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trialled a computer-enhanced physical token-based substitute for the flight strips. Clearly
new ICT technologies, such as mobile devices and ubiquitous computing can play a role
here. Second, where relevant, the environment of the agents must be designed to aid
situation handover between agents.
Discussion and conclusions
In this paper we have proposed an initial methodology for designing situational inform-
ation systems. Using traditional methodologies, designers decompose the world into
object correlates for implementation in databases where information about real world
objects is held. A situational approach is, by contrast, likely to result in data about
activities and situations being recorded so that action can be undertaken. The systems
designed are likely to be radically different from those resulting from traditional meth-
odologies. For example, it is highly unlikely that an IS designer trained in existing design
methodologies would design a system with the simplicity and elegance of the Kanban
system whereas an operator on the shop floor would probably see Kanbans as a logical
system for controlling stock. This observation, which is in principle testable, dramatically
highlights the gulf between information design theory and operations practice, which
our methodology addresses. Furthermore, the use of Kanbans cannot be dismissed as
merely a quaint or anachronistic manual system because it is now very widely used in
the high-tech automotive manufacturing industry where it often replaces computerised
systems based on the deliberative approach. Thus, this methodology has the potential
to revolutionise information systems and, we expect, will lead to much more effective
information systems in specific contexts.
We built the initial methodology by examining concepts from the situational systems
literature and by building a tentative methodology based on these concepts. We then
examined some existing (manual) situational systems found in the literature involving
human actors to deepen our understanding of the characteristics of situational systems
and thereby to strengthen the tentative methodology.
We have found, in examining human actors as part of evolved situational systems, that
environmental structuring and the role of physical tokens in an actor's environment are
critical to designing situational systems. Representation of situations and activities in
an agent's environment helps situated reasoning and enables action with little delibera-
tion. Physical tokens help agents to hand over situations and to solve problems. We also
expect that, in computerised information systems, specific physical information and
communications technology may be required to support physical tokens for human
actors in these systems.
In future work, we intend using three action research cycles (Baskerville and Wood-
Harper, 1996; Lau, 1999) to successively refine the methodology from here. In each
cycle, an already implemented system in an organisation will be analysed and changed
by applying the situational systems methodology. The methodology used in each cycle
will be the output methodology of the previous cycle (or that emerging from the pilot
cycle, if it is the first). The system selected in a specific cycle will be one that has been
implemented using a traditional design and development methodology, involves routine
work, and has been deemed to be ineffective.
The methodology being refined in this project is likely to add a much deeper understand-
ing to disparate attempts at designing information systems for difficult contexts involving
repetitive routine activity. Soft Systems Methodology, Human-computer Interfaces, and
Ubiquitous Computing are all examples of other possible approaches but they lack uni-
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