The Changing Nature of User Involvement in Information System Development Projects

This paper presents an investigation into the changing nature of user involvement in Information System Development (ISD) projects. This analysis shows the representative papers that have been published on user involvement in ISD projects and identifies areas requiring further investigation and research. Considering different project contexts the need for a new approach where an ISD project is steeped within social complexity is proposed. The specific phase of requirements elicitation and the need to consider more than the technical requirements for an ISD project are clearly presented. The systems approach is proposed for considering the "whole" rather than the separate social and technical systems as well as considering the business processes that are associated with the ISD project. It is proposed that creating a shared understanding between users and developers at the very beginning stages of an ISD project will influence a projects success.