Studies in health technology and informatics, 2012
Health care aides (HCAs) are the backbone of the home care system and provide a range of services... more Health care aides (HCAs) are the backbone of the home care system and provide a range of services to people who, for various reasons related to chronic conditions and aging, are not able to take care of themselves independently. The demand for HCA services will increase and the current HCA supply will likely not keep up with this increasing demand without fundamental changes in the current environment. Information and communication technology (ICT) can address some of the workflow challenges HCAs face. In this project, we conducted an ethnographic study to document and analyse HCAs' workflows and team interactions. Based on our findings, we designed an ICT tool suite, integrating easily available existing and newly developed (by our team) technologies to address these issues. Finally, we simulated the deployment of our technologies, to assess the potential impact of these technological solutions on the workflow and productivity of HCAs, their healthcare teams and client care.
ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) such as consulting and research and develop... more ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) such as consulting and research and development services are important factors of performance and innovation in industrialized economies. However, current modeling techniques aimed at supporting service design do not account for their core characteristics such as the relational nature of exchanges among providers, clients, and other actors. Using data from a case of academic research and development service as a type of KIBS, we present a modeling technique that can support the design of successful service engagements in this domain. This work is guided by the understanding of service as a process of collaborative value creation, or value cocreation. Beyond the contribution of the modeling technique to KIBS design, our work shows the strength of using a Design Science Research methodology in creating design artifacts that are strongly aligned with the problem domain for which they are developed.
Proceedings of the 2012 iConference on - iConference '12, 2012
ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) play an important role in industrialized ec... more ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) play an important role in industrialized economies, yet little research has focused on how best to support their design. The emerging understanding of service as a process of value cocreation could provide a relevant framework for KIBS design. However, we first need to better understand how value is actually cocreated in KIBS; this understanding then needs to be made operational in design tools that can help create successful outcomes for all parties engaged in a service relationship. Our work aims to identify key mechanisms of value cocreation in KIBS, and adapt existing modeling techniques so as to support KIBS design. While preliminary, our results show that Agent-Oriented modeling, in particular i*, is able to express key mechanisms of value cocreation and account for its intentional dimension. This research yields theoretical insights for a KIBS-specific theory of value cocreation and practical support for the design of KIBS.
Proceedings of the 2012 iConference on - iConference '12, 2012
ABSTRACT There has been much interest in the design of social websites and an increasing use of s... more ABSTRACT There has been much interest in the design of social websites and an increasing use of social tools for group work in organizations. Recommendations and design guidelines have been developed that guide designers in building certain aspects of social network and social media sites from scratch. However, there has been little investigation into transforming existing information systems into socially-oriented ones. We address this gap by first identifying the key features of socially-oriented systems from literature on social network and social media sites. We then present S-FIT, a social features integration technique, which can be applied to a model of an existing information system in order to identify opportunities to incorporate social features within the system. S-FIT can be used to extend commonly-used systems modeling techniques. We illustrate the application of S-FIT on a Business Process Diagram of an existing library information system.
Studies in health technology and informatics, 2012
Health care aides (HCAs) are the backbone of the home care system and provide a range of services... more Health care aides (HCAs) are the backbone of the home care system and provide a range of services to people who, for various reasons related to chronic conditions and aging, are not able to take care of themselves independently. The demand for HCA services will increase and the current HCA supply will likely not keep up with this increasing demand without fundamental changes in the current environment. Information and communication technology (ICT) can address some of the workflow challenges HCAs face. In this project, we conducted an ethnographic study to document and analyse HCAs' workflows and team interactions. Based on our findings, we designed an ICT tool suite, integrating easily available existing and newly developed (by our team) technologies to address these issues. Finally, we simulated the deployment of our technologies, to assess the potential impact of these technological solutions on the workflow and productivity of HCAs, their healthcare teams and client care.
ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) such as consulting and research and develop... more ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) such as consulting and research and development services are important factors of performance and innovation in industrialized economies. However, current modeling techniques aimed at supporting service design do not account for their core characteristics such as the relational nature of exchanges among providers, clients, and other actors. Using data from a case of academic research and development service as a type of KIBS, we present a modeling technique that can support the design of successful service engagements in this domain. This work is guided by the understanding of service as a process of collaborative value creation, or value cocreation. Beyond the contribution of the modeling technique to KIBS design, our work shows the strength of using a Design Science Research methodology in creating design artifacts that are strongly aligned with the problem domain for which they are developed.
Proceedings of the 2012 iConference on - iConference '12, 2012
ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) play an important role in industrialized ec... more ABSTRACT Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) play an important role in industrialized economies, yet little research has focused on how best to support their design. The emerging understanding of service as a process of value cocreation could provide a relevant framework for KIBS design. However, we first need to better understand how value is actually cocreated in KIBS; this understanding then needs to be made operational in design tools that can help create successful outcomes for all parties engaged in a service relationship. Our work aims to identify key mechanisms of value cocreation in KIBS, and adapt existing modeling techniques so as to support KIBS design. While preliminary, our results show that Agent-Oriented modeling, in particular i*, is able to express key mechanisms of value cocreation and account for its intentional dimension. This research yields theoretical insights for a KIBS-specific theory of value cocreation and practical support for the design of KIBS.
Proceedings of the 2012 iConference on - iConference '12, 2012
ABSTRACT There has been much interest in the design of social websites and an increasing use of s... more ABSTRACT There has been much interest in the design of social websites and an increasing use of social tools for group work in organizations. Recommendations and design guidelines have been developed that guide designers in building certain aspects of social network and social media sites from scratch. However, there has been little investigation into transforming existing information systems into socially-oriented ones. We address this gap by first identifying the key features of socially-oriented systems from literature on social network and social media sites. We then present S-FIT, a social features integration technique, which can be applied to a model of an existing information system in order to identify opportunities to incorporate social features within the system. S-FIT can be used to extend commonly-used systems modeling techniques. We illustrate the application of S-FIT on a Business Process Diagram of an existing library information system.
Uploads