Fostering adoption, acceptance and assimilation in ... - KnowMiner

KMS. In order to increase acceptance on the individual level, the
factor Facilitating Conditions in the group Effort Expectancy,
describing the degree of provided organizational and technical
infrastructure which supports system use [23], was used to
formulate a recommendation for this application area. User
support, expressed by trainings, tutorials, step-by-step guides,
videos, and wikis were planned to be available and communicated
in a proper way.
5. LIMITATIONS
The current research combines factors taken from several models
and theories explaining human behavior using IT on an individual
as well as an organizational level into one comprehensive model
covering adoption, acceptance and assimilation of KMS.
Consequently, validity is challenging in design and a complete
validation is problematic and probably not feasible due to the
large number of variables that would need to be controlled over a
period of time due to the fact that adoption, acceptance and
assimilation are regarded as a process taking place in a dynamic
socio-technical environment. However, all single models and
theories used to extract factors, were individually validated
As the model is intended to be used to inform design activities,
empirical validation of the model is not our primary concern, but
we rather long for demonstrating its usefulness and practicability
as an explicit guide that helps investigating and adjusting design
activities in respect to the adoption, acceptance and assimilation
by critically examining the single factors for each phase in the
context of the project. Such an application was demonstrated in
the case example above, i.e. a large scale project in which this
approach was welcomed and resulted in a number of
recommendations informing project decisions. The proposed
categorization of factors and the distinction whether they can be
influenced by KMS design or not is therefore argued for on the
basis of a first application within a large-scale R&D project in the
field of KMS with multiple instantiations for several distinct
organizations.
6. CONCLUSION AND OUTLOOK
To conclude, the proposed model represents a comprehensive
basis for a systematic consideration of factors influencing
adoption, acceptance and assimilation within the field of KM. Our
contribution comprises a structured review of the literature, the
consolidation of factors, selected as relevant for designing KMS
for the three topics adoption, acceptance, and assimilation as well
as an example application of the model in a large-scale KMS
project. Moreover, we differentiated between factors that can be
influenced by design and those that cannot be influenced by
design. As described and demonstrated, there are various
applications in KMS design, e.g., evaluating (non-)functional
requirements, eliciting additional requirements, or influencing
packaging and offering of KMS in order to enhance the adoption
by organizations, the acceptance by users and the assimilation of a
KMS solution into organizational processes and work practices.
Consequently, the model supports and informs KMS design with
the aim to improve the take-up of the resulting KMS solution.
There are a number of future research directions and opportunities
implied by the results of this paper. One is that the categories
within the model should be reviewed in the context of further
applications. Moreover, additional applications and project
experiences with the model may also allow a more detailed
evaluation of the relevance of the factors specifically for KMS
design. Besides that, it would be interesting to examine additional
factors proposed in KM literature that are particularly important to
improve the adoption, acceptance and assimilation of KMS.
However, they are typically not validated upon strong empirical
basis in contrast to most of the factors extracted for our model.
Furthermore, we see other possible areas of application that are
worth to be examined, e.g., the use of the comprehensive model
from the perspective of organizations that aim to adopt and
introduce a KMS within their organization. Factors that cannot be
influenced by KMS design are suggested to be considered from an
organizational perspective, e.g., the users’ attitude towards
technology can be influenced by guidance, motivation or trainings
when rolling-out the KMS.
7. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was co-funded by the European Commission under the
Information and Communication Technologies theme of the 7th
Framework Programme, Integrating Project ARISTOTELE
(contract no. FP7-257886).
8. REFERENCES
[1] Bishop, J., Bouchlaghem, D., Glass, J., and Matsumoto, I.
2008. Ensuring the effectiveness of a knowledge
management initiative. Journal of Knowledge Management.
12, 4 (Nov. 2008), 16-29.
[2] King, W. and Marksjr, P. 2008. Motivating knowledge
sharing through a knowledge management system.
Omega.36, 1 (Feb. 2008), pp. 131-146.
[3] Chatterjee, D., Grewal, R. and Sambamurthy, V. 2008.
Shaping up for E-Commerce: Institutional Enablers of the
Organizational Assimilation of Web Technologies.
Management Information Systems Quaterly. 26, 2 (Jun.
2002), 65-89.
[4] Rogers, E. 1995. Diffusion of Innovations. Free Press, New
York.
[5] Dillon, A. and Morris, M. 1996. User acceptance of new
information technology - theories and models. In Annual
Review of Information Science and Technology. M. Williams
ed. 31, 3-32. Information Today, Medford, NJ.
[6] Venkatesh, V., Morris, M., Davis, G.B., and Davis, F.D.
2003. User acceptance of information technology: Towards a
unified view. In MIS Quarterly. 27, 3 (Sep. 2003), 425-478.
[7] Tornatzky, L.G. and Fleischer, M. 1990. The Processes of
Technological Innovation. D.C. Heath & Company,
Lexington, MA.
[8] Chau, P.Y.K. 2001. Information Technology Acceptance by
Individual Professionals: A Model Comparison Approach.
Decision Sciences. 27, 3 (Dec. 2001), 451-719.
[9] Zhu, K., Kraemer, K., and Xu, S. 2003. Electronic business
adoption by European firms: a cross-country assessment of
the facilitators and inhibitors. European Journal of
Information Systems. 12, 4 (Dec. 2003), 251-268.
[10] Mustonen-Ollila, E. and Lyytinen, K. 2003. Why
organizations adopt information system process innovations:
a longitudinal study using Diffusion of Innovation theory.
Information Systems Journal. 13, 3 (Jul. 2003), 275-297.
[11] Teo, H.-H., Tan, B., and Wei, K.-K. 1995. Innovation
diffusion theory as a predictor of adoption intention for
financial EDI. In Proceedings of the Sixteenth International
Conference on Information Systems (Amsterdam, The
Netherlands, December 10-13, 1995). ICIS 1995. ACM, New
York, NY, 155-165.