Introduction: New technology and the implementation process

Implementing concurrent engineering

“…Once this is recognized, a crucial area of implementation research is the investigation of all the economic, technical, cultural and political factors affecting the final form that the technique takes. This represents not only the reality of change but also its requirements if generic techniques are to be customized to work effectively in particular contexts (Badham, 1993).…”

Work restructuring and technical change

“…There continue to be opportunities for the technology to be shaped (or``configured'') during the period when it is being implemented into an adopting organization and, indeed, during``everyday utilisation''. Fleck has termed this process``innofusion'', others talk about``post-adoption innovation'' (Fleck, 1987(Fleck, , 1993Badham, 1993;Wilkinson, 1983). Some actors and groups are likely to have more opportunity than others to shape the technology during implementation and utilisation, and this is one reason why it is important to know who has those opportunities, and their orientations towards work, the organization, people and technology (Preece, 1995).…”

Implementing team‐based cells in Australia: a configurational process approach

“…The failure of many new technology projects to achieve effective implementation and realize the expected benefits is now widely documented. It is also generally accepted that this failure is related to a lack of attention to human and organizational factors in the design and implementation process[6]. As a result, there is now a broad constituency of consultants, research bodies, diffusion agencies and government programmes committed to integrating technical and organizational change in the innovation process[7].…”

“…In contrast to more traditional views of technology, the concept of technological configuration points to the loosely systemic, complex and locally‐ constituted character of working technological systems. It combines insights of recent work on engineering systems, configurations and “unruly technology” with traditional STS theory[6]. Specific generic technology elements are, according to this view, merely a resource that can only become a working technological system when they are appropriately configured within a production context.…”