Large-scale IT Research Articles

Development method in a large-scale public sector IT programme

The Norwegian parental benefit programme started as a large-scale information technology operation to automate and provide self-service solutions for parental benefit applications. This benefit replaces lost salaries for about 100,000 parents every year while parents are home with new-born children. A previous programme to modernize IT solutions was stopped. The new programme replacing legacy solutions from the 1970s was seen as a large, complicated, and risky undertaking with a cost limit of USD 130 million. Initially, this programme had three main releases based on an internal development method combining project management and agile methods. During the second release, the programme experienced challenges with coordinating work across the business and development projects. The programme manager established a task force to propose changes in the development method for the last release. We then ask the question: If you were part of this task force, what should the programme manager do to remedy the coordination challenges for the last release? This teaching case is based on a longitudinal case study and is relevant for graduate or continuing education courses in information systems development or IT project management during which students learn how to organize efficient software development at scale.

Competing institutional logics in healthcare organizations: theorising digitalism

PurposeThe digitalisation of healthcare services has proven to be difficult, with numerous negative effects. We argue that the reason for the problem is not poor project management, but a clash of different institutional logics. The aim of this article is to explore, define and theorise the concept of digitalism, as a term for a new institutional logic in contrast to other, more known logics in organisations, such as managerialism and professionalism, to better understand processes of digitalisation.Design/methodology/approachWe illustrate our arguments with a case study of a process of organizational development before and after the implementation of centralised large-scale IT systems at a large Norwegian hospital. Data was extracted from documents and observations from January 2015 to January 2016 during an organizational audit. In addition, a follow-up study was conducted in 2019 and 2024 by interviewing eight key personnel who were involved in the implementation process.FindingsThe implementation of a new digital health record in a Norwegian hospital is a process of social restructuring that involves new actors, logics and control systems. The process of digitalisation shows us how digitalism create tensions, diverges and merges with other institutional logics.Practical implicationsUnderstanding digitalism as a sensitising concept offers insights into how large-scale technology and organizations are tied together and can help to reduce organizational dysfunctionalities and improve the implementation of IT systems.Originality/valueThis study contributes to a new understanding of digitalisation processes and links an ongoing theoretical debate on the digitalisation of organizations with empirical findings.

Agile Project Planning and Execution in Large-Scale IT Projects

Agile methods have changed project management, particularly for major IT projects. This abstract examines Agile project planning and execution in complex IT settings, where size and scope bring distinct problems. Traditional project management methods struggle to handle major IT projects' fast changes and complexity. Agile's focus on flexibility, collaboration, and customer-centricity makes it ideal for these situations due to its adaptability. Agile planning breaks complicated IT project needs into manageable components or iterations in large-scale initiatives. Iterative development keeps projects manageable and adaptable. Agile stresses frequent feedback loops, where each iteration is examined, to help teams change and realign their objectives. Large IT projects need ongoing feedback since mistakes may be costly and team alignment is essential. Cross-functional teams are crucial to Agile in big projects. Agile fosters cross-disciplinary cooperation, which is crucial in big IT environments where development, operations, security, and business teams must collaborate. Teams meet regularly, called'scrums,' to review progress, identify barriers, and plan future actions. With its focus on openness and responsibility, the scrum structure keeps team members aligned and the project on pace. Resource management is another important part of Agile project planning for big IT projects. Agile resource allocation is dynamic, unlike set schedules. Large IT projects, where resource demands vary fast, need this flexibility. Thus, agile techniques reduce waste and ensure teams have what they need at each project stage by optimizing resource utilization. Large Agile project execution involves risk management. Due to Agile's iterative structure, teams may regularly analyze risk and address problems before they become significant. Risks may be exacerbated in big IT projects, thus proactive risk management is crucial. Agile teams see risks as opportunities to improve, promoting continual learning and adaptability.

AMAD: Active learning-based multivariate time series anomaly detection for large-scale IT systems

Multivariate time series anomaly detection on key performance indicators helps mitigate the impact of large-scale IT system anomalies. Due to the large volume and the abstract nature of multivariate time series, previous works have tended to make overly strict or optimistic hypotheses on labeling costs and resulted in unsatisfactory results. Thus, it remains a challenge to make an appropriate trade-off between labeling costs and model performance. This research proposes AMAD, an active learning-based approach that works to address this problem. Its core idea is to provide the learner model high-value label queries via an ensemble query strategy, which dynamically adapts to the estimated anomaly ratio and the ever-changing model performance. Moreover, it is the first to discuss in detail the margin effect of query strategies on model performance, to our knowledge, this has not been investigated in previous works on time series anomaly detection. Extensive experiments on five public datasets demonstrate that AMAD works well and robustly on various real-world scenarios, which outperforms state-of-the-art baseline methods by 16% and 11% in terms of recall and F1, with only 3% of data being labeled.

Solidarity through service: the role of the guild of IT service managers in the field of European (in)security

ABSTRACT Critical research is highlighting how processes of (in)security are transformed by the participation of new agencies and actors, especially data managers and IT systems operators. Expanding analysis to account for these new agencies and actors requires engaging with their professional practices. I argue that these actors can be understood as a guild of IT service managers who operate under a logic of service and are not just another (in)securitising actor. To do so, I analyse the practices of operational management carried out by the European Union Agency for the Operational Management of Large-Scale IT systems in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (eu-LISA). By organising its work in line with a logic of service, eu-LISA rationalises its seemingly contradictory relationship to the field of (in)security. Despite its active participation in the construction and maintenance of IT systems for border security, eu-LISA does not make sense of its work or role in terms of security. Rather, it views its work as distinct from but in support of that of professionals of (in)security. I characterise this relationship to the field as one of delimiting security. Identifying this relationship reframes the securitisation/desecuritisation dualism as a continuum, reflecting the increasing complexity of actors’ relationships to security.

Retention of Public IT Professionals: The Mediating Roles of Perceived Organisational Support and Psychological Empowerment

The demand for skilled IT professionals remains strong in a global manner. Therefore, recruiting and retention of IT professionals are vital for many organisations. The research data was collected from 361 IT professionals employed in 31 public institutions with large-scale IT units in Türkiye. The results indicated that 40.7% of public IT professionals are considering leaving their current jobs in Türkiye. It was observed that POS fully mediated the relationship between LMX and the turnover intentions of public IT professionals. Moreover, contrary to the literature, enhancing employee competency increased the intention to leave (β = .27, p < . 05) rather than decreasing it.

Security knowledges: circulation, control, and responsible research and innovation in EU border management

ABSTRACT The knowledge emerging from research funded by the European Union (EU) through its Framework Programmes for Research and Innovation and other funding streams is significantly shaped by different forms of epistemic control exerted by the EU itself. Through the promotion of industry-research-policy cooperation in EU-funded research, and in light of the growing importance attached to ‘impact,’ this knowledge will often contribute to bureaucratic decisions taken by the European Commission, Frontex, the EU Agency for the Operational Management of Large-Scale IT Systems (eu-LISA), and other agencies tasked with border security and control. The circular dynamics surrounding knowledge production, from the calls for proposals to the results of the research, are intrinsically political and contribute to exposing the limits of the EU-promoted principle of Responsible Research and Innovation. Additionally, and due to the centrality of EU funding in the research outlook in contemporary Europe, these processes raise wider questions about the sociology of the academic fields that this article relates to: critical border studies, critical security studies, and science and technology studies. How can we interpret the interplays between the EU’s policies fostering development and integration of border security technologies, on the one hand, and the Union’s broader principles for free and open research and innovation? Through the use of autoethnographic vignettes, and mediated by an expanded Foucauldian understanding of circulation as a technology of control with performative effects, the article sheds light on the dynamics surrounding knowledge production in the field of border technologies in an EU context.

Relationship between Interpersonal Skills in Project Success

The most asset to any project, regardless of the industry is the project manager. Research has shown whether the project fails or succeeds depends on the project manager, and the skills they bring to the table. The research problem in this study is the lack of research regarding the relationship between the interpersonal skills of the project manager and the success and / or failure of large-scale IT systems development projects. The existing literature indicated a strong positive relationship between the interpersonal skills and leadership traits of senior managers who manage with a passive leadership style and the primary IT systems development project success factor of cost. There was also a strong positive relationship between the interpersonal skills and leadership traits of senior managers who manage with leadership outcomes and the primary IT systems development project success factor of scheduling.

Introducing Lightweight IT - A Way to Build Flexibility for Healthcare Organizations?

The paper addresses socio technical relations of implementing a lightweight IT app in Norway. The focus is on how such technology will influence the possibilities for an organization connected to a large-scale heavyweight IT infrastructure to provide more rapid changes in line with healthcare worker's needs. The research question is therefore: How can lightweight IT support rapid organizational changes? The empirical site is one of the first health trusts in Norway implementing lightweight technology integrated to their Electronic Health Record (EHR). The lightweight technology is a nursing app for registering early- warning score (NEWS) bedside the patients. The paper is based on a qualitative interpretive approach, and the results are discussed in line with information infrastructure theory.

IT Project Management: Supply Chain Optimization for Service Operations

IT project management can use both project and process-oriented approaches. Pre-investment, investment (development and implementation phase), and operations and maintenance are the three phases that make up the life cycle of an IT project. The service processes are part of the third phase. The earliest stage of an IT project's life cycle necessitates a substantial financial commitment. As a result, it may be considered a business venture. As a result, project management concepts and techniques may be used in the implementation of IT projects. During the investment phase, methods for software development and testing are implemented. It is carried out in compliance with industry standards that govern the deployment of life cycle models. The size of the program code and the complexity of the software determine the cost and timeliness of IT system implementation, maintenance, and servicing jobs. As a result, the process approach can be used to manage various phases of large-scale IT projects. Supply chain optimization, in particular, can be used advantageously. This report is devoted to the optimization of supply chains for service operations at the stage of implementation and maintenance of large IT projects. A feature of this approach is that the human resources of an IT service support team are considered as a subject for the supply chain. Conditions are also given that the supply chain for service operations considered has the resilience and viability properties. The parameters for the multiple-channel queuing model are calculated using the mathematical model presented in this paper. Microsoft Excel is used to implement this model. It enables us to generate estimations for the average time of maintenance and support jobs during the pre-investment phase, as well as determine the optimal size for the IT service support team.

Between Infrastructural Experimentation and Collective Imagination: The Digital Transformation of the EU Border Regime

A central and formative ingredient in the governance of migration in the European Union (EU) is the continuous construction of a large-scale digital infrastructure to ensure border security. Although border and critical security studies have increasingly focused on the multiple aspects of techno-materiality and infrastructural devices of border control, less has been said about how such an infrastructure encodes and transmits collective future visions of border (in)security. Therefore, this paper analyzes the making of a sociotechnical imaginary of digital transformation of the EU border regime, specifically focusing on the role of eu-LISA, the European agency for the development and management of large-scale IT systems. Drawing on ethnographic observations and interview material, we analyze the ways in which this agency emerges as a site for assembling and rehearsing this sociotechnical imaginary, gradually transforming borders into sites of experimentation in the EU Schengen laboratory. As our case illustrates, studying the visionary dimensions of digital infrastructuring helps us to understand how imagination becomes collectivized and materialized, opens up or closes down sociotechnical realizations, and thus tacitly governs the project of digitally infrastructuring the EU border regime.

An Automatic Planning-Based Attack Path Discovery Approach from IT to OT Networks

With the convergence of IT and OT networks, more opportunities can be found to destroy physical processes by cyberattacks. Discovering attack paths plays a vital role in describing possible sequences of exploitation. Automated planning that is an important branch of artificial intelligence (AI) is introduced into the attack graph modeling. However, while adopting the modeling method for large-scale IT and OT networks, it is difficult to meet urgent demands, such as scattered data management, scalability, and automation. To that end, an automatic planning-based attack path discovery approach is proposed in this paper. At first, information of the attacking knowledge and network topology is formally represented in a standardized planning domain definition language (PDDL), integrated into a graph data model. Subsequently, device reachability graph partitioning algorithm is introduced to obtain subgraphs that are small enough and of limited size, which facilitates the discovery of attack paths through the AI planner as soon as possible. In order to further cope with scalability problems, a multithreading manner is used to execute the attack path enumeration for each subgraph. Finally, an automatic workflow with the assistance of a graph database is provided for constructing the PDDL problem file for each subgraph and traversal query in an interactive way. A case study is presented to demonstrate effectiveness of attack path discovery and efficiency with the increase in number of devices.

Applicability of Agile Methodology in Technology Migration Projects: A Thematic Overview

Ever since, inception of IT services on global level, lot of SDLC methodologies were developed to ensure proper balance between Time, Cost and Scope factors of the Projects. Over period of time, it was noticed that IT services using waterfall SDLC were gradually unable to deliver best requirements, despite having extensive experience in handling such large-scale IT projects. To overcome the shortcoming of the Waterfall SDLC model in early 2001, Agile SDLC methodology was introduced, which is even till today treated as de facto best industry standards of any IT projects across the globe as it successfully curtailed the demerits of earlier model such as dangers of traditional, front-end planning methods that often lead to downstream development pathologies. In this research paper, an attempt is made by the authors to understand how Agile SDLC methodology helps in improving efficacy of software development and various challenges faced during the development process. Limited research is done to highlight the efficacy of same across different variants of IT Projects. It is worthwhile to mentioned based on the past experiences of the authors that in case of Technology Migration IT Projects, bare implementation of Agile Methodology will not provide any addition advantage and success rate is extremely low. Authors has made an attempt to decipher the root causes which influences the efficacy of Agile SDLC methodology on Technology Migration Projects and suggest new SDLC methodology with list of KPIs to monitor the success rate of the project on real time basis.

Risk identification of implementation of ITS to real traffic

Intelligent Transportation System is one of the concepts of modern sustainable transport in Smart Cities, which increases flow and safety of road traffic with use of information and communication technologies. The use of smart technologies such as Internet of Things, BigData, Artificial Intelligence and so on, requires strengthening or even creating a new communication infrastructure in the field of traffic. This paper discusses the risks of ITS implementation by analyzing the current state, identifying the key risk factors and showing possibilities in reduction of these risk using system methodology. It can be assumed that this transformation will be time-consuming, not only in policy and construction areas, but also in putting these systems into operation. In this meantime, when smart and non-smart systems will come in contact, there should be expected risk situations, that could cause difficulties for large-scale ITS to emerge, for example for large cities. An important part is also early awareness of the population which is affected by the situation of putting the system into operation, especially trainings for professional drivers. A participant in traffic, who are not affected by smart technologies as so-called “internet generation“ should be taken into account, as possible source of risk situations. Determining the potential risks on all the above-mentioned case is a current problem because of the rapid development and onset of ITS.

Digital service teams in government

National governments are setting up digital service teams (DST) – IT units outside the centralized CIO's office – to respond to complex governmental and societal challenges in a responsive and agile manner. DSTs emerge as a third space between centralized and decentralized IT departments that are triggered by large-scale IT failures and the need to abandon black swan IT projects - tasks that traditional CIO offices were not able to handle so far. DSTs design principles have been replicated from the initial idea of the UK's Government Digital Service team and implemented in other countries, such as the U.S., Canada, Italy, or Finland. For this article, a qualitative interpretative approach was chosen to understand external and internal context factors that contribute to the emergence of these digital service teams. The article brings initial clarity of the composition and tasks of DSTs and extends the existing theory of context by providing insights about this third space between centralized and decentralized IT departments to organize IT Governance in public sector organizations.

Adopting integrated application lifecycle management within a large-scale software company: An action research approach

ContextApplication Lifecycle Management (ALM) is a paradigm for integrating and managing the various activities related to the governance, development and maintenance of software products. In the last decade, several ALM tools have been proposed to support this process, and an increasing number of companies have started to adopt ALM. ObjectiveWe aim to investigate the impact of adopting ALM in a real industrial context to understand and justify both the benefits and obstacles of applying integrated ALM. MethodAs a research methodology, we apply action research that we have carried out within HAVELSAN, a large-scale IT company. The research was carried out over a period of seven years starting in 2010 when the ALM initiative has been started in the company to increase productivity and decrease maintenance costs. ResultsThe paper presents the results of the action research that includes the application of ALM practices. The transitions among the different steps are discussed in detail, together with the identified obstacles, benefits and lessons learned. ConclusionsOur seven-year study shows that the adoption of ALM processes is not trivial and its success is related to many factors. An important conclusion is that a piecemeal solution as provided by ALM 1.0 is not feasible for the complex process and tool integration problems of large enterprises. Hence the transition to ALM 2.0 was found necessary to cope with the organizational and business needs. Although ALM 2.0 appeared to be a more mature ALM approach, there are still obstacles that need attention from both researchers and practitioners.

Instrumental Variable Estimates of the Effect of Management Practices on Firm Performance in Korean Firms

Policy makers as well as entrepreneurs pay much attention to the success of firms. This is because the performance of firms can promote directly and indirectly the economic growth in a country. For instance, after financial crisis in 1997, the Korean economy experienced the rapid recovery. It is recognized that the improvement of firm performance has played a crucial role in such recovery. We focus on the determinants of improving the Korean firm total factor productivity (TFP) because TFP can explain performance not explained by inputs a firm employs. This paper suggests management practices as one of crucial factors to improve firm TFP. For empirical analysis, we use an instrumental variable approach by using a set of four firm-level instrumental variables including motivations for organizational change, large-scale organizational change, empowerment, and IT investment during the past organizational change. The results of the instrumental variable estimation show that better management practice leads to a higher level of firm TFP, statistically significantly; whereas the effect of management practices is statistically insignificant in the ordinary least square estimation.

Simulation based assessment of resilience of two large-scale socio-technical IT networks

Most sectors of modern society are currently undergoing rapid digitalization. With the progress of this development IT networks are becoming an ever more crucial asset whose failure are prone to cause economic losses and risks to health and safety of the population. Due to this development, it is increasingly important that IT networks are designed to be resilient, meaning that they either maintain or quickly recover their functionality when exposed to strains of various kinds. Simulation-based methods that consider supply network topology as well as system for repairing the supply network have previously been applied and found to be useful for assessment of resilience of electricity and water networks. A method of this kind is here applied for IT networks. The method, however, considers only hardware and operator fault modes, not software and dependency faults. The IT networks are studied as socio-technical systems, here broadly understood as systems whose functionality depend on technical as well as organizational sub-systems. The aim of the present paper is to investigate if the method is applicable for assessment of resilience of large-scale IT networks that are critical to society, meaning that (1) it is possible to apply for such systems based on available data, in this case gathered mainly through interviews with focus groups, (2) the results are relevant for users/maintainers/owners of these systems and (3) it captures all relevant factors. The method is tested in case studies on the IT network of a municipality and the SCADA system of a wastewater network. Follow-up interviews were conducted with system managers to assess the perceived relevance of the method and results. It is concluded that the method can be used to obtain the resilience metrics sought for and that the method enables system owners to see if and for what levels of strain they are presently reaching their desired targets concerning system resilience. Follow-up interviews also indicate that the method is perceived by the system managers as being able to support decision making concerning improvement in system resilience.

Evaluating large-scale IT investment decisions

Businesses are becoming increasingly dependent on information and Information Technology. This dependence brings with it both risks and rewards, and managers must decide whether or not to stay averse to the risk, or whether to embrace it in order to achieve the potential rewards. This study explores some of the risks and rewards that integrating Information Technology into a corporation can produce. In this study, a research method that is mainly based on a review of the scientific literature was employed. The final contribution of this study lies in the fact that it identifies and articulates the most important risks and opportunities that must be evaluated carefully and extensively by decision makers before making large-scale IT investment decisions.

ЦИФРОВИЗАЦИЯ VS ЗАНЯТОСТЬ: ОПЫТ БАНКОВСКОГО СЕКТОРА

The paper shows that economy digitalization is inevitable, but is still an insufficiently studied consequence of ICT development. Among the main economic challenges of digitalization is the transformation of the traditional labor market. According to experts, the Russian economy can use the "transition to all things digital" as one of the key factors for GDP growth. At the same time, the degree of readiness of individual industries to accept digital technologies varies significantly. The financial sector is in the lead, which is why bank employees were the first to face the negative consequences of large-scale IT projects of their employers. This paper provides an assessment of the dependence of the need for bank employees on the most likely threats of credit institutions, including economic recession, revocation of banks licenses and investments in ICT technology. The obtained results confirm those of a number of international studies of different years on the absence of a significant relation between vacancies and the digitalization expenses of credit institutions. The analysis of digitalization influence on the need for bank employees is accompanied by indirect assessment of this influence – through evaluating the dependence of banking divisions number on investments in digital technologies. PAO Sberbank, the main market player and leader in the implementation of IT projects, was chosen as the object of research. The built regression model made it possible to identify a significant dependence of indicators and predict changes in the number of Sberbank divisions with a high level of reliability.