maidique & Patch, 1988). Technology
policy deals both with the extent that an organization pursues technological change
on a strategic level (Lefebvre, Mason, & Lefebvre, 1997) and on a micro level, how
new technology is implemented in the organization. According to Parker (2000),
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the closer the fit between strategy and technological choices will increase the
chance of positive organizational outcomes.
The process of policy making is not always transparent and linear:
“...behind the steps of policy making is a nonlinear sequence of parallel
overlapping events” (Stevenson & Greenberg, 1998, p.759). This involves what
Dutton (1999) would term ‘information politics.’ Determinants of policy
development include management perceptions of external environment, structure of
the organization, and strategy (Lefebvre et al., 1997). Van den Ende & Oost (2001)
found a number of factors that influenced policy around the use of office
technology: economic depression, legislation and conservative attitude of
management. The process of policy-making is not entirely rational; management
needs strong analysis but they also rely on intuition and ‘soft speculation’ in
making decisions about new policy (Mintzberg, 1976).
More specifically, the policy created around technology has a specific niche
within the organization. “The enactment of technology policy is observed through
specific realized innovative efforts in the form of R&D investments, adoption of
computer-based administrative or production applications and technological
monitoring, all of which are aimed at improving the firm’s products or processes.
In turn, these efforts contribute to the organization’s performance” (Lefebvre et al.,
1997, p. 857). Support for new policies is related to the amount of involvement
members have in the change process (Schwochau, Delaney, & Jarley, 1997).
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This process of creating technology policy, or rules, is a part of the
structuring of technology and the organization. Members enact and react to policy,
both reinforcing it and recreating it with their actions. This process within the
organization has not been closely researched in the past.
Research question 6: At the organizational level, how does organizational policy
andlCT implementation structure each other?
In chapter five, I will expand on the implementation of ComputerSystem, a
new ICT within BrokerHouse, and policy created around this new technology,
specifically focusing on privacy issues. The process of policy creation and
enforcement can be understood through the structuration and coevolutionary lenses.
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Methodology
This research is based on a case study, grounded in qualitative data and
analysis, to understand issues around the implementation of ICTs in organizations.
Brokerhouse is a large top-10 financial firm, with over 16,000 employees, and they
were only offered company access to e-mail and the Internet for the first time in
1999. This offered a perfect scenario to study the implementation of ICTs in a
company that was essentially a late adopter. This chapter includes justification for
using qualitative data and methods for data collection and analysis. Then, I
introduce the specific case to set the stage for further results.
Qualitative Case Study
Due to the different outcomes in past research about communication
technologies and itsr effects, some exploratory work still needs to be accomplished
in this area. There are many factors that affect the adoption and use of a
communication and information system in an organization which need to be further
explored. The purpose of this study was to glean from those participants involved
in the use of a newly implemented ICT the factors that affect not only their use, but
also their perceptions of the technology. Qualitative methods, and specifically case
studies, are appropriate for exploration as they allow the participants to voice what
is important to them rather than focusing on preset hypotheses; Yin (1994) also
makes the argument that case studies are also appropriate in descriptive and
explanatory research. This research also fulfills the three requirements for case
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study research: a focus on ‘how’ and ‘why’ research questions, no control over
behavioral events and a focus on contemporary events (Yin, 1994).
This method falls under ‘naturalistic inquiry’ in that it is the study of things
in their natural environment (Rudestam & Newton, 1992), also referred to as field
research. It also uses an inductive approach which draws from specific
observations to reflect broader patterns or themes that emerge from the data. This
research did not have apriori hypotheses but is rather motivated by more general
research questions (Rudestam & Newton, 1992).
This has led to a qualitative study design - gathering data from employees
in 2 offices in a large financial company that participated in the study, as they
transitioned from an older to a new communication and information system. The
use of interview, observation and focus group data allowed me the opportunity to
explore the participants’ views of the technology and the factors that were specific
to their situation. Qualitative data provide “a source of well-grounded, rich
descriptions and explanations of processes in identifiable local contexts” (Miles &
Huberman, 1994, p.l).
Two methodological decisions that must be made to understand any sort of
change: 1) how many levels of analysis and 2) which processes should be included
and which excluded (Pettigrew et al., 2001). I chose to collect data at the
environmental level, the organizational level and the individual level.
Environmental level data include historical analysis of press articles, SEC reports,
and statistics of the state of financing and changes at that time period. At the
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organizational level, I collected official documents about policy around the new
technology, interviewed top decision makers in the organization, and observed
important meetings about the new technology. At the individual level I conducted
focus groups and interviews of the employees. In deciding which processes to
include, I focused on change around the implementation of CS (the new ICT) at the
organizational level and individual level. This included the rollout, the policy
around its implementation, and individual use and perceptions.
Although interview data are not correlated perfectly with behavior, and may
suffer from recall bias, they are used because the specific individual’s
understanding and perception of their interaction with CS is an important part of
understanding the implementation and use. This narrative analysis is valid because
the focus is on the individual creation of reality (Berger & Luckman, 1966) and
‘sensemaking’ (Weick, 1995) of their experience. This is documented through the
use of 'thick description,’ which helps to untangle hierarchies of meaning behind
language and action (Geertz, 1973). Language can be viewed as “constructing
social and organizational reality” (Heracleous & Barrett, 2001, p. 755). An example
of this research includes Stevenson & Greenbergs’ (1998) analysis of the narratives
around organizational change dealing with conflict with an environmental issue.
This narrative analysis gives insight into the nonlinear sequence of events behind
the policy formation. It attempts to capture the “divergent, multiple, parallel
sequences of individual actions” (p. 741) instead of collapsing them into a more
abstract series of steps. This example, and above explanations, provide
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justification for pursuing a case study with qualitative methods to further explore
my research questions about ICTs in organizations. Next, I will explain more
specifically my data collection and analysis.
Data Collection
BH rolled out CompSyst (CS), nationwide, from 1997 - 2000. Two offices
in a metropolitan area were chosen to participate in this research study. The actual
offices are to be kept anonymous and therefore will be labeled Large Office (LO)
and Smaller Office (SO). The Large Office was located in a metropolitan area and
had approximately 120 employees located across 2 floors. The Smaller Office was
located in a more suburban area and had approximately 40-50 employees located
on a larger part of one office floor. The total time spent in LO was 6 months, with
a break in December. The total time spent in SO was 5 months with a break in
July.
I used a stratified sampling method to cover different levels of the
organizational hierarchy and to cover different departments within the company.
Within the stratified sampling, I relied on snowball and convenience sampling,
based on recommendations from my site coordinators, to choose individuals to
participate. I sampled those in management in the corporate office in charge of the
entire rollout, management in each office, employees of each function of the office
(financial planners, support staff and operations), and finally trainers responsible
for the rollouts within offices. The limitation of a snowball sample is that it is not
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random, and therefore could have some bias. Given the culture of the organization,
it was the best method available to find participants willing to be honest and talk.
A total of 4 focus groups (Appendix E), between 30 - 50 minutes, were
conducted. Focus groups had 2-6 participants and were used to illicit general
perceptions and responses to the technology. From these focus groups, specific
interview questions were developed. Focus groups consisted of Financial Advisors
(brokers) and Client Services Associates (CSA) in both LO and SO. Most of the in
depth research came from semi-structured interviews (Appendix A-D) with 28
employees, 12 from LO and 14 from SO and 2 from Corporate. Most of the
interviews were 15 - 45 minutes and were conducted before and after the rollout of
CS.
Interviews were comprised of employees:
• External to offices: Corporate Executives & Trainers
• Internal to offices: Managers, Branch Technology Liasons (BTLs), Financial
Advisors, Client Services Associates, and Operations
The final research method was observation within the offices and at training
meetings. This includes noting communication and activity about CS.
Observations included general office activity, meetings and training for 5 to 6
months in each office (before, during and after implementation).
Role o f researcher. As the researcher is the “measurement device” (Miles
& Huberman, 1994) it is important to understand the role of the researcher. I
collected data as an observer participant, which is a “double-edged” notion because
it assumes an involvement, as well as a distance, in the field studied. I was a
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researcher outside of the organization, not an internal member, but I was privy to
sit in on many meetings and generally observe the action of the office. I became a
regular, weekly, part of the office and developed friendly relationships with many
of the employees. The line between researcher and participant becomes more
blurred when you become more a part of the environment happenings. This can
allow for a better ‘inside’ perspective, but also muddies an idea of the unbiased
observer. Van Maanan (1988) acknowledges that ‘representing’ another culture or
people is always affected by the fieldworker’s own style, interpretations and
position of power.
As any fieldworker is not neutral (VanMaanan, 1988), it is also important to
acknowledge my perspective and biases as a qualitative researcher. I lean toward a
more subjective view in that organizations and technology are created and
interpreted through human lenses. Therefore, my interviews and observations
focus on how people are creating and interpreting the reality around them. My bias
tends toward a positive view of technology, as something that can enable change in
organizations.
Data Analysis
After the data have been collected, it was analyzed using an interpretivist
approach in grounded theory. Interpretivism is based on the belief that human
communication and action can be analyzed to understand layers of meaning (Miles
& Huberman, 1994). This involves a rich microanalysis of the texts to produce
categories or themes. The relationships between these themes become the
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theoretical groundwork as it also fits into a larger body of knowledge already
known in this area.
Computer-aided analysis. The first step in narrative analysis is to transcribe
all interviews, verbatim, including verbal and nonverbal cues when important. With
computer-aided analysis, they are then loaded into the data analysis software,
Atlas.ti to assist in the organization and analysis. Atlas.ti supports different kinds of
qualitative analysis including content analysis, grounded theory, and
phenomenology, depending on how you want to use it. It does not perform the
analysis but provides organizational supprt. As a researcher, you are the instrument
in qualitative analysis. Atlas.ti does help to organize all of the codes, allow you to
comment on your codes, and to create conceptual networks to build the connections
between codes. This forms the basis of the analysis. Atlas.ti helps perform the
organizational, mundane tasks to allow your brain more freedom and space to focus
on the analysis. These steps are often performed simultaneously - collect data,
analyze, code, create networks, begin developing theory, reanalyze, collect more
data and so on.
Coding. Microanalysis is a concept developed by Straus and Corbin (1998)
and involves many steps, although they are not sequential. First, to ensure privacy,
I assigned each participant a pseudonym to be used in all of the coding and any
reference in future results. Then I began with a careful exposition of the actual
words and phrases participants’ use. This included transcribing all the interviews
verbatim and writing up focus group and observation notes. I reflected upon the
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words, comparing them to similar and different concepts to get a sense for their
properties and dimensions. Then I create a code which focuses on one of the many
the potential variation of meanings. As common themes or interpretations emerge
from the data they are marked and tracked. This is the ‘open coding’ aspect of the
analysis. As this continues, ‘axial coding’ of the same data is also occurring. This
means relating categories and themes to each other - looking for relationships
between themes and connections between micro and macro levels. I began to build
conceptual networks connecting codes together around common themes. From
this, more questions might surface which need further research. At the same time,
tentative propositions are established and then reinforced or discarded as more data
are studied. This systematic and thorough review of the data should then produce
some preliminary ideas that can be tested in further studies.
When coding, it is important to be intentional and thoughtful. Coding schemes
can be bottom-up (e.g., grounded theory), in that codes emerge from the data or
they can be top-down (e.g., content analysis), previously established and then
applied to the data. Another distinction between types of codes is whether they are
factual (well defined, mutually exclusive, indexes, e.g., “male/female”) or
referential (vague categories, overlap, continuous refinement, permeable and
dynamic, e.g., “democrat”) (Woolf, 1999). I used both types of codes; factual
codes, such as ‘broker,’ informed me of the participant’s job position while
referential codes, such as ‘negative response4 , helped to define perceptions and
themes emerging in the data. A third aspect of coding is based purpose: to simplify
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and reduce data or to complicate data by expanding, transforming and
reconceptualizing a concept (Coffey & Atkinson, 1996). I both reduced data, in the
sense of coding common interpretations or reactions across a number of
participants, and then complicated the data by expanding on this code and its
implications for my topic of research. In evaluating the strength of qualitative
research, both reliability and validity must be probed.
Reliability. Reliablity of research refers to the ability of operations of a study to
be replicated under similar circumstances. I developed a research protocol which
would allow others to repeat my methods and I closely documented my interview
schedules. Also, in dealing with replication, researchers must be consistent with
respect to coding criteria so that others could utilize the same coding scheme if they
chose a top-down method of coding (Rudestam & Newton, 1992). Using a
computer based data analysis program allows for this repetition very easily because
it documents the codes as well as personal notes and comments pertaining to the
definition, scope and meaning of the codes. Finally, the reliability of my research
was tested between the two offices settings since data collection was at two
different times. The sampling method, interview questions and observations were
repeated in the second office, with the addition of only a few new interview
questions. The data produced from these operations in the second office was
similar in strength and content, also supporting the reliability of my methods.
Validity. Validity includes both internal and external validity. Internal validity
is the “structural corroboration” (Rudestam & Newton, 1992). Part of internal
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validity for fieldwork is spending sufficient time in the field and gathering data of
sufficient detail (thick description) to support the conclusions. Once again, my
total time was about a year within this organization. Interviewing various
participants across two offices helped to validate the data within the organization.
One way to prove internal validation is to use multiple sources of data, to
‘triangulate’ your findings from different sources. I used focus groups, observation
and interviews to have multiple sources of data. Finally, a last measure of internal
validity is to gather feedback from participants on your findings. This will help
determine how well it ‘rings true’ to those that the research is based on. After my
initial data collection, I created a results paper for BH with my first findings and
impressions. I sent this report to both office managers, the head of technology
training, and made it available for anyone in the offices. In my conversations with
Linda (pseudonym) of technology training, she agreed with my findings and found
them in support of her thought and observations. She reported that the office
managers did not have any issues with my findings. This was further support for
the internal validity of my findings.
The second type of validity is external validity or its generalizability to other
populations or environments. Because case studies are so unique, one critique is
that one sample is not applicable or generalizable to a larger population. The
purpose of case studies is not to be statistical generalizable, but rather to generalize
and expand on theoretical propositions. This is an ‘analytic generalizing’ which
then can be applied to other settings and research situations (Yin, 1994). So, the
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results or theoretical insights generated from my research should be able to be
studied or applied in other organizational settings.
After examining the reasons for a case study, the benefits of qualitative data,
and my data collection and analysis techniques, I want to introduce the field site in
more detail. The case study is embedded in the financial industry and focuses on
BrokerHouse, a strong contender in this industry.
Case Study o f BrokerHouse
The Financial Industry
The finance industry, specifically brokerage firms, is an interesting backdrop in
which to understand the specific access issues around new technology. Aspects of
this industry relevant to this study include new access to trading over the Internet,
its highly regulatory environment, and an intense level of competition.
Internet and trading. The general access of the public to the Internet has
allowed them to access and trade investment information in a way that was not
possible before the Internet. Traditionally, the stock broker or ‘financial planner,’
through their institutions, was the only one who could perform these transactions.
Essentially, now, the ‘middle man’ could be cut out. Given the unprecedented rise
in the stock market over those couple of years, investing increased both through
brokers and through online services. So, access to the ability to trade was expanded
to anyone with an Internet connection, access to information about companies and
their stocks was increasingly available on the Internet, and all this was offered for
less money than using a brokerage firm. This triggered a trend of what was labeled
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‘day trading.’ These were usually smaller investors who would buy and sell on a
daily basis to make small increments of money based on the daily fluctuation of the
market. According to Business Week (Farrell, 1999), online trading volume in the
U.S. increased from approximately 200,000 shares per day in 1998 to almost
600,000 shares per day in 1999.
Similarly, there are also ‘swing traders’ who try to profit from wider moves
in the market over the course of a few days. According to a Bear Steam’s report,
the number of day traders in 2001 holds steady at about 50,000. At the end of 2000
day traders made up about 81% of online trading volume, up from 76% at the end
of 1999 (Schwartz, 2001; Stone, 2001). This has resulted in more volume of trade
overall - increased from 45 million shares per day on the NYSE in 1980 to close to
800 million in 1999 (Farrell, 1999); but, at the same time, smaller increments of
shares per trade. For example, on Nasdaq, since 1996, “the size of the average trade
has dropped 50%, to just under 700 shares” (Schwartz, 2001). Wall Street must
respond to this change.
That's where the Wall Street giants— written off as dinosaurs by e-commerce
gums— have the edge. True, they've been clumsy in using technology; most
are just now letting brokers send e-mails directly to clients. But they're
rapidly adding cybertools to let investors track portfolios and figure out
their own investment mixes. Brokers can monitor the results and follow up
with specific recommendations. ‘It's counterintuitive, but we've found that
when an investor uses a self-service analytic tool, her appetite to talk to her
adviser increases,’ says Martin Hoekstra, group head of markets for UBS
(UBS ), the Swiss parent of UBS BrokerHouse. (McNamee, 2001)
This quotation explains how these financial organizations have been slow to adopt
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communication technology, but are responding quickly to consumer demand for
online portfolio management and trading. Within this fast paced trading
environment, they also must deal with strict regulations.
Regulation. Another aspect of the finance industry is that it is highly regulated
by the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), the Commodity Futures Trading
Commission (CFTC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), which
affects their use of ICT. BH operates in one of the most highly regulated industries
within the United States. The SEC’s primary mission is to “protect investors and
maintain the integrity of the securities markets” (How the SEC protects investors,
maintains market integrity, 1999). The basic laws governing the securities are
based on the premise that investors should have access to basic information about
the investment prior to buying. It also oversees the interactions between
organizations and individuals, including brokers and investment advisors.
Common violations of SEC regulations include insider trading, misrepresentation
of information about securities, and brokers not treating clients fairly. These
regulations are strongly enforced, with 400-500 civil enforcement actions filed
against companies and individuals each year. The SEC regulations are far-reaching
- they affect business interactions and the distribution of information as well as
personal relationships between broker/advisors and clients. For example, a broker
would be in violation of SEC rules if she “guaranteed” a certain return on an
investment. Because of the regulatory environment, brokerage firms monitor
employee communication closely.
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Competition. Finally, this industry is very competitive between organizations,
but also within the organization itself. Each broker considers their clients as ‘their
business,’ even though it is within the context of an organization. They are not
directly competitive internally, but they do work mostly as individual businesses,
rather in teams or groups. For example, this is how one manager described new
trainees ability to be successful on the job:
And then whether or not they make it is. ..there’s criteria. They have
benchmarks. X-number of dollars of production, the amount of money and
assets they have under management during different periods of time. We’ve
recently let a trainee go. And you can kind of tell pretty early on how they
come out, how they come back from Corporate. What their business plan is;
how fast they start showing some production. It’s not an easy thing to do. It’s
tough. It’s really tough. And it’s very tough if you don’t have some contacts.
Previous businesses, people that have been in other industries that have
business contacts, that’s very helpful. Family contacts. If you come in cold,
it’s really hard.
It is obvious that the individual create their business on their own. Their success
depends on the personal business they bring in, not on the overall success of the
company. The individualistic nature of the business is also apparent in this
comment from a financial advisor:
Well, it’s, any Broker will tell you this... (pause) I mean, this is our
business. Broker’s field, this is our business. We don’t really want, we
wanna be able to take it with us when, if we wanna go somewhere else.
And they also, you know it’s kind of like Jerry McGuire when, when you
know I left tomorrow, the whole office (inaudible) manual hand-out of all
my client’s names and say, “Call them and see if they wanna stay,” and I’d
be calling trying to get them to go. The less information that they could get
on me, ideally I wouldn’t even have their phone numbers on there... It’s like
that with any salesmen, if it be a lawyer when you leave you know, does the
Firm keep your clients or you keep your clients? If you’re any type of sales
at all, it’s very much like that.
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The organization is there to support them and give resources, but the individual
must create his/her own business and enough personal production to survive. Of
course, this atmosphere affects how ICTs are conceptualized and used. It is used to
support individual business but is not used as often to support teams or networks.
BrokerHouse
Within the context of the financial industry, BrokerHouse (BH) is one of the
top ten largest full-service securities and commodities firms in the United States.
As the industry enjoyed significant growth, so did BH. It was established in the
late 1800s and, at the beginning of this research, employed over 16,000 people in
approximately 300 offices world-wide. This expanded to about 23,000 employees
in close to 400 offices by the end of 2000. After the research, it had been acquired
by another company so organizational demographics have changed. In general,
their business was doing very well during this period due to the market growth.
Net income in 1997 was approximately$415 million and by 1999 it jumped to
about $630 million; this was the fourth consecutive year of record earnings. These
were increasingly record levels of revenue and income in their entire history.
Similar prosperity was experienced in other companies in this field.
The company focuses on mitigating legal risk through compliance with
government regulations. According to their annual report in 1997, “Violations of
applicable regulations can result in the revocation of broker-dealer licenses, the
imposition of censures or fines, and the suspension or expulsion of a firm, its
officers or employees.” Following compliance significantly affects their policy
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around the implementation and use of ICTs. Due to increased regulatory scrutiny,
they have had to settle a number of different charges from the SEC in the last five
years resulting in millions of dollars of settlements and the firing of top brokers
(Wall Street Journal, no. 22, Jan. 31, 1996).
Company strategy focused on individual affluent investors (versus discount
brokerage firms or small ‘day traders’)- They focused on the quality of investment
advice tailored to meet individual client needs. To continue serving clients well,
they began to focus on improving the information and communication technology
within their firm.
Information and Communication Technology. During the late 1990s, the
Operations, Service and Systems (OSS) division focused on the enhancement and
expansion of their communication and information infrastructure. In this regard,
two major initiatives began in 1997, in which they spent $500 million on
technology. The first was their introduction of a new broker workstation featuring
CompSys (pseudonym), which contains proprietary software for “asset allocation,
relationship and portfolio performance management, and enhanced capabilities for
e-mail, Internet/Intranet browsing, and remote computing” (Annual Report, 1997).
This was the first time that employees officially had access to e-mail and the
Internet at work. The system included new hardware, such as monitors and hard
drives, as well as new software, such as Microsoft Outlook and Internet Explorer.
The entire rollout lasted for 2 years as they transitioned over 300 offices to
Compsys. This is the major focus of this case study. The second initiative revolved
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around offering clients online account information through BH Access
(pseudonym).
The new system they received, CompSys (CS), included both new hardware
and software. The hardware consisted of new computers, keyboards and monitors.
The software systems were more GUI based than previous systems and the
software was better integrated. It also became the only system available, whereas in
past conversions they allowed employees to access older versions of the system if
they wanted. They made many incremental changes to software that provided
different information services. Beside this, two of the most significant new
software programs were Microsoft Outlook, to access electronic mail and to use as
a client database and Internet access through the BrokerHouse Intranet. This
capability opened up many new avenues of information, both financial and
personal. They adopted CS to improve service to clients and increase productivity.
The second ICT, Access, began as a secure web site for clients that allowed
for access to full account information, monitoring of potential investments, and
receiving market summary data and news coverage from Reuters. In the Fall of
1999 they extended Access capabilities to allow clients to actually trade online,
following the lead of other traditional brokerage firms that made similar decisions.
It experienced accelerated growth in 1999 with close to 200,000 client households
subscribed, representing more than $140 billion in assets annually. Its stated
purpose has been to enhance broker-client relationships, not to replace them.
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Conclusion
From this revolutionary time in the financial industry, I gathered data on the
specific implementation of CS within BrokerHouse. This was an important time in
the industry because of the new technology available to the public. It was also an
ideal location for a case study on the implementation of ICTs because their
company had no access to Internet and limited e-mail before this research. From
my data collection, involving focus groups, interviews and observations, I used a
grounded theory approach to analyze this rich corpus of data. This led to the
following two chapters detailing the emerging themes from this data: chapter four
explains coevolutionary changes in the finance industry regarding technology and
chapter five focuses on the issues surrounding the development of policy around
CS within BrokerHouse.
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Coevolution of Environment, Organization and Technology
Coevolution, at the system level, deals with the interaction between the
environment or financial industry, and its players in this instance, the organization,
BrokerHouse and technology. There are two levels of technology in this analysis.
The first is the larger access of the Internet, which affects access for clients to
information and trading capabilities. The second level of technology is CompSys,
the specific system implemented within BH which also affected the brokers access
to communication and information capabilities.
Online Trading Reconfigures the Industry and the Broker
The ability for people to access information about companies online, and to
trade themselves, affected the financial industry, and influenced BrokerHouse to
respond in a number of ways. BH was in the community of “interdependent”
populations (Rosenkopf & Tushman, 1994) of financial organizations (more
specifically other brokerage firms) and its related regulatory bodies. By belonging
to this organizational field or community, they are influenced to conform to
specific patterns of behavior in order to achieve legitimacy (Borum & Westenholz,
1995). The addition of online trading within this community encouraged a new
revenue model and pressured traditional brokerage firms to offer new services.
Also, BrokerHouse, and its employees, began to transform how they thought about
their business and the role of brokers within it. This story answers research
question one about how institutional pressures affect the coevolution of
organization, environment and technology.
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Revenue model. With online trading companies such as E* Trade, Ameritrade
and Charles Schwab clients could now directly invest their money into the stock
market or other financial markets. This changed access to information and services,
as well as put institutional pressures on traditional brokerage firms to adapt. The
online trading companies charged clients a small transaction fee, usually $14.95 to
$29.95. This is a significant difference to the transaction fee usually charged by
traditional brokerage firms based on the price of the stock and the number of
shares. So the more expensive the stock, or the more shares that were traded, the
bigger the commission the broker would receive from that transaction. Online
services lowered the cost of trading significantly to the individual client. Part of the
cost discrepancy was due to the very minimal advice or research offered by online
services. Large financial institutions have research departments that develop
strategies and compile information about companies for their brokers to use to
advise clients. So, they have much greater overhead costs and therefore had to
charge more. Clients were of course attracted to the lower price of online trading.
Theoretically, a client could get an idea from their broker and trade online to reduce
transaction fees.
BH and financial planners responded in a number of ways. BH strategy began
to push toward fee-based revenue model rather than commissions. They knew they
could not compete with the transaction fee, so they went with a fee-based model. In
this model, the client would pay a 1-2 % fee annually or a quarterly fee on their
account and could have unlimited trades or a certain number of trades depending on
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the plan; they were not charged per transaction. This is a shift from a per-trade
transactional fee to an annual percentage. Earnings for brokers are more
predictable under this fee-based model, as it is not based on number of transactions,
which tend to vary more with the market. A stronger base of recurring fee income
steadily increased; in 1997 it increased by about 22%, another 32% from 1997 to
1998 ($921 million in the revenue stream) and from 1998 to 1999 an increase of
54%. This has become an increasingly important portion of BH’s overall
production. One broker in the Small Office summed up the change in this way:
In the firm, it is one of the fastest growing sources of revenue. It’s something
that is not going to be threatened by cheaper commissions. So, there isn’t that
whole issue between is he [the broker] calling me to do a trade because he
needs a paycheck this week? I mean, that whole thing is gone. The whole thing
Is if I’m calling to make a trade it’s because I think it’s going to make their
portfolio grow. All the clients that have used it have been very happy with it
and I like it because I don’t have to worry about losing my trading revenue.
This broker made the point that clients might even trust him more because they
know he is not calling to merely make a transaction so that his revenue increases.
Another broker acknowledged that fee-based profit is a protection against the threat
of online trading and services.
I mean it’s a different business than it was ten years ago. And if they were
smart enough to realize that things are changing and they started to set up
their business for that change than it wouldn’t be a threat. But a lot of them
have not done that and it could..I don’t know. The past few years I have
been transitioning my business to fee based. I don’t think that business is
going to be affected at all. Currently, 50% of my business comes from that
and I would expect that 90% of my business could be coming from that in
the next few years.
This reflects the trend that many brokers were transitioning to this fee based model.
Besides changing the revenue stream, other brokers offered other ways to mitigate
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the threat, presented later in this section. This is a clear example of the coevolution
of the organization as it adopts to Internet technologies which directly affect its
business. Another way the organization evolved was to begin to offer new services
to their clients.
Offer new services. A second way the traditional brokerage firms
responded to the new threat of online trading was to begin offering the service
themselves. This reflects the variance offered by other firms, which forced BH to
respond by selecting new services to offer. The institutional pressures to adapt to
new standards in the environment led BH to offer online trading for their own
clients. This was a huge change in the initial way that brokerage firms responded.
For example, the CEO of Merrill Lynch made very public statements against
E*trade. Later, Merrill Lynch decided to offer online trading through their
company for a $29.95 transaction fee, similar to the online trading companies.
BrokerHouse then followed suit and offered their own online trading services.
Generally, BH employees felt that when Merrill Lynch made this offer they were
‘selling out’ on their brokers. When BH began to offer online trading, the
executives made a concerted effort to show that the broker was still the most
important part of their company; this was not going to reduce the broker’s
importance or their profit. One broker responded in this way: “I like our agenda,
our strategy, better than other firms. It’s clear that BH wants everything to be
through the broker, that the broker is the most important proponent of this whole
thing. With some of the other firms you don’t get the feeling. Right or wrong, if
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you’re on this side of the business you’ll want to believe BH. At Merrill they kind
of feel like they are being phased out in some ways.”
Immediately after BH made their announcement to offer online trading, I
interviewed the brokers in SO for their reactions. They mentioned that other
brokers might feel threatened, but not one said they were personally threatened.
They gave a number of reasons for this: 1. Their clients are fee based (as mentioned
above), 2. Their clients are high-net worth and not the type to use that business, 3.
It will keep some clients in that would leave or do business elsewhere, 4. The
broker’s advice is still the most important aspect of their job and worth the money.
They transformed their job description from gatekeepers, the only ones with access
to perform transactions, to knowledge workers whose value added is in the rational
application of their advice and research.
The first reason brokers were not threatened is that they felt that the type of
client who would use this service was not their clients.
I just think that’s a segment in the market, I’ll never appeal to. Because
people don’t need to do it through me and I went on an appointment last
night with someone. I said, “Look, if you wanna trade those stocks you
trade, don’t do it through me at BrokerHouse, keep your account over there
because I might not be here, when you wanna make that trade or it might
slow down somehow. So you need to do it by yourself and I don’t want
your responsibility for the dumb picks.” And I don’t, I really honestly
believe Rebecca, that people do not make time, money over time by trading
a lot and by owning speculative investments. What the hell do you do
online but speculate?....that’s the segment of the market I’m not gonna deal
with anyway, so, that’s my opinion on that.
This broker was adamant enough to tell his clients that if they wanted to trade
online, then they were not the type of clients he wanted. He felt that ultimately this
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was not beneficial to the client and he did not want to take responsibility for their
failures. Other brokers categorized different types of clients:
By and large, my clients are not affected because my clients are very
wealthy, very busy people. My clients are not the kind of people that are
out there looking for the cheapest execution. They’re looking for
convenience. You know, they shop at Nieman-Marcus through the
catalogue. They don’t go to Mervyn’s.
This broker compares online traders to clients who shop at Mervyns; assuming they
are looking for a cheap price rather than quality or convenience. Comparitively,
the clients who use brokers shop from the catalogue of Nieman-Marcus; this
presumes they have more money and care about quality and convenience. Another
broker explains why it will not affect his business:
You know, I don’t think, I don’t really see it affecting my business, to be
honest with you. I think that’s a select group of people that are going to
want something like that. I think the majority of the people that we have as
clients, or that we’re trying to get as clients, are either retired with a lot of
money and just do not want to be bothered with the whole research, doing
their own research. They’re used to having a broker. They were an
executive when they were working, or they had their own business and they
didn’t have time to do the research. So, they used a broker.
This broker stressed the idea that they provide convenience to the client. Most
clients who are successful and busy do not have time to do the research to do their
own trades. So, he did not feel as though his business would be threatened by
offering online trading.
A second reason why brokers did not feel very threatened is that they felt it
was a necessity to offer online trading to keep the clients that they already have.
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They did not see the new technological services as a substitution for the broker, but
rather as an enhancement to the services they already offer.
I think it will be a good thing. It will help us keep.. 90% of my clients aren’t
going to be affected by it one way or the other, but there’s a number of
clients in that 30 to 40 age group that want me to manage their serious
money but still want to do the online trading and they don’t want to pay a
hundred bucks or more to do a trade. If they can do those trades in this
account, then at least the money will stay here and I will still get paid on the
other business they are doing. Rather than them having an account at
Discover and one here, they can have it all here.
This broker is pleased that this new service will make him competitive with other
companies that offer the same service. Plus, it will help him to keep the clients he
already has that might be interested in this. Once again, though, he explained that
this was a small percentage of his overall clients. Another perspective supports the
idea that it offers more services which will expand their client base:
The company’s in the business of making money. They can not close any
door that represents a revenue stream to the firm. I have clients that utilize
my research, my system and pay me for that advice and for that research
and for the transactions. Those same clients are also doing Internet trades
using somebody else. Why shouldn’t we bring it all in-house? Let them
keep the money in the account here, instead of keeping it out there. My
asset base can grow whether or not I get the commission for the trade or
whatever... You know, so I’m not really that concerned about it. And it just
probably just gives me another arrow in the quiver. You know, again, I
have to figure out more precisely what exactly they’re doing. But for the
most part, at least, it expands my ability to serve.
He does not feel his job is threatened because it ‘offers on more quiver’ - instead
of substituting for the broker it enhances the services offered. One broker
mentioned that it is just keeping clients, but is not an innovative change to their
process to bring in more business:
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And following other people’s leads when it comes to that. Because we’re
not advertising, I don’t know, pre-IRA’s or Internet for free, or something
that would give us the opportunity to have the phone calls coming in to us.
So, to me that would be really innovative. That would be real helpful,
where we try to get more assets to automatically come in to our firm.
Instead we are giving us tools to offer clients, to hopefully stop them from
leaving. But the onus is still on us in terms of gathering those assets.
They see the new service offered through the ICT not as a substitute for their
abilities or services, but rather an enhancement to what they already offer. It is not
a way to get new business, but a way to keep existing business in house. The
online trading service is a reaction to other institutions offering the same services
that could potentially take their clients. It is also a way for them to appear
legitimate in their field.
The (un)emotional knowledge worker. A third reaction to the general trend
of online trading, and the specific instance of BH offering this services, was the
transformation of brokers as those who ‘make trades’ to those who give advice,
foster a relationship with the client, and take the emotion out of trading. This
changed the traditional gatekeeping role of brokers into knowledge workers. BH
also emphasized the relationship between the broker and client as the most
important service they offer. One broker said, “They’re [brokers of other firms]
gonna end up being replaced by you know fairly low price sales force really, is the
way I see that going. BrokerHouse, so far what they’ve told us is they, they don’t
want to, to do that to us, they want to embrace the, more specialized personal
service aspect.” The emphasis is not about the information and trading, because
that is available more widely but it is about creating relationships and offering
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wisdom and advice as a service. This is how the brokers conceptualized their role
as an (un)emotional knowledge worker:
I think that, to me, it’s one of the biggest services we provide is we take
emotion out of it. Because that’s what kills you in the market. It’s greed
and fear that makes you invest and buy and sell. Well, when it’s your own
money and, you know, you’re watching it every day. It affects you, as a
client. Let’s say you’re trading on account and your scared, and now sell,
and now you buy, and whatever. When I’m managing your account, that’s
not involved in it for me. I’m just using purely historical information and
good research. I mean, you have that too, but then you have the greed and
fear and that screws it all up.
He emphasizes that his role is to provide good research and analysis to give rational
advice that doesn’t respond to emotional forces. Another broker echoed these
sentiments:
I think that in my opinion the people who, do a lot of Internet trading on
their own, are people I don’t want to have as clients anyway. Because if
someone believes that there’s no inherent value in a relationship with a
professional who knows what he’s doing and is unemotional, with what’s
going on, then those people should not even talk with someone like myself.
Look at all the Internet, the day trading that’s going on. That satisfies a
need for the public to gamble. I think in this country there’s a real problem
with things like alcoholism, drug abuse and gambling. The gambling is, is
one of those codified, tolerated, weaknesses of the human character that, in
this country, no one thinks anything bad of. But people are just... (pause)
Just taking it out, taking out their need to gamble, on the Internet or on day
trading and I believe that over time what happens the law of averages,
making everything equal, those people have such a bad experience, that
they probably will really, actually, in the end perceive there might be some
value in a relationship with someone like myself, (italics added)
This is interesting because this broker perceives that with his advice investing in
the stock market is not gambling; however those that day trade are gambling. The
distinction seems to lie in the relationship to a broker who is unemotional and not
just fulfilling the client’s needs to gamble. Besides taking the ‘greed’ and ‘fear’ out
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of the decisions, brokers develop a strategy so that clients are not left to their own
devices:
I think doing an execution is not the important part of investing. I think the
important part of investing is what strategy you use in order to buy the
stocks. What do you do when it goes up? What do you do when it goes
down? What do you do, you know, how much of it do you buy? And most
people, left up to their own devices, starting out at once, will get scared
when it goes down and they’ll sell it rather than buy more. They’ll probably
over-weight themselves and have more than ten percent of their money in
one given stock, which aggravates their fear. So that they get even more
scared when it goes down. And then they become frozen and they become
a deer in headlights. You know like, “Oh, my gosh, the market’s down.
Better get me the heck out before it goes down any more.” Because
normally when the market index goes down ten or twelve percent,
individual stocks in your portfolio might go down twenty, twenty-five,
thirty, thirty-five percent. And it makes it look a lot scarier if you just
owned an index file. So, I don’t think people are prepared for that, to live
through that on their own. And don’t get me wrong, some people are, but I
think as a result I think the Internet will appeal to some people, but I don’t
think it’s going to be the universal, “Boy, we don’t need a broker” appeal.
If it is it’ll just scare a lot of people and they’ll stop investing - and head for
the hills for a while and then we’ll have to work to get them back.
These quotations all share the commonality of the ‘unemotional’ role the broker
plays in investing money. They all emphasize the role of the broker as someone
who makes rational decisions based on strategies and research. This definition of
their contribution to trading secured their position in the industry, even when
clients could trade for themselves online.
Next, brokers focused on their expertise and strategy that gained the trust of
their clients and made them irreplaceable. When asked about BH’s new service of
online trading one broker responded:
I think it’s dangerous for people ‘cause a lot people don’t have the ‘know
how’ and I think it’s really important that you do have an expert behind you
and so I think they’re doing it to appease the public, probably. I don’t
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know. I haven’t really thought about it. It is the trend, but it’s also a lot of
smaller investors and I think the bigger investors and the people who are
worth multi-million dollars and that sort of thing are going to stick with the
broker because they want to maintain their wealth. Wealthy people want to
stay wealthy and they’re not going to trust themselves to. ..wealthy people
got there either by inheriting it or by doing something that they know how
to do well. They’re not investors, and if they are, they have their own
accounts. I guess I’m not opposed to it... they understand that I’m valuable
and that I should be paid for what I do. It’s just, for them, it’s more just
something they want to do for fun or because their friends are doing it. They
are not interested in replacing me.
They are not threatened by online trading because they believe the type of
clients they have value their advice and knowledge. The redefine themselves as
knowledge workers, not stock traders. This trend on the emphasis of advice and
service has continued, even trickling over to the online trading companies.
Now it's time to put the investing back in online investing. Wall Street's
new Internet emphasis is advice— from financial planning to stock-picking
to money management. Old-line brokerage houses and online upstarts alike
are searching for the right amalgam of tech and touch, combining powerful
Internet tools for calculation and communication with human insights into
investors' needs and desires. (Business Week, May 28, 2001, Mike
McNamee)
Currently, as the market has significantly dropped and the initial shock on online
trading has begun to fade, BH and other firms and trying to figure out how to
leverage the technology and their services in a strategic combination that serves
their needs and the clients’needs. As many online traders lost money when the
market dropped, they began to realize that access to the information and the ability
to trade for themselves did not guarantee a profit. There was something beyond the
ICTs, which offered access, that was important - knowledge and strategy. As the
environment changed access with new ICTs, BH also felt institutional pressures to
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adopt new technologies within their organization. Brokers then responded by
redefining or more clearly defining their role in the investing process. The
organization coevolved in response to changes in the environment. Brokers then
coevolved in response to all of these changes.
Interaction o f Institutional Pressures
As mentioned earlier, institutionalism occurs at the State or government
level and at the professions level. In this case, they seemed to work in contradiction
to each other. In 1999, BrokerHouse still did not have Internet access of e-mail for
most of its employees. As a top firm in its field, this became increasingly
unacceptable. From the interviews, most employees thought that the
implementation of a new computer system was essential for three reasons: 1) other
firms were far more advanced in their technological capabilities, 2) clients had
access to information through the Internet that the brokers did not have, and this
made them look bad and 3) clients wanted to contact their brokers through e-mail.
This proves that professional legitimation within their organizational field, and with
their clients, was a motivating factor to adopt new ICTs. “Compared with unskilled
operators, professional experts benefit from a legitimate power: their official
function in the organization is to continuously cope with uncertainty” (Pichault,
1995). Professional experts base their power more on legitimacy than other types
of workers.
Even with these strong institutional pressures, there was still some
reluctance to adopt these new ICTs because of the SEC regulation and liability in
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the finance industry. This is ‘coercive isomorphism’ (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983)
from the ‘State’ because it is pressure from an organization, the SEC, that BH is
dependent on. This is legitimation in Giddens’s (1984) sense of the word - legal
institutions that affect normative regulation. The strict regulation actually worked
against the forces to adopt new ICTs - so there were opposing institutional forces.
BH did not want to offer e-mail because it would increase written communication
which, in turn, increases the risk of breaking SEC regulations. The legitimating
force ‘won’ in that they adopted the technology, but BH’s policy around using the
new technology was so restrictive, responding to regulatory pressures, that many
employees chose not to use it. In coevolutionary terms, BH selected an ICT but
there was initially variance within this selection (e.g. options offered, how often it
is monitored) so they developed policy to regulate this variance for individuals.
Then after some testing and refining, they decided to retain the system after a
shared understanding of expectations had developed.
After Compsys was implemented, and decisions around its use were
finalized, members’ adoption of Compsys was a result of the structuring of
organizational form, power, and technology, as well as the perception of Compsys
and its affect on access. Structuration, in this application, allows for an
understanding of the micro processes that occur within coevolutionary frameworks.
Selection of a technology occurred, but variances in its actual use and their affects
on the organization, can be understood as a process of structuring between
members/actors and the rules and resources of the organization.
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CompSys: Organizational Tool and Information Source vs. Relationship
Technology
CompSys offered new access to the Internet and e-mail; the brokers now had
access to new sources of information, better applications of existing information
sources, and the ability to communicate interpersonally or with groups through e-
mail or chat rooms or other communication capabilities. The second research
question explores how changing access affects the coevolution of organization and
technology. Interestingly, the employees, including management, brokers and
support staff, did not strongly view CS as a tool to enhance their relationships but
did focus on the importance of using it to access information. From Dutton’s
perspective (1999), the users viewed the changing access to information as more
important than access to people or other services. This reflects how individuals
responded to the resources available to them. Their perception was a mitigating
factor in the structuring cycle of resources and agency.
Their use and perception of Compsys was very different from the historical
patterns of Internet & e-mail use in the United States. In general, 90% of Internet
use is e-mail for both one-to-one and one-to-many communication. In fact, many
companies who were initially very excited about e-mail capabilities began to
develop more stringent policies because of the amount of use.
Information technology. Compsys changed access to information in a number
of important ways. This change in access affected the power structure within the
brokers. The vertical control (Fulk & DeSanctis, 1995) was leveled within this
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specific instance. Contrary to this, the other aspects of Compsys, such as e-mail,
supported the existing power structure (discussed in chapter 5). This supports
Bloomfield and Coombs’ (1992) findings that ICTs can both centralize and
decentralize power at the same time.
First, there are four levels of access and capability for employees depending on
their position. Level one is a broker, level two is a sales assistant, level three is
operations and level four is management. These levels determine individual access
to certain capabilities (e.g. ability to change information on an account) and
information sources. Each person’s software, access and capabilities are very
individualized. Then within levels, there was a need-based system set up for
certain brokers to have access to certain financial information sources depending on
the area of business they were in. At one point, they had even divided up who
needed Excel and Word, but now everyone gets ‘the basics’ as defined by
executives. Then, the broker can ask for other financial resources, often called
entitlements. They must prove a need for that service as it usually costs BH a
monthly service fee. After 3-6 months, if they are not using it, it is ‘scrubbed’ off
of their computer. One manager explained the ‘scrubbing’ process:
Scrub is where we go through and we say, “Okay, here’s all of our
entitlements that we have out there and here’s how much their cost to us.
What kind of things can we eliminate from our entitlements to save money
without impacting productivity/” I’m not going to take. You know, I could
save a lot of money if I took New York quotes off everybody's machine, but
that doesn’t make sense. But somebody who has commodity quotes, for
example, that the only thing they look at is periodically see where gold is
trading. The commodity quotes are expensive, a few hundred dollars a
month. And urn, if all they’re doing is getting a gold quote every now and
then, they can go to the bluebird and get that. They can go to their
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neighbor’s machine and get it. They can go to my commodity trader and
get it. And there’s other ways they can get it at a reduced cost. So we’ll go
through and essentially scrub off the things that we are not getting the bang
for our buck on.
In this way, technology, in terms of software, and the access to information it offers
as well as certain capabilities is very segmented and individualized. For example,
one broker could look at another broker’s computer system and find completely
different capabilities (e.g auto-dialing to clients). This also strongly segmented
those who had certain information sources and those who did not. This created
power differences around access to information.
This difference changed slightly with the implementation of CS and the
ability to get information from the Internet. It leveled the playing field, somewhat,
in terms of access to financial information even for brokers within BH. Now, many
of them had the same access to many important financial resources (as well as the
general public). For example, one broker explained his hopes for CS, “I won’t
have headlines. So, then I have to go over to my neighbors and get that. So, with
the rollout everybody is going to have the same tools. I think that’s kind of nice,
for me. I can see a difference.” After the rollout, another broker commented:
[With] the Web there’s information, a lot of people only use the Web, and
there’s information on there that can be useful to us. For instance, our
monitor we can get Dow Jones news, which is one news service. On Stock
Fellow Express they may say there is information on Reuters News which
we don’ t have service at. I could go on to the web on to E*trade or another
company and get Reuters news off of it if I had to.
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So, the Internet allowed brokers access to ‘entitlements’ without the need to get
approval from their manager. It also gave more even access to all the brokers,
hence slightly decentralizing the power structure around these resources.
Beyond access to more financial information, they also found that CS was
important in terms of organizing their client information and their own schedules.
Before Outlook, they had a client management program that was too slow and
seldom used. Most of the brokers thought that the ability to stay organized,
especially with easy access and manageability of client information, was one of the
greatest benefits of CS.
The e-mail thing, that’s a big thing, but I would say the biggest change in
my job is the fact that I can use an online organizer. So, that I can use my
Outlook to organize things, to put appointments and dates and task lists and
the like. I had been trying to figure out the best way to do that and a
centralized place for me to that, before this. ‘Cause we didn’t really have
anything like that before. And so for me, I feel like I’m much more
efficient ‘cause I know if I have to do something next Tuesday I can write
something on my task list and have it pop up next Tuesday. So, I’m not
concerned about it until next Tuesday, and I love that. That’s the biggest
thing.
Even compared to e-mail, the organizational aspect, the ability to file and
categorize information about client accounts or schedules, was more important than
the ability to communicate directly with others! This supports that notion that the
perception of CS was as an information and organizational source but not as a tool
to build relationships. This organizational and information capabilities helped
brokers do their job much better so they emphasized these functions over
communicating with others:
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I think one of the big advantages that I like is that it, it allows me to
leverage my time in many ways. I have access to information very, very
quickly that I can, I can find. It has all the programs that I need to maintain
my knowledge, my database on my clients, to uh, build my business in
terms of writing out recommendations and doing research for people.
So, in terms of both financial information and client information, CS significantly
increased the volume of information available to everyone and the ability to
manage that information. This ability was perceived as very important, while
communicating through CS was not viewed as important. E-mail met with both
acceptance and resistance.
Communication technology. There are two potential recipients of
communication through e-mail - employees inside the office and to clients outside
the office. E-mail was not used very much for either. After LO and SO rolled out
CompSys, I observed their communication patterns, especially regarding intraoffice
communication. In Large Office, they sent some office-wide e-mail messages, but
they were usually from management. For example, this is how the sales manager
was now using e-mail, (recounted by a broker):
If there’s a new municipal bond or corporate or something new comes up,
they’ll just instantly mail everybody instead of having to call a meeting or
say it over the wire, or over the intercom system. That kind of thing. It
would come over this [points to wire box], but I’m in a room that doesn’t
have this because we already create a lot of noise. We wouldn’t hear it
anyway. For me it’s better.
Employees who were not managers never sent office wide e-mails - it was used for
mostly top-down communication. They still also distributed memos about
everything as they had before CS. A month after Small Office received CS, they
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had not sent one office-wide e-mail. They still distributed all general
communication by memos, either to the desks of the brokers, hand delivered by the
Client Service Associates or placed in their mailboxes. This is partly due to the e-
mail policy and review software, which will be covered in chapter 5. When asked
about the reason for this, they said
This is a pretty dumb office compared to some, and [the management] isn’t
a real computer person. So, do I think he’s going to do morning notes on e-
mail? Nooo. Do I think that, maybe, we’ll have our calendar on someday?
That’s a real possibility...I think that would be a good idea and it would
certainly force everyone to look at their e-mail.
The Office Assistant, who often distributes memos and important communication
messages from management in SO said this:
If it’s not an urgent thing, I’ll put it in their mailboxes. And I suppose I
could do like some kind of interoffice e-mail to everyone. But I know not
everyone is using it. [The manager] is not, I mean he’s been getting mail,
he’s just like, I don’t want to look at that. So you know he’s, so and I’m
sure some other people are like that, too, so I mean that’s why they’re
getting it.
She was obviously influenced by management’s attitude toward using e-mail. This
is a good example of social influence (Schmitz & Fulk, 1991) in which those within
your communication circle influence the type of technologies that you use.
Another instance of social influence shows the resistance of using e-mail for intra
office communication:
We still do memos on paper, but I think a lot of people... like one time I did
e-mail something to Gigi. She takes care of all of our order stuff. I e-mailed
something to her to ask her to order, you know, twenty copies of whatever it
was and she called me and she said, “I noticed you sent me an e-mail and
the only reason I knew that is because it popped up at me, but I’ll never use
my e- mail and I’ll never check it, so don’t send me anything there. Just let
me know.” So she wouldn’t get the memo if you were to send it to her. So
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there is some resistance to that. They still would much rather have the
human contact, I think, or something more substantial than just a little
envelope in the corner of your computer screen letting you know there’s a
message waiting for you.
For e-mail to be successful, there is a social contract or unwritten agreement that
people will check it or use it if you are going to use it as the only communication
medium for certain kinds of communication. If others do not buy into that
expectation, than it is not a viable communication medium for either person.
The transition from certain communication media, such as paper or over the
wire, to e-mail takes time. Even within the entire corporation, the continued using
paper notices instead of e-mail.
But you know they’ve got this e-mail here and it’s like, instead of e-mailing
us with information like, say, BrokerHouse is sponsoring a meeting that
we’re going to go to. Instead of just sending out an e-mail with a reminder
notice, or you know, a schedule of what the meeting is going to be, they’re
still sending us paper. So, I don’t know why they don’t use that better.
When I specifically asked employees about the use of CS as a way to share
information, most people did not really understand what I was asking. They either
responded that it did not help them share information, or they imagined getting
information and then sharing it face-to-face with others. Then, when I asked about
e-mail use, about half mentioned that they did e-mail research reports to clients.
So, some viewed CS as a way to share information, such as research reports, but
not to enhance the personal relationship with their clients.
I only use it, for example, you can e-mail research. I use it for that if I need
to e-mail research or something else, like attachments of some sort but other
than that, like personal e-mail, I don’t use it. That’s the only difficult part
when it comes to sharing.
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One broker commented about the use of e-mail with clients, “Which I have not
grown into where I would consider myself angling to incorporate that as part of the
way, ways, I would want to communicate.” Most brokers considered face-to-face
or telephone communication to be superior to e-mailing clients:
I mean this job is a job, business relationships. You know, this computer is
a tool. But you’re either you’re good with talking with people and having
them confide in you and then have them trust you or you’re not. You know,
computers are nice were I can like, be talking to someone and it’ll pull up
and [remind me of their] kid’s birthday tomorrow.
This broker only saw CS as way to get information about a client while he was
speaking to them on the phone; he did not see it as a way to build the relationship
which is based on ‘trust. ’ His assumption seems to be that trust is not built by
communicating through a computer system. Other brokers emphasized face-to-face
and telephone over e-mail as a preferred way of communicating:
I haven’t used it because I would rather talk to somebody. I mean that will
always be the case, it’s regulated, that’s kind of what the article is about.
It’s so heavily regulated, it’s kind of a bummer... So, I have to only use it
for business, which is what they want, but I think a phone call is just as
easy... I’m not going to just say, it’s just not as powerful as speaking.
He did not think that it had the same ‘power’ as speaking verbally with someone.
Another broker did not see e-mail as either a substitute or enhancement of other
forms of communicating:
I’m not using e-mail to replace phone calls or to replace writing things in
the mail. In fact, I think I’ve only asked two clients for what their e-mail
address is. So, I wouldn’t consider myself a heavy user of e-mail, but I
haven’t not used it at all.
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They did not perceive CS as a way to communicate with others beyond the media
they already used to communicate. They definitely do not think it will replace the
traditional face-to-face meeting and the many phone calls they make. There did
seem to be an age bias on this issue. The older brokers, who had been in the
business for decades, felt as if they were successful before e-mail and they could
still be successful without it. The younger brokers seemed a bit more interested in
trying to incorporate the use of e-mail into their business. The younger brokers
might also have younger clients who might expect to use this type of technology.
Organizational Structure and ICT
With the introduction of CS, there were aspects that created a more
democratic distribution of information, such as the access to financial information
online, but most of the use of the ICT supported traditional organizational
hierarchy. This analysis answers the third research question about the structuring
of ICTs and organizational form with a specific focus on power around information
control. Power was enforced rather than subverted with a strong focus on control
and regulation, especially in regard to e-mail. There was the potential to have more
intraorganizational communication from non-management and an easier ability to
communicate with clients. Yet, policy and social norms were developed that
continued the strict regulatory climate already established in the financial industry.
Dutton (1999) notes that ICT is often used to reinforce prevailing patterns of
control and further key actors’ values and interests. Due to power differentials,
actors that attempt to shape ICTs to serve their interests are not equally capable of
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doing so. For example, management had much more ability to shape and enforce
e-mail policy than the brokers or support staff. The head of the technology
division in Corporate explained their stance toward communication procedures:
But, we tend to see that the branch, everything within an office, kind of
takes the lead from the manager. Or the office as a whole, you know, is
doing these kinds of things. And part of what of what we’ve seen, unless
you look at it as a whole, those kinds of things can get very frustrating. So,
you know, if you don’t sit down as a department and talk about e-mail
versus Audix versus paper versus this, you end up with people doing
whatever they’re comfortable with and you know, you’ve got kind of a
mishmash of procedures.
They would rather have more control from management than allow people to figure
out what is ‘comfortable.’
Much of the literature on ICTs and new organizational forms had focused
on its ability to decentralize and to democratize. The virtual organization is often
cited as an example of that which uses technology to decrease the technology and
create the networked organization where teams come together across boundaries of
time and space. While this form is possible, and also manifest in some
organizations, it is not a deterministic result of certain technologies. Other social
factors also affect organizational form.
For BH, the interplay of online trading and CS within the organization was
affected by the regulatory environment, the client expectation and demand, the
established social norms and influences, and the organizational policies developed
around these technologies. This made BH reluctantly embrace the new technology
in ways that changed the shape of business but rather continued strict norms of
control over information access and communication. The perception of CS as an
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information tool rather than a communication medium affected the way employees
used the system. They appreciated the organizational capabilities and access to
information, but did not use e-mail very often to communicate within the office or
to their clients. Beside the social influence of others in the office, the use of e-mail
was also shaped by corporate policy which advocated monitoring and limited
privacy.
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Communication Technology, Privacy & Organizational Policy
The Privacy Debate
As we increase our use and dependence on information and communication
technology to communicate and perform many daily transactions, privacy becomes
a more salient and important issue. Using electronic or digital means of
transmission to accomplish many of our communication and information needs
allows their capture to an extent that was not possible before. The United States has
historically tried to protect privacy of the individual, especially in public spheres.
Not only has the increase in use of ICTs brought this issue to the forefront, but also
the successive legislation passed after September 11th. The Patriot Act allowed for
significantly increased access to personal communication via phone, e-mail, and
Internet use, especially with Carnivore, than has been allowed in the past. It is also
much easier for law enforcement agencies to obtain permission to capture
information and communication.
A combination of these factors has made privacy one of the most important
issues facing our society, especially in regard to ICTs. In the private sphere,
specifically in most companies and organizations, the laws protecting privacy are
not applicable anyway. While it is still important to understand legislation, in these
organizations it is not only a legislative issue, but also an issue played out at the
organizational policy level in and around how policy governs use of ICTs within
the organization. Therefore the creation and enforcement of policy, and its affect
on employee behavior and perception of technology, can offer insight into the
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privacy issue as it plays out in the corporate arena. Structuration offers a
framework to understand the relationship between organizational policy and human
behavior in regard to technology.
The adoption and use of ICTs is influenced by structures, such as policy, and by the
actions of other actors, such as management and employees who respond to the
policy.
Defining privacy. Privacy is difficult to define and is historically vague in
the courts of law. There is no explicit mention of a right to privacy in the
constitution, so it is loosely interpreted to fall under the Bill of Rights (Cate, 1997).
Constitutional rights mostly apply to the government so they are not even
applicable in private settings. For a person’s privacy to be violated they must show
that they had a reasonable expectation of privacy. Because most of the law does
not apply to a private setting, including most businesses or organizations, people
can have no expectation of privacy and therefore cannot expect law to protect them
in these environments (Adams, Scheuing, & Feeley, 2000).
The debate about privacy and information and communication technologies
has become more prominent in both academic circles and the public press because
technology allows for the collection of information as well as surveillance on
greater scale. Agre and Rotenberg (1997), in Technology and Privacy: The New
Landscape, summarize this well:
Ever since computers were first applied in organizational settings, nearly 50
years ago, social theory and popular imagination have associated
information technology with the practices of bureaucratic control.
Technological threats to personal privacy, accordingly, have been
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understood as the inexorable progress of Big Brother’s agenda of total
surveillance over our lives, (p. vii)
Privacy issues can be divided into two large categories. The first is the privacy of
individual’s information (Shapiro, 1999) and the second is the privacy of personal
communication. In U.S. society, much of the debate revolves around the privacy of
‘personal information’ (such as social security number, address, and telephone
number) that is often transported across digital technologies and kept in databases.
New multimedia communications and computing technology is potentially
much more intrusive than traditional information technology because of its
power to collect even more kinds of information about people, even when
they are not directly aware that they are interacting with or being sensed by
it. (Belotti, 1997, p.63)
This can be sold to third parties to make a profit and to target specific markets.
Privacy in this realm focuses on access and control of the individual over their
information (Belotti, 1997).
This privacy debate turns to national or state policy for protection and
rights. The Federal Trade Commission has allowed E-commerce to regulate itself,
but has now proposed creating legislation to requiring consumer-oriented web sites
to comply with their four principles of fair information practice. These include
l)Notice - disclose information practices before collecting personal information 2)
Choice - consumers must be given a choice about whether or how personal
information is collected 3) Access - consumers should be able to view the accuracy
of the collected information and 4) Security - data collectors must ensure that
information collected is accurate and secure. {The Federal Trade Commission on
"Privacy Online: Fair Information Practices In the Electronic Marketplace ", 2000)
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Another option for protection is to privatize the privacy industry. In other words,
create technologies or services that must be bought to protect privacy. Shapiro
(1999) warns against this sort of privacy protection because privacy should be
treated as a right not as a commodity for those who can afford it.
Privacy in communication. A nascent area of research involves privacy
issues surrounding the monitoring of communication or Internet use, rather than the
collection of personal information. This focuses on issues of surveillance rather
than the collection of information. This is critical in the private sector, especially
the use of ICT in the organization or corporation. For example articles such as
“Big Boss is Watching You” (Meeks, 2000) and subheadlines such as “Big Brother
is Corporate America” (The privacy dilemma in the Internet age, 2001) has put this
angle of privacy in the headlines. As former computer crime prosecutor Mike
Zwillinger said, “When government wants to look at your e-mail, depending on
what they can show the court, they may or may not be granted authority. Yet when
an employer wants to look at your e-mail, they need nothing” (Zuckerman, 2001,
p.3). Although the law has not significantly changed in this area, it is receiving
attention because of the new capabilities for monitoring that ICTs in the
organization make possible. They also make it easier to monitor, track and analyze
data about individuals in the organization.
U.S. Law. The United States law, in general, provide some protection of
electronic communications in the public sphere, but very little in the private sphere.
The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) was passed in 1986, which in
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essence gave electronic communication, such as e-mail, the same protection as
telephone conversations (e.g. can’t wiretap without a court order). It also made it an
offense to read another’s e-mail, similar to postal mail, unless you are a system
operator. Finally, the ECPA established a difference between content and records
regarding use (Johnson, 2000).
These laws have no bearing in the private sector, as corporations have had
free reign to adopt their own policies regarding employee privacy. In 1999, the
Notice of Electronic Monitoring Act (NEMA) was presented to Congress to, at the
minimum, force employers to announce when they will be monitoring employees.
But, NEMA was rejected. The monitoring of employee communication has
continually increased in the past four years since the bill was introduced and
subsequently tabled.
This is in contrast to Europe where more has been done to protect the
privacy of individuals in the workplace (Shapiro, 1999). In 1998, the E.U.
implemented the Data Protection Directive which protects the privacy of consumer
information. Although it is not directly related to personal communication, it
exemplifies a different approach than the U.S. to privacy; “the European Union
embraces privacy as a fundamental human right and thus considers comprehensive
legislation as the most appropriate means to protect personal information” (Yu,
2001).
Many of the cases of privacy around employee communication that have
gone to trial have been ruled in favor of the company, as the judges continue to tell
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employees they should have ‘no expectation of privacy. ’ They have consistently
ruled in favor of employer’s right to protect their interests over an individual’s right
to privacy (Adams et al., 2000). In one famous case, Smyth vs. Pillsbury Company,
Smyth was promised that e-mail was not monitored. He was later fired for
something he communicated via e-mail. The court ruled in favor of Pillsbury,
stating that Smyth should have no expectation of privacy, even if his company
promised him privacy. {Privacy Issues in the Workplace, 1996)
A few judges in the federal court system disagree with the trend of unrestricted
monitoring in private organizations. Judge Rosenbaum, chief judge of the United
States District Court for the District of Minnesota wrote a provocative article about
questioning the carte-blanche no expectation of privacy. He wrote, “But just as an
employee does not surrender all privacy rights on the company’s premises, so they
should not be automatically surrendered on the company’s computers.” (Kaplan,
2001, p. 1) In the 9th circuit, federal Judge Kozinski has launched a campaign
against a plan to monitor court employees’ use of e-mail and the Internet, including
judges. He was successful in getting no e-mail monitoring and limited Internet
monitoring (Biskupic, 2001). This is in a public setting, so it may or may not have
repercussions for those who want the same protection in private organizations.
Although this seems to give corporations a lot of power, many are favorable
toward keeping government out of these issues and allowing organizations to
develop their own policies. Those in favor of smaller government appreciate that
the government does not get involved at this level of regulation. They based their
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support on the assumption that an individual can choose to be or not to be a part of
an organization, so they choose to put themselves in that situation.
Monitoring in the workplace. The monitoring of employee communication has
continuously increased in the past four years. According to a survey by the
American Management Association (Greenberg, Canzoneri, & Joe, 2000), 78% of
companies monitor employee communication in some form, e.g. video
surveillance, phone taping, reading e-mail. This has doubled since 1997. About
38% of organizations monitored e-mail at some level, up from a mere 14.9% in
1997 and 20% in 1998. Also, 54% monitored Internet connections. AMA included
four levels of monitoring in their study: ongoing (constant and uninterrupted),
routine (regular, but not constant), occasional (spot checks), and specified (not
normal, e.g. part of an investigation). Along with the medium of communication
monitored, the level of monitoring varies greatly between organizations.
Variables that affect amount of monitoring include the size of the organization
and the industry or field it belongs. Generally, the larger the organization, the more
likely it is to monitor in some form. Regarding industry, the financial services
industry has the highest level of active monitoring at 90% , while many other
industries, such as manufacturing, retail, and business and professional services
hover around the low 70%. (Greenberg et al., 2000)
In another study, Schulman (2001) measured how many companies buy
software that actively monitors employee communication. He found that, overall,
about 35% of companies use software to actively monitor e-mail or Internet use,
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with 15% for e-mail and 19% of Internet use. This is a significant number of
employees when based on the estimated number of U.S. employees online at 40
million. Although this number is lower than the AMA study, he also found that
monitoring has increased in recent years (Benner, 2001b). In fact, it is increased
twice as fast as those who actually gain Internet access (Schulman, 2001).
AMA (Greenberg et al., 2000) found four general reasons for organizations
to chose to monitor employee communications. The first was for performance
review. For example, sales calls are recorded to monitor ‘quality assurance.’ The
second was for legal compliance as a part of keeping adequate records and files.
The third reason companies monitor communication is for legal liability; they want
documentation if, for example, employees create a hostile work environment with
offensive material or e-mail. Finally, some use it to measure productivity, such as
counting the number of key strokes in an hour or ensuring employees aren’t surfing
the net for too long. There have also been a number of widely publicized cases of
employers firing employees over content in e-mail (Schulman, 2001). Edward
Jones, a large investment firm, fired 18 employees and disciplined 41 after and
internal investigation around an offensive e-mail (Mendels, 1999). Employees are
aware that it can be monitored to both protect them, especially from hostile work
environments, but also to prosecute them. “Corporations are really in a bind,” said
Atkins, part of a consulting firm that helps companies create privacy policies.
Corporations can be sued for invading an employee’s privacy, but also for not
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controlling communications enough and allowing workers to be harassed (Benner,
2001a).
Although it is legal, and employers have reasons to monitor, there are
repercussions for more or less pervasive monitoring. First, employees can respond
negatively to this sort of intrusion of privacy. “Some workplaces are informal
enough that tough e-mail restrictions would be at odds with company culture”
(Mendels, 1999, p.3). It can also create a culture that is not supportive of
information sharing and open communication, as is vital to virtual organizations
and knowledge sharing organizations. It might inhibit the use they want to
encourage of communication technology. People often respond negatively to
constant monitoring. “By constantly monitoring, what kind of environment are you
creating there? Companies need to weigh that into their equation. It boils down to
human dignity. People just don’t want to be watched all the time, and happy
workers are productive workers” said Deborah Pierce, a privacy attorney for the
Electronic Frontier Foundation (Benner, 2001a).
Constant monitoring is reminiscent of Taylor’s Scientific Management
which is premised on a negative view of the employee as a person who needs to be
controlled and pushed to work. The result of too much monitoring affects the
culture of the organization and employees’ perceptions of their worth and
autonomy. It can also be read critically as a modern day panopticon which makes
it possible for “a single gaze to see everything constantly” (Foulcault, 1995). This
‘disciplinary gaze’ effects power in that it makes the subjects of the panopticon
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more visible. In that case, the level of monitoring does not matter, because people
would monitor their own behavior if they knew there was even a possibility of
being watched. Given this tension between the perceived need to monitor, yet the
possibility of negative consequences, organizations have struggled with developing
appropriate organizational policy around these new ICT.
From law to policy. The use and monitoring of e-mail, Internet, intranets, and
databases has become a negotiation between the private employer and the
employee. Employers can monitor anything, anytime that happens within their
organization on their equipment, without being outside the law. How often and by
what means this monitoring occurs are then negotiated with the organizational
policy, although they are not legally required to be officially announced in the
organization. As the larger public policy issues around the use of ICTs in the
United States become clearer, the debate around privacy and the use of ICTs in
organizations is actually determined in the creation and enforcement of
organizational policy. Some advocate that in the absence of clear laws, that the
“strongest protection for an employer is a clearly written, uniformly enforced e-
mail monitoring policy” that is distributed to all employees (Adams et at, 2000,
p. 44). It is often not a question of government law, but of policy created by
individual organizations.
Organizational Policy and Change
Organizational policy is developed to encourage certain norms of behavior
and to spell out opportunities, as well as limitations, in different organizational
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arenas. Although there has been considerable focus on the need for effective
organizational policy in different arenas [e.g. sexuality (William, Giuffre, &
Dellinger, 1999); work performance (Lefebvre et al., 1997); new technology
(Schwochau et al., 1997)], the process by which this policy is implemented,
negotiated, and recreated has been overlooked. The former research assumes that
once a well developed policy is created it will be successful in accomplishing its
goals. Often this process is not so simple. The policy has potential to be interpreted
and enforced differently in varying parts of the organization. It can also be
interpreted disparately across individuals. Then, the outcomes or effects of the
policy must also be reviewed.
When a change occurs within the organization, often new policy is
developed around this change. Or, a new policy developed around an already
existing process or resource often precipitates change. Change and organizational
policy often go hand in hand. When dealing with organizational change, such as the
implementation of new ICTs, formal participation by employees and management
was found to lessen the resistance to new policy and change. Also, when
employees had more authority to implement recommendations they were more
supportive of policy changes. The most common areas for employees to have input
were quality, work unit performance, and work flow; and less often the
introduction of new technology and safety/health issues (Schwochau et al., 1997).
Another reason for developing technology policy is to manage technology risk,
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which could include defense against loss of data, compromise of the system, or
legal liability (Hughes, 1997).
The development of organizational policy around a new ICT played itself
out in BH and its new e-mail capabilities. It demonstrates how organizational
policy is developed; and how employees and management responded to issues of
privacy and monitoring.
Privacy and E-mail Policy in BH: The Recursive Process
Policy, within organizations, is more easily changed and transformed than
government legislation. Specifically when policy deals with implementation of new
processes or resources in the organization, a process occurs in which policy
develops in response the organization’s needs and the employees’ responses. From
a structuration perspective, policy is a part of the rules and resources (Giddens,
1984) that structure the organization. When new ICTs are implemented within the
organization they become an ‘occasion for structuring’ (S. R. Barley, 1986)
between human agency and the organization. Individuals have agency to respond
to the policy and reiterate or resist it. In this process the organization is structuring
itself around policy development, then human responses, and the recreation of
policy. In BH, employees reacted intensely to policy around Compsys because
many they felt strongly about their lack of privacy with monitoring. The issue of
privacy made this instance of structuring a pertinent and engaging point in the life
of the organization, and in society generally.
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This reciprocal relationship between structure and agency has been especially
apparent in the policy developed around new ICTs. For example, when e-mail was
first introduced to private organizations, in the early 1990s, organizations were so
excited about its possibilities that it was often not regulated at all. This could also
be a result of the very open academic environment in which e-mail first became
popular. After members used the technology and responded to it, companies began
to reevaluate their policy on e-mail. They began to tighten up on the content of e-
mail sent through their ICT. As the previous studies have shown, monitoring has
steadily increased. Policy is revised after e-mail had been used for an amount of
time. The trend seems to be toward more stringent restrictions in e-mail use. In
BH, this reiterative process played itself out in introduction of e-mail capabilities,
the creation of policy around the use of e-mail and employees’ reaction to this.
Influences on Creation o f E-mail Policy
In BH, the creating and enforcing policy around the use of e-mail and the
Internet was also a recursive process. There were a number of rounds of policy, and
each time employees interpreted the policy differently. This was partly due to the
fact individual offices enforced the policy differently. Then, organizational
members would test the boundaries and see how strictly it would be enforced.
Members will still act in the pursuit of their own interests sometimes against the
constraints of their social structure (Scott, 1995). Some new interpretations or even
revision of the policy occurred in response to employees and management
experience with the new communication and the policy governing it.
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BH’s e-mail policy developed from the influence of industry environment
and past communication technology policy. First, as mentioned earlier, this
industry is highly regulated by the SEC. Their guidelines strongly influence policy
development. Even if there is not a specific pertinent regulation, the culture of a
highly regulated industry encourages behavior patterns, including policy, to
continue in that same spirit. Regulation and control are the norm, rather than the
exception.
Along with industrial regulations, past ICT policies set the stage. The new
capabilities of CS were often compared to other ICTs in the organization. Due to
SEC regulations, communication was highly regulated within this industry. BH
was reputed to have particularly strict communication policies. For example, every
letter or fax had to be approved by management before it was sent out. The
purpose was to ensure that brokers were in compliance with SEC, e.g. they were
not promising too much or sharing insider information. Yet, phone calls were not
monitored. It was not monitored in the same way but there was an emphasis on
limiting personal phone calls. This stern bias toward monitoring written word,
especially because of legal ramifications, and limiting personal calls transferred
itself to policy around e-mail. One employee noted that policy is the same for most
of the different communication media.
And I guess our thoughts here at the firm is, it’s no different than any other
communication tool. Both e-mail and Internet. Right? So, you look at the
telephone and you look at the fax machine, and you look at just technology
as a whole, an individual who will spend time that is not productive, or an
individual who would take advantage of a tool, or an individual who would
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abuse a tool, it’s really the individual and it’s not the tool. So, we’ve used
same policies that the firm has for anything else.
This perspective takes a monolithic view of communication technology and places
the onus on the individual to not ‘abuse’ any form of technology.
Management and employees compared e-mail more closely to written
correspondence rather than verbal. This means that the same review policies for
letters and faxes would apply to e-mail. Yet, one manager realized the difficulty in
treating e-mail the same as written correspondence. Compared to the seriousness
o f ‘hard copy,’ she says:
And that’s the concern that the regulators have is that that kind of
communication goes on [in written correspondence]. In the e-mail world,
who’s going to review it? Well, the majority of it isn’t that. The majority of
it is, “Hey, give me a call. I got a stock you might like.” Like a phone
conversation...And you certainly don’t have the time, nobody has the time,
to be able to chase down every single one of those things that are phone
conversations or chatty conversations that happen to go through e- mail. But
that’s an industry problem. That’s not isolated to me. But it does, you know.
What am I going to do because of the tone of it? Those are tough.
This is one of the interesting aspects of developing policy around a new ICT. It
might be similar to other technologies, but it is never exactly the same, especially
in terms of access and capabilities. So, management attempt to create policy that is
similar to another ICT, treating the technologies as if they are the same. In this
case, the content and tone of the e-mail is more conversational, something you
would expect on the phone, but it is written down, so BH is still concerned about
liability issues As the quotation above represents, different ICTs often encourage
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information.
First Round o f Policy & E-mail
Ironically, the first time e-mail capabilities appeared on the old BH system,
it was not ‘officially available’ due to policy. This policy was not systematically
enforced. The technology itself was very crude and not very user friendly. It was
hidden away in the system and not introduced to employees. Some employees
stumbled upon the software and used it, only to get reprimanded unless they turned
in a list of contacts they would be e-mailing. Each e-mail sent or received was
printed up at the end of the day and read by management.
The use of this e-mail program was affected by both the policy and the
actual technical capabilities. One employee explains this first crude system:
Well yeah, it will change. We’ve just recently been entitled to have e-mail.
And the system that we are using is horrible. So most people don’t use it.
Urn, under the new platform, we’ll have you know something that will give
you intrusive alerts. If I have e-mail come in, unless I go to the e-mail
package, open it up, and look for messages, it won’t ever tell me that I’ve
got an e-mail, so I could have one sit there for a week and I don’t get
enough of it to justify going in and make that a part of my daily habit.
So, it was obvious that the technical limitations inhibited use as well as the mixed
messages from management on whether they were actually allowed to use the
system.
This conversation during a focus group of CSA in Large Office aptly summarizes
this confusion:
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Participant #1: And then they hooked us up with electronic e-mail, but
then you couldn’t get any e-mail in. Plus you can’t format anything on to e-
mail. You were basically able to just send, like, a message to someone. So,
it was kind of useless.
Interviewer: Do you use e-mail?
Participant #2: No.
Participant #3: We’re not allowed to use it.
Participant #1: Not yet.
Participant #3: We’re not really supposed to yet, for compliance purposes.
Participant #2: Because I think they’re redoing it.
Participant #2: When the new system comes out, we should have it.
Participant #4: That will be nice.
Participant #3: In fact, they kind of gave us e-mail and never really told us
it was on the system.
Participant # 1 :1 mean, a few people just found it by accident.
The capability existed, albeit in a difficult format, but the policy affected individual
agency - how people used or did not use the e-mail system. People interpreted the
original e-mail policy differently. Some claimed that you couldn’t e-mail anything,
while others thought that only e-mailing research reports was restricted, while
others thought you had to give them copies of the correspondence in advance.
These different interpretations of the policy were probably a result of the ‘secret’
nature of e-mail on the system, and because of differing personal interactions or
experiences with management about the use of e-mail.
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Decision to Officially Offer E-mail
Then, with the introduction of CS and the new software of Outlook, BH
decided to officially offer the capability of e-mail. This meant offering a technology
that was more user-friendly, as well as developing a consistent policy around the
use of e-mail. As mentioned earlier, one of the greatest concerns was meeting
compliance for the SEC. Also, they were concerned with employee efficiency and
not wasting time on e-mail.
BH tried to balance the offer of a new communication technology to help
the employee, while at the same time not increasing compliance risks or wasting
productivity. They strategically developed a policy around e-mail to balance these
concerns. The director of information systems in NYC explained the official
introduction is this way:
We are right now about to introduce e-mail out to our branches which
we’ve not had before. We’ve had some very, very raw e-mail systems. It’s
e-mail both within a branch and e-mail between brokers and their clients.
We think e-mail within a branch can really help to streamline
communications in the office. So today, typically if a branch manager
wants to alert the office of a sales meeting, they write up a memo and they
stuff it in everyone’s mailbox and who doesn’t get it or those kinds of
things. Or they announce over the loudspeaker, but that’s not an effective
means or whatever. So what we’re working with the branch managers is,
how do you effectively communicate in your office? And maybe reduce
some of the confusion, some of the paperwork and those kinds of things.
But also work with them from the reverse side. You know, you kind of want
to set up e-mail etiquette, so that you are not overloading your employees
with e-mails. So that’s what we mean by, sort of, best practices. It’s not
just, “hey, you’ve got this great new e-mail tool. Click here and you’re into
it,” but it’s how do you really incorporate it into the way that you work.
This sets up tension between allowing people to use e-mail for more 'efficient
communication' but also limiting it so people don't get too much e-mail. They want
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to avoid information overload. They also focus on how to effectively or
strategically incorporate it into work. They want to set up ‘best practices’ to help
offices understand the abilities as well as the limits of using e-mail.
Second Round o f Policy on E-mail
After the conversion to CS, e-mail was officially introduced throughout the
entire company. They had new software, Microsoft Outlook, with which to e-mail
and to store client contact information. An official e-mail policy was developed and
distributed via a number of brochures or pamphlets and in meetings. BH official e-
mail policy included
• Managers must review 25% of every employee’s e-mail everyday
• E-mail should be mostly used for business but limited personal e-mail is
acceptable
• Software, Assentor, is programmed to recognize certain problematic words
such as “guarantee.” Any e-mail, sent or received, with these terms will be
quarantined and must be released by management.
This policy was systematically distributed and everyone was required to sign a
form that they have read the restrictions and agree to abide by them.
The new policy about e-mail was clearly stated and distributed to all
employees. But these rules and resources were not static. They instigate user
response, specifically in reaction to the monitoring and limited freedom of use.
The implementation, interpretation and enforcement of this policy was negotiated
and renegotiated. Although the written policy is clear and set, its actual application
is interpretable and tends to change, officially or unofficially, over time. From this,
three themes emerged in this process: the negotiation of e-mail for personal use,
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reaction to monitoring and privacy issues and third, the actual feasibility of
enforcing the policy.
Personal use o f e-mail. The management, in both the LO and SO offices,
created a stricter policy around the use of personal e-mail than the larger company-
wide policy. The individual offices have some freedom in how they interpret and
use the policy around new technology, as long as they stay within SEC standards.
For management, they wanted to keep down the amount of e-mail they had to
review everyday and emphasize that this was a business tool. In a sense, the heavy
monitoring influenced a stricter e-mail policy, specifically about personal e-mail,
initially. The active monitoring meant that management could read e-mail and
know if it was business or personal. This individual office interpretation of personal
e-mail use affected how the employees thought about and used e-mail, and was the
first major theme around the policy that became apparent.
In the Large Office, they decided around December that no personal e-mail
was allowed. According to management:
Yes, they may limit it. Right now we have our branch, on the branch level
we’ve made certain rules, like we’ve said no personals, ‘cause we don’t
want to deal with having to monitor personal e-mails. Uh, they may just
come back with certain rules. I don’t know as a firm what they’re going to
do, but within the branch, we certainly will. We may block certain people if
we see that they’re abusing it. They, I’m sure, we advocate that they’ll let us
do that. I don’t know that we will, but it’s better to censor, censor someone,
from using e-mail than have them cause a big problem. And again, this is, a
lot of this is Nicole’s baby, so I don’t know how she’d do it. But that’s my
standpoint. If I were her and I saw someone on the branch level, I may turn
them off. We have the capability to do that.
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Management leaned toward completely inhibiting personal e-mail rather than
dealing with a ‘big problem’ if someone wastes too much time on e-mail. They did
not view it as a limitation of personal freedoms, but rather as a practical way of
avoiding too much difficulty in their job as enforcers of this new ICT. Another
manager responded to the use of e-mail for personal messages:
I view it as a total waste of time, of the recipient’s time, and when you see
people that are getting five or six of them a day, you know, you’ve got to
wonder, “How much time are you spending on this stuff?” And it takes,
you know, it will take you ten minutes to read it. Well, like, I’m paying for
that ten minutes. So, from a productivity stand point I have an issue with it
and also from my productivity stand point I have an issue with it. It’s for
business. Use it for business. If you want to have personal e-mail, you
could have bought a computer here for fifty bucks, bought a modem for it
and taken it home and set your self up on AOL or free e-mail or whatever
you want to do, you don’t have to use this one. That’s not what this one’s
for. So, from both stand points I have an issue with it.
This manager takes an efficiency perspective of e-mail use - personal e-mail is a
waste of time. Of course, this ignores arguments about the total well being of a
person. From a human resources perspective, employees must be treated as whole
individuals with the assumption that happy employees are more productive. Once
again, the management perspective, which is supported by the culture in the
financial industry, is biased toward monitoring e-mail and controlling employees
rather than personal freedoms. In the Small Office a manager commented about
personal use that “It’s fine. You know, this is not an office, I think we’ve scared
them enough that we don’t have a lot of stuff that isn’t approvable. Today was
pretty light. I didn’t think it was a big issue.” Once again, they lean toward a scare
tactic so that individuals monitor their own use. Part of the reason for this is that
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management did not have extra time in their day to monitor a large quantity of e-
mail.
So, it is obvious that despite the general company policy of limited personal
e-mail, the management with Large Office and Small Office strongly discouraged
this type of use. Individual employees then interpreted the policy based on how the
office was enforcing it. Here are specific examples from employees in response to
the new policies:
Well, I guess it’s okay. It keeps the system from being abused. I think it’s
a little too strict because even if you’re doing, within the system and
between regular employees, if they think it’s something personal, they’re
going to block it which kind of sucks. I mean, we can talk back and forth. I
just think it’s sort of strict. ..They’ll put a block on it and say something to
the effect, “The information contained is not acceptable information for
transmission.” Something to that effect. They just won’t let it go through.
It has already happened.
This employee is making the argument that within the office they converse back
and forth, assuming about personal things, so why is it different on e-mail? Why
would personal communication be limited through this medium? The strict policy
is already creating negative reactions in the employees. Another employee began
to monitor themselves:
It’s been wonderful for me, I’ve had really and truly, I only have one major
problem were I had and it was the person on the other end had my home e-
mail address and my work e-mail address and e-mailed both and it came out
as a distribution letter so it went to my home and to work. Which I
necessarily wanted here so I mean it wasn’t, and it wasn’t really appropriate
to come here.
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This CSA supported the policy about what was appropriate and inappropriate to
come to the office and regulated herself.
What affect do these ‘rules’ have on the perception and use of this
technology? For many that I interviewed, this narrower interpretation of the policy
inhibited their use of e-mail.
I probably would have used it a few more times if we did not get an edit that
said you can’t use it for personal business. Well, just an example on that,
unless you’re experienced on using a lot of e-mail and so forth, you’re
probably not going to leap to it as a primary means of communication with
your clients. If you have a prohibition against using it for personal
business, how then are you going to learn how to have a proficiency with it
if, you know. I don’t generally experiment on my clients.
This employee wanted to become more comfortable using e-mail with their friends
before they tried it out on clients, but this was not possible with the policy
enforcement. The following employees just do not use it for business, or would
prefer other means of communication.
I haven’t been [using e-mail] and I’ll tell you why I haven’t been using it,
because most of the stuff that I use e-mail for is personal. And I haven’t
had an opportunity to really use the e-mail for business purposes. If they go
in and they see that it’s not pertaining to business, they’ll block it. So, it
doesn’t do me any good.
So, BH spends close to $500 million on CS and other technology and many
employees don’t want to use it in the way specified by BH. It ends up inhibiting
use of e-mail for anything because people start to develop a negative association
with using e-mail. The brokers find other means of communication just as good, or
better, so they decide to use phone calls or face-to-face instead of e-mail.
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I haven’t used it because I would rather talk to somebody. I mean that will
always be the case, it’s regulated, that’s kind of what the article is about.
It’s so heavily regulated, it’s kind of a bummer. I can’t give it to my friends
because they’ll send me things that will get me in trouble. So, I have to only
use it for business, which is what they want, but I think a phone call is just
as easy. It would be nice if we could e-mail research reports but we can’t
now, which is what they told me. I’m not going to just say, it’s just not as
powerful as speaking.
This distinction of personal versus business use becomes difficult if the relationship
is blurred between the two:
You know I think it’s very difficult to say it has to be all business and no
pleasure. ‘Cause there is, like this person I was talking to on the telephone,
he is, he’s a friend of mine for many years, from the Marine Corps, and he
also has his account with me and he also has friends he works with who,
whom he refers me to, whom he talks with about investing so, if we were to
e-mail each other, would that be personal correspondence, professional
correspondence, probably a little of both. And I think that there’s powers
that be in this, in the office here at BrokerHouse who, who don’t have a
very good ability to interpret the spirit of laws and try to interpret the letter
of law, unfortunately, they’re not in a position of absolute control.
For this broker, personal e-mail is continuing the relationship with a friend who
also happens to be a client. In this situation it is more difficult to asses what should
be categorized as personal versus what is business e-mail.
The original company-wide policy allowed for limited personal use of e-
mail, but both LO and SO, independent of each other, created a branch level policy
of no personal use. This is the first occasion of structuring around CS. The
employees responded to this policy by either not using e-mail at all, or monitoring
their own behavior. The policy slowed the use of the resource made available to
them. Another theme that inhibited the use of e-mail was the extent of active
monitoring and the lack of privacy.
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Lack o f privacy. The second major theme was the amount of monitoring
and lack of privacy in e-mail use, often referring to the company as ‘Big Brother.’
Employees knew that all e-mail could be monitored and that at least 25%, some
thought all, was actively monitored. This is one of the reasons it was mentioned so
often as a serious issue. Most people in organizations understand that e-mail could
be monitored or retrieved, if necessary; they don’t assume privacy. The difference
in perception and response is in the amount of active monitoring that actually
occurs. This is organization-specific and affects the perception and use of this
capability. One broker in Small Office begins to articulate the uncomfortable
feeling of others reading his e-mail:
I don’t use the e-mail because the e-mail is just so... how do I want to say
it? I think Julie still gets reports on our e-mails that come in. So, if
somebody was to send me an e-mail tonight while I’m not in the office, and
I come in at seven o’clock tomorrow morning, and Julie is in here at six or
whatever, it’s my understanding, and I know it used to be this way, and I
think it still is this way, is that she gets a printout of the e-mails that come
into the office. So, she knows what I got before I get it. And that kind of
bothers me. You know. So I don’t, I mean, for clients that’s one thing, but
for anything else. And maybe that’s the way they want it to be, just strictly
business. But even in that regard, it’s still a little bit too, you know, too
much of that Big Brother element for me.
This discomfort made this individual reluctant to use e-mail for personal or
business use. Another employee at SO interpreted their policy as management
communicating that employees should not really use e-mail:
How did they convey it to us? Well, they’ve, of course, you don’t want
inappropriate information being relayed on it. But they’re just Big Brother,
you know. They filter it when it comes in the morning. They go through
everybody’s e-mail to be sure that whatever it is appropriate. And they just
would rather us not use it. I think it’s pretty restrictive since most
companies use it more often than a telephone.
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Both of those quotes mention the organization as ‘Big Brother,3 which is interesting
because that term was first coined to represent government. Yet, it is obvious that
companies have more freedom than the government to monitor and control
individuals. The protection of privacy is very limited in the private organization
and so some have transformed themselves into a recent embodiment of Big
Brother. The new ICTs especially allow this kind of control and monitoring of
communication. This presents an ironic twist in that usually new ICTs are
implemented to encourage communication, but at the same time it allows for
monitoring that detracts people from using it.
Feasibility o f monitoring. The third theme that was mentioned often by both
management and employees was the feasibility of actually monitoring all of that e-
mail. Management had to constantly check for quarantined messages to be released,
and also review 25% of every person's e-mail everyday. In the beginning, when
usage was low, this was not a problem. It had the potential to be a major drain on
resources when e-mail would be increasingly used by employees. In a major
branch in New York the manager completely shut off all e-mail use because he said
he did not have the proper resources to monitor all of it. The manager responsible
for reviewing e-mail in LO said:
I’m having to tell people, “Please have so-and-so take you off of the Joke of
the Day list3 3 because I don't want to look at it everyday, and I have a
requirement that I’ve got to look at it. I hate it because the supervisory
requirement is a full, and there's system problems in the Assentor program.
So, it’s added to my day, at least a half and hour. At least a half an hour of
just kind of trudging through this stuff... I know I have to look at a certain
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percentage of everybody’s e-mail and I have to hit those numbers even if
what I’m looking at is ridiculous... I don’t like it.
She obviously does not like the requirement of reviewing e-mail, especially it is not
related to business. A quick hypothetical calculation: if 150 employees each send
10 e-mails per day, a manager would have to review 375 e-mail messages to be in
compliance with the policy. This results in a negative attitude toward the
technology as well as placing tighter control on her employees in their e-mail use.
One employee noticed that, “How do you monitor so much going out?...‘Cause I
can sit here and e-mail all day long and how does one person, or two people, or a
department [monitor]? You know, you need a department in a place like this.” I
asked one assistant manager if they would also review e-mail. She said, “No, I
don’t want that job. I’ll do anything I can to avoid that job. I mean, that’s a
nightmare for her [the current manager] to have to do that.”
The employees also felt the weight of the expectations on the managers.
One broker said:
So far, I think that it is what it is, but it’s totally unmanageable from a
compliance stand point. I expect it’s just going to get worse and worse and
worse and it’s something that we just have to get out in front of. I mean
that if you, right now, we’re supposed to view twenty-five percent of all e-
mail that are in the branch. Okay, and that’s okay if you’ve got a hundred
e-mails a day. But what happens when we get to a thousand? Right? And
also from the stand point of this quarantining of messages. ..we had some
messages that we were sending out on Monday and she had to leave and
some e-mail messages remained quarantined until she could send them
almost forty-eight hours later. So there was a tremendous delay because of
the policy. But I sort of view that as a work in progress.
She makes the astute observation that this system is only good as long as the
number of e-mails stay within a small number. If employees actually used e-mail as
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much as BH is promoting it, the job of monitoring would be too much for one
person. With only one or two people in each allowed to release quarantined
messages creates a critical bottleneck in information flow also. One broker
summarized the situation and its effects very well:
Well, I think that I completely understand the e- mail policy and I think that
when you bring technology like this into a company that has such stringent
compliance rules and it’s so highly regulated, as well it should be - 1 think
to open up technology like this to an entire company, can be very dangerous
if you don’t put very strict measures on it. So, I understand it. I think that
they’re, ‘cause they have to read all, anything that’s quarantined and then,
like, twenty-five percent of all other mail, they have to read. And
depending on how much e-mail the branch generates, that can be very time
consuming for the managers and I wish there was... I understand the policy,
but I think that there may be a better way to make it - and I don’t know
what it would be, but a better way to make it more, not as much of a burden
on them because if they are overwhelmed by the amount of, you know,
however much e-mail they have to read and approve every day, then if their
attitude is poor towards, you know, I think that can affect the whole thing,
and we just spent a lot of money to get to this place and I just want to, my
desire is to make sure that we see the technology become our friend and not
our enemy. That we ’ re not burdened by it, but that we ’ re able to use it
(italics added).
He directly addresses the idea of reworking the policy so that they are actually able
to use the technology rather than ‘burdened’ by it. From these quotes, the view
from management is very apparent. Monitoring the e-mail is time consuming and
cumbersome. This leads them to be stricter on policy, in hopes of reducing quantity
of e-mail, rather than more loose with policy. Others in the office are also
concerned, or aware, of the time drain and its affect on management’s perception of
e-mail. This adds to the interpretation of this technology as a burden rather than a
new exciting way to communicate.
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As this second round of policy was created and communicated to the
offices, with the branch specific interpretations, employees began to test the
boundaries. They want to find out what is actually going to be enforced and what
is not. This is the next step in the recursive process of policy development.
Testing boundaries
Part of the recursive process is to test boundaries, to find out what
communications behavior will be allowed and not allowed. So those who ventured
to use e-mail pushed some of these boundaries, intentionally or accidentally, testing
where it would be enforced. Once certain aspects of the policy were or weren’t
enforced, employees had a better idea of how they were allowed to use the
technology. In true narrative form these stories were passed around and people
learned through others what was acceptable. Here is how management viewed it on
their end of enforcing policy over personal e-mail:
Or if, the way that it’s come back to me a couple times is, at the beginning I
was sending warning messages. Every time they’d send a joke, I’d send a
warning message and then I’d go ahead and approve it. Well, the person
that was the recipient, if it was an incoming let’s say. I would send a
warning message back to the sender and then approve it so that it got to
whoever it was going to. And they would hear from the person that was the
sender that they got this warning message. Otherwise they had no idea that
anything had gone on in the backdrop. And then I just to where I was
rejecting them and, you know, after I’d sent a couple of warning messages
and the same person keeps sending in the Joke of the Day, I’d just reject
them back to them. But the recipient, if the recipient is inside, never new
that they had been quarantined, never knew it had been rejected. There’s no
kind of notification for them. Well, I’m not going to take the time to call
them up and say, “By the way, your Joke of the Day from this person was
rejected.” After five or six of them though, I will call them and tell them,
“Please have this person take you,” if they’re not responding to the reject
messages and be astute enough to take them off of there, then I’ll call the
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recipient and say, “You know, you’re on this guys joke of the day list. Fm
tired of looking at them. Please, have them take you off.”
On the other side, here is how employees interpreted management’s enforcement of
some of the policy regulations:
[Regarding personal e-mail] You get reprimanded or you get a call from
management. Let’s say, you know those jokes that that get e-mailed to
you? (Laughter.) The very first time that I tried it, Fran called me, “Tell her
not to send you this again.’’...And we were just testing, you know, we were
testing the a ..., just to see if it worked, to see if I’d get it and that’s how it
came about....She asked me to fill out one form, you know, as to my contact
or who sends me the e-mail, who I send the e-mail. I think it’s for the
whole office. And since I’m not using it a lot... I want to use it, you know,
to communicate outside. But I’m afraid to do it.
This employee felt intimidated to even test the technology for fear of being
reprimanded. These stories began to circulate of individuals receiving ‘warnings’
about e-mail use. The employees began to monitor their own use so that they did
not receive a warning.
That’s been a lot of stuff that I understand that she’s rejected. That have
come in and that have been rejected so um, or she’s released some and then
she’s gone and warned and said, I don’t exactly know what our policy is on
that but I do know that there have been things that, oh yeah that have come
through and then have been... (pause) You know, quote, unquote,
supposedly no, not acceptable and that they’ve questioned on it.
From these stories, people began to gain a more coherent sense of the policy and
how it was actually going to be enforced with them. One employee responded by
questioning his responsibility for what others send him:
I’d really like to see BrokerHouse get aggravated at me for what other
people send me. I’m not responsible. I can’t be responsible for what
people send me. They can send me vulgar, pornographic letters, how can
you hold me responsible for that?
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After they tested boundaries for awhile, the enforcement of the policy became
clear. As this settled and became more set, employees had three general reactions.
Reactions to E-mail Policy
In general, overall use of e-mail was low in the first couple of months. In
reflection of the major themes and testing boundaries, reactions to the e-mail policy
can be categorized into three groups: 1) those that accepted the policy and used e-
mail accordingly, 2) those that wanted to use e-mail but tried to subvert the
monitoring, and 3) those that avoided using e-mail all together because of privacy
issues.
The first group understood the compliance issues surrounding e-mail and just
considered the monitoring as part of the job and their industry. They understood the
need to regulate written communication given SEC regulations and the potential for
lawsuits.
Many did not use e-mail very much or limited it for professional purposes only and
assumed that the monitoring would never be a problem.
There are a lot of really stupid people that get jobs. And unfortunately, you
can be good at what you do and largely stupid at the same time. So, that’s
why there are policies. I mean, you really shouldn’t put things down there
that don’t belong there. And some people, you know, talked funny on them
or they’re saying inappropriate things. So, I think it’s a good thing. I’m
fortunate. I mean, I don’t like anything that regulates anything, but the real
world is more like big brother’s got to be checking on people because they
do say the wrong thing, and do the wrong thing.
He obviously believed that monitoring people was important because people make
mistakes. This view buys into a more negative view of human nature - that people
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need to be watched to be good. I asked every interviewee what they thought about
the monitoring. Those in this category replied with answers such as, “They have to
do that. Absolutely. Absolutely needed” and “I believe that the policy is
appropriate for the business, I don’t have any problem with it.” Most of the people
in this category deemed it a necessary evil due to compliance issues. They might
not like it, but they understood why BH had that policy:
I can understand where it’s you know, why they need to have it. I don’t
necessarily agree with it but I can understand it and knowing that, knowing
that yes, people would abuse it. So, I believe it’s there for a reason...That
one percent out there... Yeah, human nature. People will tend to push the
envelope. Even regular letters, you have to get it approved some how, you
know. So, they are watching. Even if I e-mail or letter. Even a fax. If you
are going to fax something, in fact, you have to get it approved. You just get
used to us it.
Even though this employee did not agree with it, he was ‘used to it’ because of all
the monitoring of any written communication. Based on a negative view of human
nature, this is to be expected for that errant ‘one percent. ’ For these employees, it
fit into their view of humanity and the regulatory nature of the industry.
The second group did not agree with the BrokerHouse policy and thought it
inhibited effective use of this new capability. They tried to subvert the monitoring
and find avenues around it. They viewed the heavy monitoring as “Big Brother”-
esque and as an invasion of privacy. The most common way to avoid monitoring
was to bring in their own computer and use a separate e-mail account. One broker
wrote in a different language so that the computer would not quarantine the words
and management would not understand the e-mail. Another broker expressed
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119
concern that monitoring would go beyond just the business content, but begin to
monitor his personal beliefs.
I also understand that there are certain issues, which I find a little bit
obtrusive and obnoxious and this is where the invasion of privacy comes in.
And that is that there is a political correctness that is infringed upon the
corporate culture and where you can not say certain things, not withstanding
the fact that you have a moral concern against certain lifestyle choices and
behaviors. That if you voice those concerns that you are then seen as
insensitive or in need of some kind of re-adjustment in your common think,
you know the mind police come out and you know they have a ready
resource by which they can prove that your thinking is obscure, that you’re
clear, that you need to be adjusted.
He clearly did not think monitoring would stop at just business communication.
His fear was that the ‘mind police’ would disapprove of his thoughts or
communication about nonbusiness related issues. He did not want to be ‘adjusted’
by those in his office so he brought in his own computer everyday and used a
public ISP. Most of the employees who wanted to subvert the system would bring
in laptops and use an Earthlink or AOL account to avoid the monitoring.
The third group also disagreed with the policy and refused to use e-mail at all.
They saw the monitoring as obtrusive and an invasion of privacy. They decided
not to use e-mail, with that level of regulation, to conduct any business. A few
mentioned that their clients are also their friends. There is a blurring between
professional and private life that the e-mail policy does not take into account.
Some commented that the rules need to change to produce a viable e-mail policy.
I don’t know, it’s a little ridiculous, trying to handcuff people. You know,
that’s why I don’t use it. And if I give it out you know, you know my clients
are my friends so. You know, things that would be sent over, would not be
appropriate... I’m talking about jokes and things like that, would come
across and I [would] get in trouble for it. So I think that’s [the] bigger
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reason as why I don’t give it [e-mail address] out.
Rebecca: So do you think it would change the nature o f your relationship
with your clients or how you interacted if you use the e-mail?
Yeah, it probably would I mean, you know I don’t know it might make us
closer, if we did use it... without big brother looking. But with big brother,
I’d just rather not even use it.
The kind of e-mail he thought would be helpful, more ‘friendly’ communication,
was considered in appropriate. So, he did not want to use it at all. Because of
potential delays when e-mails were quarantined, this broker did not trust the
reliability of communicating through this system:
As I understand, because of the anal retentive nature of lawyers and
Compliance Departments, e-mail can literally sit in the holding tank for a
week, until somebody reviews it, so why bother? So no, I haven’t [used
it]and I don’t intend to unless they can contract the process in time. Because
I really don’t want to put a message out there, that I have no idea whether or
not it was received on the other end. The nature of our business is that the
decisions that are not made within the next five minutes could grossly affect
the outcome of a piece of news or information. We don’t have the luxury to
sit around and wait for e-mail to clear, I have to pick up the phone and
communicate my thoughts and ideas.
Others said that “It’s just not worth it,” referring to the monitoring they would have
to endure.
The recursive nature of policy and action are mediated by individual
interpretation of the policy. So, attitude plays a role in the behavior, which then
either reinforces or subverts the policy. This cycle shows the structuration of rules
and resources, in this case CS and the policy around it, which affect human action.
Then the responses by the employees did affect the policy.
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121
New Policy Developed
The overall use was still fairly low after a couple months of the technology
(in SO and LO it was estimated at about 10%). BrokerHouse became aware of
complaints from both management and employees. For management, the
complaints focused on the time of monitoring, specifically a waste in intraoffice e-
mail. For the employees, the complaints focused on those issues mentioned above,
privacy and personal e-mail.
Brokerhouse changed the software so that intraoffice e-mail was not a part of the
25% e-mail that had to be monitored. This reduced the burden of e-mail for
management to review. Two years after the introduction of CS, they still have a
policy of 25% of all e-mail must be monitored due to SEC regulations. They also
have added more ‘trigger’ words to the Assentor software program so that more e-
mail is quarantined. In large offices, the branch and assistant managers are not
usually the monitors. Instead, they have an office or compliance manager who will
monitor. In one office it is estimated that they spend 2-3 hours per day reviewing
e-mail. Despite this, e-mail use has increased significantly.
The interaction between the rules and resources with human agency clearly
plays itself out over the use of e-mail and policy regulating it. The policy is not a
set entity, but rather evolves over time in response to users’ perceptions, attitudes
and behaviors. The new policy then affects their behavior. This kind of evolution
can happen more quickly at the organizational level than at the national legislative
issue in regards to privacy. It is a smaller group of constituents that are affected.
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Lack of privacy was a serious concern for most employees that wanted to use CS,
specifically for e-mail. The strict policy initially inhibited the use of e-mail in the
way that BrokerHouse originally intended. Years later, e-mail use has increased
which brings up new questions about perception and use of ICTs. Does privacy
become less important or do people become comfortable in their culture? Further
exploration of the relationship between privacy and communication technologies
within organizational contexts is needed to better understand this phenomenon.
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123
Conclusion
Discussion
The theoretical advances of this research are embedded in the joining of
coevolutionary and structuration perspectives to understand the adoption of ICTs in
organizations. Both environmental factors and internal factors must be taken into
account to understand the entire picture of technology adoption and implementation
in an organizational context. Coevolutionary theory offers a broad picture
regarding the means to understand available options, selection and ultimately
retention. But, other more specific theories clarify the process of how these
decisions are actually made and then implemented. Overall, perception, and with it
attitude, toward ICTs was an important mediating factor between structural forces
and actual behaviors. This was evident in how CS was actually used. Most
employees did not see it as a relationship tool, but rather as an information source.
So, they used the Internet and other databases for research. They used the client
database software to manage client information. But, they did not use it as a way to
work with others in teams, to build stronger relationships with clients, and only
reluctantly used it for intra-office communication. Second, their response to the
monitoring policy around e-mail determined how much, if at all, they actually used
e-mail.
Coevolution and structuration. Most research has not wed these two
theoretical frameworks together because, initially, they might appear incongruous.
Giddens (1984) is specifically critical of theories that give too much explanatory
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power to structures and limit human agency. This research has shown that
organizations coevolve in relation to their environment, institutional pressures, and
the implementation of technologies in ways that are not predictable. The new
coevolutionary theory allows for human agency to interact with environmental
factors. It does not have deterministic evolutionary outcomes. This is important
when trying to understand the numerous factors within a complex system such as
an organization. It lives in a larger environment that affects it, but the organization
also has its own structures to follow. Individuals have agency to affect the
structures which ultimately are a part of, and have an influence on, the coevolution
of the organization. The structuring of the organization, at that level, affects how it
coevolves in its larger environment at the systems level. Both theories provide a
dynamic framework in which to understand the process of change in and around
organizations.
Coevolution and institutional theory. At the system level, the coevolution of
BH and ICTs was affected by opposing institutional pressures and the changing
access landscape. The introduction of new technologies, namely the Internet, into
the environment of the finance industry put isomorphic pressures on BH to adapt.
In response to online trading, they changed their revenue model, offered new
services, and reconceptualized the role of the broker into that of a knowledge
worker. As the organization coevolved in response to its environment, the response
of the employees was the most interesting. This adds another level of analysis -
what is the organizational members’ response to this coevolution? Most did not feel
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threatened, partly because of how the organization framed the change. The
company assured brokers that they were still at the heart of the business. This
framing might affect the response and retention of selected options in the
coevolutionary process. On the other hand, brokers did reposition themselves to
emphasize their role as advisors rather than as traders. This ‘survival’ tactic was
important in adapting to the coevolution.
In response to institutional pressures from other firms and their clients, BH
offered their own online trading service, Access, as well as implemented CS so that
employees could have Internet and e-mail access. The selection of CS was strongly
influenced by professional isomorphic pressures, but its actual implementation and
use was influenced by another institutional pressure - state regulation. The
interaction between these two forces essentially handicapped the actual use of the
new technology. It was offered to employees, but policy around its use was so
restrictive that employees did not want to use it. In other words, BH became more
legitimate because their employees had access to the Internet and could now e-mail
clients; however, the monitoring policy made its use unattractive to many. For the
research on institutional theory, this adds a dimension of opposing institutional
forces and their potential interactions. What happens when two institutional forces
have different pressures? In general, both are needed to be ‘legitimate’ but the
organization might be pleasing different audiences (in this case, government versus
clients). Future research should focus on how organizations resolve opposing
pressures.
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Perceptions o f technology„ At the organizational level, CS was perceived as
an information and organizational tool, but not as a tool to build relationships.
Employees appreciated the access to more information, which leveled some of the
power differences based on information access. They also used the client
organizational tool to keep track of clients, but still thought that the telephone or
face-to-face communication was better for building the kind of relationships needed
to be successful in this type of business. They view their business as a
“relationship business,” based on trust, in which they provide knowledge and
advice to help their client succeed. This advice goes beyond information, and it
was important for the brokers to establish strong relationships with their clients.
They also did not use e-mail for very much intra-office communication. Those
who refused to use it influenced others’ behavior.
Perceptions of the policy around e-mail also affected the attitudes and use
of e-mail. One group of employees understood the compliance issues and were not
against the monitoring. They worked within the policy to still use e-mail. The
other two groups reacted negatively to the policy. They either subverted the e-mail
system or chose not to use it all. This limited overall use of e-mail, both intra-
ofBce and to external recipients. Management’s desire to keep their amount of
monitoring to a minimum also affected employee’s perceptions of how they should
use e-mail.
Organizational characteristics. CS gave brokers more equal access to
resources, but for the larger organization it tended to reinforce the power structure
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already established. Managers still had tight control over communication. This
supports the argument that management will often choose technology that already
supports the existing power structure (Danziger et al, 1982). CS did not change
the environment from individualistic and competitive to a team-based knowledge
sharing organization. Even though new organizational forms could emerge, the
social factors shaping the implementation supported the current structure. As
Barley (1986) found in the implementation of technology in hospitals, the
technology itself could be appropriated to support the existing structure (as in one
hospital) or to change it (as in the other). Although the use of ICTs allows for more
control through surveillance and monitoring (Beniger, 1986), the ability for some to
shape the use of the ICTs is greater than others’ ability in the organization. In this
case, the executives and management continued their control over communication
in using this technology.
The focus of this research was not on the outcomes based on the
technology, but rather on the ICTs implementation and appropriation. The rewards
in this organization were still based on individual sales so employees worked
mostly alone; they did not use new communication technology to share information
with each other, even though technically sharing became much easier. The
compliance issues around the finance industry, as well as reward structures, limited
the use of CS and also perpetuated stringent norms of control over information
access and communication. This did not encourage the use of CS to share
information with others. Finally, because of the limited e-mail use, past media for
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communication were still continued. For example, memos were still distributed
even though the information had also been communicated in e-mail. In the private
sphere, including companies, privacy of communication is based more strongly on
the individual’s negotiation with the organization, and less on national law.
Privacy and policy. The very important issue of privacy plays out
differently in the private realm versus the public. The legal standing in the private
sphere, ‘no expectation of privacy,’ in conjunction with an increase in using
communication technologies, allows employers to actively monitor employees at
levels that were not feasible in the past.
So, employees must negotiate their privacy, in regard to communication
technology, by interacting with the organizational policy around this issue. As was
demonstrated with BH, this was a recursive process, open to interpretation and
testing boundaries, as the policy was reconstructed over a number of cycles. When
the policy became more set, employees chose to either follow it, or to resist or to
not use the technology at all. Creating policy around technology is important
because the more aligned strategy is with technological choices, the chance of
positive organizational outcomes is increased (Parker, 2000). Thus, policy is one
of the most important social factors within the organization that affects how new
communication technologies are understand and used within that context.
Employees’ behavior, especially with respect to the use of ICT, is strongly
affected by their perception of privacy within the organization. This can create a
certain organizational culture of monitoring and rigorous control of
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communication. Some accept that cultural norm as the way business is being done
in that industry. Others view the organization as the next manifestation of Big
Brother in their lives* These privacy issues have implications for work life,
employee satisfaction and organizational culture that need to be further explored.
This also affects their view of communication technology and how it should
be used. They do not see new ICTs, such as e-mail or the Internet, as knowledge
sharing and communication tools. Rather, CS was most commonly viewed as a way
to gather information because this had the least amount of monitoring and did not
put the organization at risk. CS was not seen as a personal communication tool, so
many brokers would still rather use the phone. So, in general, e-mail use was
limited for three reasons: 1. personal use of e-mail was prohibited, 2. lack of
privacy and 3. it was perceived as second-rate to develop business relationships in
comparison to other media. This third point is rooted in the idea of e-mail as a
substitute for other forms of media rather than as an enhancement. Employees
seemed to have the idea that it was the phone or e-mail, but not both.
Limitations
To be more generalizable, the insights from this case study should be
further explored across different situations. Another limitation is the use of a
convenience sample within the stratified sample because self-selection bias could
influence the representative nature of the data. A third limitation is that only 2-3
months was spent in BH after the implementation of CS. Over time, some of these
initial reactions and behaviors might have changed.
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Implications
The theoretical implications of this research are constructed from the
joining of coevolutionary and structuration theories. Structuring processes within
the organization affected how the organization coevolved within its environment.
This means that even in coevolutionary frameworks there is room for agency and
various outcomes. Another important implication is that institutional pressures
might be contradictory. Within coevolution, an organization chooses to follow one
pressure or another, or attempts to reconcile them.
This research has implications for all organizations implementing new
information and communication technologies:
• Understand the institutional pressures, some contradictory, that affect
decision-making in adoption of new ICT.
• Perception of the ICT plays an important role in its adoption and use.
Frame its implementation and use strategically.
• Develop training that supports the organization’s goals for the ICT.
• Decide overall goals for ICT and create policy that supports those rather
than hinder them.
• Understand which organizational cultures enable certain types of
technology.
• The nature of the business internally, competitive vs. collaborative, and
its culture will affect how the ICT is adopted and used.
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® Privacy is an important issue to employees, even if organizations have a
legal right to monitor. Think about effects of lack of privacy on
technology use and organizational culture.
• Organizational factors to take into account: size, complexity, vertical
control, culture and structures.
Future Research
There is obviously more to uncover in the coevolutionary relationship
between environment, organization and technology. The evolution in terms of
changing access could be further developed. Second, how the evolution is framed
at the selection level may affect the overall retention. This is the point at which
perception of the ICT is very important. This process could be further explored.
Third, the interaction of different institutional pressures within the coevolutionary
process and how they affect selection and retention needs more exposition. The
culture of an organization also plays an important role in how people use and adapt
to technology. Cultural norms of communication and behavior should be explored
around this issue. Issues to look at are the nature of the organization, competitive
vs. collaborative, and the size. Surprisingly, Small Office and Large Office did not
have significant differences in their response to the technology; but, differences in
size on a larger scale might be considerable. The technology itself must also be
taken into account. Is it simple or complex? What functions does it support?
Finally, specific policy issues around implementation of new ICTs within
organizations, including privacy issues, are a rich area of research. Conducting
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research about privacy and policy across a number of institutions in the same field
would offer insights into similarities and differences across organizations. Another
potential area of research would be to compare these policies against policies of
organizations in the European Union. This would give a sense of how the law and
culture affect privacy issues within organizations.
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145
APPENDIX A: INTERVIEW PROTOCOL - PREROLLOUT for NON
MANAGERS
1. How long have you worked for BH? What does your job entail?
2. What do you think about the current technology system (the Source)? Does it
meet your needs? How important is it to your job?
3. Were you consulted about the change to the new system - CompSys?
4. I know that you haven't had direct experience with CS, but what are your
expectations? Do you foresee any advantages or disadvantages?
5. How confident are you in CompSys? (very confident, confident, not very
confident)
6. How has the conversion process been implemented? What kind of training have
you received? Do you have enough information? Has it been timely?
7. Do you feel that you are ready for the conversion? Do you feel that the office is
ready for the conversion?
8. What do you think about the postponement of the rollout here in the
downtown office? Have you been given any reasons for the delay?
9. How do you feel about getting e-mail and Internet access?
10. What is the management attitudes’ toward CS?
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146
APPENDIX B: INTERVIEW PROTOCOL - PREROLLOUT for MANAGERS
1. What does your position here entail? How long have you worked for BH?
2. What do you think about the current technology system (the Source)? Does it
meet your needs? Does it meet the office needs? Why or why not?
3. Whose decision was it to change to CompSys? Were you consulted about the
change to the new system?
4. I know that you have been involved in the training in the East Coast, have you
been involved in the conversion in any other way?
5. From your experience, what do you think about CompSys? What are the
advantages or disadvantages?
6. How confident are you in CompSys? (very confident, confident, not very
confident)
7. Regarding CompSys, how are the decisions about whom gets what programs or
software made? What is the reason for not giving everyone the same software
(cost)?
8. How has the conversion process been implemented, in BH and in this office?
Do you foresee any difficulties in the conversion here?
9. What kind of training have you received? What kind of training has most of the
office received?
10. Do you feel that you are ready for the conversion? Do you feel that the office
is ready for the conversion?
11. What do you think about the postponement of the rollout here in the downtown
office? Have you been given any reasons for the delay?
12. Are you aware of any changes made based on previous implementation? What
are the “lessons learned”?
13. How good will this technology be compared to other firms in the same
business?
13. Any other questions or comments?
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APPENDIX C: INTERVIEW PROTOCOL - POSTROLLOUT for
NONMANAGERS
1. CompSys is
a) everything I’ve always wanted,
b) sufficient for me,
c) not what I expected, or
d) already outdated?
Why did you say that?
2. What do you think about CompSys?
3. How proficient would you say you are right now on CompSys?
4. Is the system what you expected it to be?
5. Have you seen any advantages so far?
6. Have you seen any disadvantages?
7. Have you used it to share or find information?
8. Did you have any problems adapting to CompSys?
9. Who do you usually go to if you have a problem with CS?
10. Were you a part of the training when it was here? If yes, how did you feel about
training? Do you feel like you could use more training or more information about
CS?
11. Have you had a chance to use the e-mail system at all? If yes, what do you use
it for?
12. How do you feel about the e-mail policy?
13. Have you been using the Internet at all? What do you usually use it for?
14. How does CS affect your job?
15. What do you think about BH’s decision to offer online trading to its clients?
16. Do you have any questions or comments for me?
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
APPENDIX D: INTERVIEW PROTOCOL - POSTROLLOUT for MANAGERS
1. How do you think the roll-out and implementation went for CS?
2. How do you think the office has adapted to CompSys?
3. How do you feel that the training went?
4. Have you seen any advantages so far?
5. Have you seen any disadvantages at all?
6. What was your experience with e-mail?
7. What is BH’s official policy on e-mail? What is considered appropriate use for
e-mail?
8. Do people use e-mail for intraoffice use?
9. How have people been using the Internet? Do you supervise that at all?
10. Do you have any other comments or questions?
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149
APPENDIX E: FOCUS GROUP PROTOCOL - PREROLLOUT at LARGE
OFFICE
Group Introductions
Have people go around and introduce themselves, how long they have been brokers
and how long they have worked for BH (Draw picture of table and put initials
where people sit)
I. Perception/attitudes of communication technology in general (10 minutes)
• Free association: What words come to mind when you think about
communications technology? (such as cell phones, computers, pagers)
• What are some pros and cons of communication technology?
II. Old system - (7 - 10 minutes)
• Who uses this system, The Source, and how much do you really use it?
• How is it used?
• What did you like about system?
• What did you not like about system?
• Do you see it as important to do your job well?
III. Introduction and rollout of CompSys - Attitudes (10 minutes)
• Whose decision was it to change to CompSys? Did you have any say in the
decision?
• How was the change introduced to you?
• What was your initial reaction? Has it changed? If so, how?
• (ask if necessary) How strong is the support for CompSys?
• How do you feel about being the “test site” for the rest of BH? What are some
of the advantages and disadvantages of being a test site?
IV New system ~ ~ CompSys - Perceptions, Training (15 minutes)
• How much confidence do you have with the new system compared to the old?
• Do you see any benefits in changing to CompSys? How will it make your job
easier?
• Do you see any difficulties in changing to CompSys? Will it make anything
more difficult (e.g. take a lot of time)
• Do you feel prepared for the change? What sort of training have you had? Do
you feel that it is adequate or enough?
• What specific steps will you take to become proficient or comfortable with
CompSys?
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

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Creator Heino, Rebecca Dawn (author)

Core Title Coevolution of technology and organization: A case study of BrokerHouse

School Graduate School

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program Communication

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag business administration, management,OAI-PMH Harvest,speech communication

Language English

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Advisor Riley, Patricia (committee chair), Cummings, Thomas (committee member), Thomas, Doug (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c16-368248

Unique identifier UC11339197

Identifier 3103899.pdf (filename),usctheses-c16-368248 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier 3103899.pdf

Dmrecord 368248

Document Type Dissertation

Rights Heino, Rebecca Dawn

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA