Purpose Evolving digital technologies continue to enable new ways to collect and analyze data and this has led some researchers to claim that skillful use of data analytics and big data can radically improve a company’s performance, but that in order to achieve such improvements managers need to change their decision-making culture and to increase the degree of collaboration in the decision-making process. The purpose of this paper is to create an increased understanding of how a decision-making culture can be changed by using a design approach. Design/methodology/approach The paper presents an action research project in which the authors use a design approach. Findings By adopting a design approach organizations can change their decision-making culture, increase the degree of collaboration and also reduce the influence of power and politics on their decision-making. Research limitations/implications This paper proposes a new approach to changing a decision-making culture. Practical implications Using data analytics and big data, a design approach can support organizations change their decision-making culture resulting in better and more effective decisions. Originality/value This paper bridges design and decision-making theory in a novel approach to an old problem.

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Failed or partially failed information systems (IS) investments continue to be a problem in both public and private sectors. Although there are many causes of such failure, lack of clarity about the goals and benefits expected and how they are to be realized is one of the major contributors. This is particularly so in the public sector where the purpose of IS investment is not to increase profits, but to accomplish social and political goals. One way of reducing failure and wastage rates is to have ex-ante evaluation. Over the past three decades IS research has proposed a plethora of new theoretical approaches to improving ex-ante evaluation, but with a few exceptions, these have had little impact on practice. This paper presents a way to address this gap between theory and practice. It proposes a way in which managers can improve IS investment evaluation by changing perspective from a focus on traditional analytic tools towards a design attitude that seeks to develop multicriteria IS evaluation approach based on contextual experience and prior knowledge. The proposed approach enables organizations to design and develop a value case using value dials as a common language that defines what constitutes the value of particular IS investments for a specific context. To assess its effectiveness, this approach was applied using a multilevel dialogical action research project within a Swedish public organization. The findings show that managers in this organization significantly improved the effectiveness of their evaluation of IS investments.

A growing older population is placing new demands on the welfare system. Elder care has been criticised for its lack of resources, competence, or respect for older people. Caregiving needs to be transformed and based on older people’s real needs and what they perceive as important. However, both older people and service organisations have to be capable of participating in new development processes. Design thinking (DT) has emerged as a field of research that provides tools and processes that are helpful for supporting innovations and new ways of thinking about problems. The concept of capability (Nussbaum M. Creating capabilities: the human development approach. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 2011), and how design researchers have embraced it, is discussed. The results from two case studies show that DT can support increasing capabilities among both service recipients and service providers when developing new services and digital solutions. The DT process can generate valuable knowledge about users’ needs in a resource-efficient way, as well as balancing the economic and human perspectives when developing new services. By directing more time and attention towards relevant problems, the solution might end up as something other than initially contemplated, which can increase the capability of being innovative when developing new services.