Promoting the Integration of Users and Developers to Achieve a Collective Mind through the Screening of Information System Projects

Abstract

The active and fruitful participation of users in the development projects of information systems (IS) is a crucial factor in achieving success. However, difficulties such as conflict and apathy often plague IS development projects that do not rely on building effective partnerships between users and those responsible for the development. Partnering ideas have been proposed that consider the building of relationships earlier in the life cycle of the development project. With this in mind, we propose going back further to the screening process and build a model that establishes how directed screening of projects to consider user-related criteria can improve the active participation of users by fostering trust, knowledge exchange, and a collective mind in the project team among users and developers. The model is tested with a sample of IS project managers and finds that project performance can be enhanced by attending to screening criteria that consider the user perspective when selecting projects to add to the organizational portfolio.