Seminar on "Work System Theory: A Theory Base for Information Systems" by Prof. Steven Alter

Work system theory (WST) is an evolving, multi-faceted body of theory for describing, understanding, analyzing, and designing systems in organizations. Join us for this seminar by Professor Steven Alter from the University of San Francisco

Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - 13:00 to 15:00

The presentation on work system theory (WST) will cover the following topics:

  • the two basic frameworks in WST, the work system framework for summarizing a work system at a point in time and the work system life cycle model for describing how a work system evolves over time

  • basic premises underlying WST, and why those premises point in unique directions

  • recent extensions of WST and directions for the future

The presentation will be designed to encourage discussion of the following issues:

  • Does WST make sense?

  • What are the benefits and shortcomings of WST?

  • How can researchers, practitioners, and instructors use WST?

  • How is WST related to other theories, such as activity theory, actor network theory, chaos theory, coordination theory, decision theory, evolutionary theory, general systems theory, and so on?

Short bio:

Steven Alter is Professor of Information Systems at the University of San Francisco. He received his B.S. and Ph.D. at MIT. His research for the last decade has concerned developing systems analysis concepts and methods that can be used by typical business professionals and can support communication with IT professionals. His 2006 book, The Work System Method: Connecting People, Processes, and IT for Business Results, is a distillation and extension of ideas in 1992, 1996, 1999, and 2002 editions of his information system textbook. His articles have been published in Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review, MIS Quarterly, IBM Systems Journal, European Journal of Information Systems, Decision Support Systems, Interfaces, Communications of the ACM, Communications of the Association for Information Systems, CIO Insight, and many refereed conference proceedings.

More information about WST and the presenter: www.stevenalter.com

Signup; e-mail to Tasja Rodian (tr.inf@cbs.dk) no later than May 18.

The page was last edited by: Communications // 04/18/2011