Design-oriented Research Approach Research Articles

Embedding Experiential, Practical and Scientific Knowledge on Care for Families with Multiple Problems into the Curriculum of Universities of Applied Sciences

Child and family welfare organizations providing care for families with multiple problems (FMPs) in the Netherlands conclude that future practitioners are often not sufficiently equipped to work with this complex target group. The aim of this study is threefold: (1) to combine experiential, practical and scientific knowledge on care for FMPs, (2) to find out, by using a design-oriented research method, which type of blended learning materials are suitable for the curricula of Universities of Applied Sciences (UAS) and (3) ascertain what facilitating and obstructive factors play a role in the process of implementation. In this study, we adopted a phased approach with four steps: (1) a scoping review, (2) a Delphi study, (3) an inventory of the curricula and (4) a design-oriented research approach. Various stakeholders such as adolescents, parents, teachers, students, practitioners and researchers were involved. The four steps resulted in various products such as informational videos and factsheets, a serious game and an implementation roadmap. We also provide an overview of the facilitating and obstructive factors that played a role in this process. The materials developed in this study contribute towards the training of future professionals in terms of being more reflective about their own way of working with these families.

Design Principles for Strategic Alignment in Smart City Enterprise Architectures (SCEA)

Smart Cities are complex systems where digital innovations are applied to design enhanced city services and enable public value creation across various domains (e.g., mobility, energy and infrastructure, environment, and so). Such complexity challenges the alignment between city strategies with city services and underlying information systems, leading to providing services that may fail to achieve city goals and meet the needs of citizens. This paper defines a set of design principles to ensure strategic alignment in Smart City Enterprise Architectures (SCEA). The design principles were derived from the literature and validated by smart city domain experts, following a design-oriented research approach. The main contribution of this paper is the formulated design principles that deepen the knowledge of Enterprise Architecture design in the smart cities field. These design principles can be used by researchers and practitioners to guide the design of innovative digital services aligned with urban strategies.

Concepts for Modeling Smart Cities

The rapid increase and adoption of new Information Technologies (IT) in Smart Cities make the provision of public services more efficient. However, various municipalities and cities deal with challenges to transform and digitize city services. Smart Cities have a high degree of complexity where offered city services must respond to the concerns and goals of multiple stakeholders. These city services must also involve diverse data sources, multi-domain applications, and heterogeneous systems and technologies. Enterprise Architecture (EA) is an instrument to deal with complexity in both private and public organizations. The paper defines the concepts for modeling Smart Cities in ArchiMate, guided by a design-oriented research approach. Particularly, the focus of this paper is on the concepts for modeling city services and underlying information systems which are added to the EA metamodel. The metamodel is demonstrated in a real-world case and validated by Smart City domain experts. The findings suggest that these concepts are essential to achieve the Smart City strategy (e.g., city goals and objectives), as well as to meet the needs of different city stakeholders. Furthermore, an extension mechanism allows addressing the alignment of business and IT in complex environments such as Smart Cities, by adjusting EA metamodels and notations. This can help cities to design, visualize, and communicate architecture decisions when managing the transformation and digitalization of public services.

Exploring the Problem Space of CO2 Emission Reductions from Academic Flying

CO2 emissions from aviation have been predicted to increase over the coming decades. Within the academic world, flying is often perceived to be a necessary prerequisite to being a successful researcher. Many Swedish universities have ambitious climate goals, but are simultaneously among the top emitters in the public sector. Reaching stated climate goals could feasibly be met through a combination of measures, including decreased flying. One way to address the challenge is to support behavioural interventions with the help of interactive visualizations of CO2 emissions from flying. Those few examples that exist in the research literature are generally directed towards management and are less applicable to universities, given the large autonomy researchers enjoy and their discretionary control of research project funds. This paper uses a design-oriented research approach to present an analysis of the problem space at the intersection of interactive visualizations using air travel data to reduce CO2 emissions from business air travel at our own university, KTH Royal Institute of Technology. Through a number of design experiments, evaluations and investigations, we have unearthed needs, challenges and opportunities for the creation of visualization tools to support more sustainable travel practices at universities and in other knowledge-intensive organisations.

Understanding the Dominance and Advocacy of the Design-Oriented Research Approach in the Business Informatics Community: A History-Based Examination

The objective of this article is to explain the dominance and advocacy of the design- oriented research approach in Wirtschaftsinformatik (Business Informatics or BI), one of the major Information Systems (IS) communities. To this end, we employed a research approach based on autobiographical material. Sixteen well-known BI scholars served as informants, and provided career autobiographies in which they document their perceptions and observations regarding the genesis and development of BI. The average age of this sample of contemporary witnesses is 70 years, signifying a rich body of experience. Based on an interpretive analysis of the data, we find that the design of IS is deeply rooted in BI's history, and our results also show that there have always been close relationships with practice. As a consequence, we conclude that the success of BI as an academic community is inseparably associated with systems design, implementation, and engineering. Against this background, we argue that it is unlikely that BI will weaken its design orientation in the future, although external forces signify a shift to a more behaviouristic research approach. In order to balance the internal strength of the community and the external forces, we suggest a ‘theory-driven design approach’ as a viable strategy for the future orientation of the community.

Organizational and Technological Options for Business Process Management from the Perspective of Web 2.0

Corporate operative systems are often highly dynamic, a fact which is only insufficiently taken into account by recent process management approaches. In contrast, the perspective of Web 2.0 opens up new options for action in process management. In this contribution, we figure out new organizational and technological options of process management using a design-oriented research approach. The analysis especially considers the aspects of self-organization and collective intelligence in process management. We conceptually develop options for action and illustrate them based on a prototype platform for process management. The paper is complemented by a presentation of real-world application scenarios in the construction industry and results of an evaluation of the design-oriented research approach.

Organizing Education by Drawing on Organization Studies

This study explores how scholars researching organizations and organizing processes can use and exploit their knowledge not only in terms of course contents, but also in organizing and managing students' learning activity. A design-oriented research approach is used in order to develop grounded design principles for organizing education. By drawing on the literature about organizational design and learning, several preliminary design ideas for organizing undergraduate education are described. Subsequently, two examples of how these design ideas can be applied are discussed. The first example involves the design of an undergraduate course in Organizational Behaviour. The second example is a tool for collaboratively supervising thesis projects. The design principles grounded in these two cases are, in sum: designing education as an authentic organization; exploiting the benefits of peer mentoring and assessment; acting and delegating as a senior manager; and setting vivid standards. Lastly, the contribution that organization studies can make to educational theory and practice is explored, and the role of design methodologies is discussed.