This paper presents a teaching mode! that has been used successfully in the MBA core course in information systems at several universities. The model is re/erred to as the "Information Technology interaction Model" because it maintains that the consequences of information systems in organizations follow largely from the interaction of the technology with the organization and its environment The model series a number of pedagogical purposes: to integrate the various course components, to provide a formal foundation for the course content, to foster practical analytical skills, and to provide a framework for case discussions and student projects. Moreover, the model is intended to acquaint students with the dynamics of information systems in organizations and to help them recognize the benefits, dangers, and limitations of these systems. The paper includes a discussion and examples of how the model can be used for proactive and reactive analyses, and it concludes with observations on the model's effectiveness in the core course.
In the course of interacting with a decision support system (DSS), decision makers may have numerous opportunities for exercising judgment. Some judgments pertain to what to do next; others require predictions or evaluations. Either deliberately or inadvertently, a DSS may guide its users in performing these judgments. This article lays a foundation and proposes an agenda for researching such "decisional guidance." Studying docisional guidance matters for two reasons. First, deliberately incorporating guidance in a system offers the potential of more supportive systems while raising a number of design questions. Second, understanding the consequences of guidance--deliberate or not--contributes to comprehending how DSSs affect decision-making behavior. This article examines three aspects of decisional guidance: (1) when and why system designers should provide decisional guidance, considering the opportunities, motives, and means for guiding; (2) how designers can provide guidance, introducing a three-dimensional typology for deliberate guidance; and (3) the consequences of decisional guidance--that is, its effects and effectiveness. This ankle provides a coherent approach to a set of behavioral questions just now beginning to be addressed by researchers in a fragmented, technologically oriented manner.
The Decision Support Systems (DSS) literature is in general agreement that use of DSS leads to individual and organizational change, but there is no consensus as to whether DSS and their designers serve as agents for directed or nondirected change. Researchers have proceeded from two different sets of premises, drawing different conclusions about the nature of DSS. This paper considers both views, examining how differences in designers' attitudes toward change agency ought to be manifest in the features of the DSS they implement. Two attributes of DSS, ''system restrictiveness" and "decisional guidance," are discussed as the basis for understanding differences in DSS following from differences in designer attitudes toward change. Using these two attributes, four DSS strategies for directed change and five strategies for nondirected change are presented.