John Robert Venable

Curtin University · School of Information Systems

This article reports on an investigation into how to improve problem formulation and ideation in Design Science Research (DSR) within the mHealth domain. A Systematic Literature Review of problem formulation in published mHealth DSR papers found that problem formulation is often only weakly performed, with shortcomings in stakeholder analysis, pati...

The accumulation of the design knowledge (DK) resulting from Design Science Research (DSR) requires other DSR researchers to appropriate, use, evaluate, modify, and/or extend prior DSR artifacts. Unfortunately, much DK (especially software artifacts) is never appropriated by other researchers for further DSR activity. The lack of take-up of DSR out...

Technological innovations raise axiological questions such as what is right or wrong, good and bad, and so on (i.e., ethical considerations). These considerations have particular importance in design science research (DSR) projects since the developed artifacts often actively intervene into human affairs and, thus, cannot be free from value. To acc...

Action Design Research (ADR) is a commonly used methodology for conducting Design Science Research (DSR). The first activity in ADR is Problem Formulation, which defines the scope of the research and establishes the working relationships between the researcher(s) and the client(s). However, while tasks and principles are defined for Problem Formula...

Purpose Project complexity is becoming increasingly challenging for project managers. Much valuable research has been done on the concept of project complexity. The research reported in this paper aims to provide a new means (the “Complexity Navigation Window”) and guiding principles for the navigation of project complexity in practice. Design/met...

Design Science Research (DSR) has many risks. Researchers inexperienced in DSR, especially early career researchers (ECRs) and research students (e.g. PhD students) risk inefficient projects (with delays, rework, etc.) at best and research project failure at worst if they do not manage and treat DSR risks in a proactive manner. The DSR literature,...

Social capital is an influential concept in understanding why and how some firms do better in inter-organizational relationships (IORs). It is an important factor in developing relationships of trust, making the basis for better collaboration among individuals, groups, and organizations. This paper presents findings from an empirical study of the e...

Conducting Design Science Research (DSR) has many risks. Extant literature, such as the Risk Management Framework for Design Science Research (RMF4DSR), provides advice for identifying risks, but provides few suggestions for specific treatments for the kinds of risks that potentially plague DSR. This paper analyses known DSR risks from RMF4DSR, aug...

Learning and conducting Design Science Research (DSR) are complex undertakings, for which there is little assistance other than publications describing how to do them. They include many activities which must be mastered and coordinated, sometimes when doing them for the first time. This paper describes a new tool, DScaffolding, developed to support...

Reading literature is important, but problematic. In Quora and other PhD forums, students moan about their frustrating reading and literature review experiences. Strategic reading might help. This term is coined to conceive of reading as a process of constructing meaning by interacting with text in a targeted way. The fact that strategic reading is...

Social capital is an influential concept in understanding why and how some organisations do better in inter-organisational relations. It has been recognized as an important factor in developing relationships of trust, forming the foundation for greater collaboration among individuals, groups, and organisations. This paper presents findings from an...

Social Capital (SC) has been recognised as an important factor in developing relationships of trust, providing the foundation for greater collaboration among individuals, groups, organisations, industries or countries, which is essential for enabling developing economies. Similarly, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is touted as a key enabler o...

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Design Science Research in Information Systems and Technology, DESRIST 2016, held in St. John, Newfoundland, Canada, in May 2016. The 11 full papers, 2 short papers and 9 short papers describing prototypes and products were carefully reviewed and selec...

It has been more than ten years since the publication of Hevner et al [1] and five years since Venable [2] surveyed editors and DSR researchers on standards and criteria for judging the quality and suitability of DSR submissions for publication. Since then, there has been much further discussion about evaluation, design theory, and standards for DS...

Over the past decade design science research (DSR) has re-emerged as an important research paradigm in information systems. However, the current recommended approaches to conducting design science research do not consider ethics. Hence the purpose of this paper is to begin a debate about the need for ethical principles in DSR in IS. In order to sta...

Design Science Research (DSR) is a research paradigm for research that undertakes to solve general problems through the invention and evaluation of new or improved technologies. Once DSR is completed, practitioners may make use of the new technology to solve particular instances of the generalised problem (and thereby make improvements in a problem...

Design Theory has been written about extensively in Information Systems (IS), but remains heavily problematic. Some researchers explicitly exclude design theory as an outcome of Design Science Research (DSR), others disagree about the form and purpose of design theories, many consider design theories to be too complicated to construct, some journal...

Current ways of teaching requirements analysis, such as paper-based case studies, do not sufficiently support development of skills to investigate a problem situation. This paper reports on research to develop and evaluate an initial prototype of a Realistic Immersive Virtual Agent-based Learning Environment (RIVALE) virtual case study. The example...

Research in the information systems (IS) field is complex and growing more complex, as alternative paradigms for research are introduced, grow and expand. In addition to the more traditional paradigms of positivist and interpretive research, recently interest within IS has focussed on Design Science Research (DSR). But how does DSR compare to other...

Evaluation is a central and essential activity in conducting rigorous Design Science Research (DSR), yet there is surprisingly little guidance about designing the DSR evaluation activity beyond suggesting possible methods that could be used for evaluation. This paper extends the notable exception of the existing framework of Pries-Heje et al [11] t...

This paper argues that Design Science is an appropriate paradigm for research into Research Methods. Research Methods (along with their tools and techniques) are purposeful artefacts, designed and created by people to achieve a specific purpose - i.e. to create new, truthful knowledge. Like other artefacts, research methods vary in their fitness to...

Literature surrounding the Knowledge Management process of identifying what knowledge exists within an organisation is scarce. This research project set out to fill the research gaps surrounding that particular Knowledge Management process called Knowledge Identification. This paper reports on the findings of a survey sent to 973 Australian organis...

Purpose – This paper aims to introduce this special issue of ITP on systems for human benefit (S4HB), to develop and promote the idea of S4HB, and advocate that more research be conducted on the design and diffusion of S4HB. Design/methodology/approach – This conceptual paper argues that S4HB are systemically under‐researched based on a historical...

This paper proposes a new research method, Participatory Action Design Research (PADR), for studies in the Urban Informatics domain. PADR supports Urban Informatics research in developing new technological means (e.g. using mobile and ubiquitous computing) to resolve contemporary issues or support everyday life in urban environments. The paper disc...

The ability to identify key intervention points in the nuclear WMD development process is vital for the development of effective intervention strategies against nuclear proliferation efforts. This paper describes research in progress to investigate nuclear weapons development as a meta-network of people, knowledge, resources, locations and tasks, a...

Design Science Research (DSR) is a complex form of research that combines very heterogeneous activities requiring different skills with more elaborate areas of risk to manage. As yet, there is little experience with managing risk in DSR or even identification of types of risks to be managed. This paper analyses DSR research activities and elaborate...

One of the first knowledge management (KM) processes, on which subsequent processes depend, has been largely under-researched. A review of the literature shows that in contrast to other processes, the process of Knowledge Identification (KI) has been less researched. More specifically, what problems face KM stakeholders with respect to KI is yet to...

Research in business can address a variety of goals, including explanation or evaluation of extant business practices, development of new business practices, critiquing business practice, and examining business goals other than profit. Empirical research about extant business practices is conducted in one or both of the positivist and interpretive...

There is ongoing debate about how the quality (rigour and relevance) of Design Science Research (DSR) should be judged. This research investigates the state of the debate by surveying the opinions of IS scholars who write, review, edit, and publish DSR papers. The survey respondents rated the relative importance of the seven guidelines (often used...

The advent of social networking websites presents further opportunities for criminals to obtain information for use in identity theft, cyber-stalking, and worse activities. This paper presents exploratory research investigating why users of social networking websites willingly disclose personal information and what sorts of information they provide...

Technologies for human benefit, such as information systems and information technology, have a key role to play in the realization of quality of life for all citizenry by modern societies. New forms of IS and IT can be developed and used creatively to improve education, health, social equity, environmental conditions, social and environ mental sust...

Design science research is a way of creating and studying new technological phenomena, where the understanding comes from inventing, designing, and building new forms of solutions to problems. It has been touted as a new means for the IS field to improve its relevance as the resulting design artifact(s) can directly be used to solve relevant proble...

This paper utilises the Critical Systems Heuristics (CSH) framework developed by Werner Ulrich to critically consider the stakeholders and design goals that should be considered as relevant by researchers conducing Design Science Research (DSR). CSH provides a philosophically and theoretically grounded framework and means for critical consideration...

This paper proposes and evaluates a soft systems approach to design science research. Soft Design Science provides an approach to the development of new ways to improve human organizations, especially with consideration for social aspects, through the activities of design, development, instantiation, evaluation and evolution of a technological arti...

Prior research has identified the similarity of Action Research (AR) and Design Science Research (DSR). This paper analyses AR and DSR from several perspectives, including paradigmatic assumptions of ontology, epistemology, methodology, and ethics, their research interests, and activities. We identify that often AR does not share the paradigmatic a...

This paper describes an action research study which focussed on requirements capture for a subscription-based business-to-consumer (B2C) electronic commerce (EC) system. The study used a recently developed approach to requirements elicitation, the Business Rules Diagram (BRD) Method. The BRD method was adapted somewhat during the study and was foun...

Seminal works in the application of design science research (DSR) in IS emphasize the importance of evaluation. However, discussion of evaluation activities and methods is limited and typically assumes an ex post perspective, in which evaluation occurs after the construction of an IS artifact. Such perspectives can assume that the evaluation is...

At face value, the relationship between Design Science Research and Action Research seems to be a natural one and has been under some discussion in the IS field. This paper reports on a research project that used an Action Research approach to enact Design Science Research. The paper describes why and how the approach was used, relating it to an ex...

Panel Presentation at ACIS’07

This paper describes the rationale, curriculum, and pedagogy for a course focusing on problem analysis during Information Systems Development (ISD). Problem Analysis is concerned with eliciting, identifying, understanding, and reconciling the disparate perceptions and needs of different stakeholders for new or modified systems. To accommodate the n...

This essay has taken the position that there is no one desired proportion or balance of rigour and relevance and that the levels of relevance and rigour that the IS research community should require are contingent on various factors, such as the target audience of the resulting publication and the state of the art in the research domain. However, m...

The global phenomenon of the IS/IT outsourcing continues to grow in importance. IS/IT outsourcing presents business challenges to both outsourcers and vendors alike. While the foundation of IS/IT outsourcing is ostensibly the transfer of financial and structural capital and vendor responsibilities, important issues remain about knowledge transfer a...

Non-profit organizations provide a large number of services of public interest, and play an important role in Australian society and economy. These organizations can very often improve or expand services to the public through the implementation of appropriate information systems and technologies. Such implementation requires undertaking a strategic...

The literature on Design Science (or Design Research) has been mixed on the inclusion, form, and role of theory and theorising in Design Science. Some authors have explicitly excluded theory development and testing from Design Science, leaving them to the Natural and Social/Behavioural Sciences. Others propose including theory development and testi...

Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) in non-profit organisations (NPOs) has not received adequate attention in the research literature. This study addressed questions of how (and how well) Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) could be employed for conducting SISP in an NPO. Action Research (AR) was used as the primary research method in this stu...

Computer Supported Co-operative Work (CSCW) systems are complex, yet no computer-based tools of any sophistication exist to support their development. Since several people often need to work together on the same project simultaneously, the computer system often proves to be a bottleneck. CSCW tools are a means of allowing several users to work towa...

A new method for providing integrated support for multiple development notations (including analysis, design, and implementation) within Information Systems Engineering Environments (ISEEs) is described. Our method supports both static integration of multiple notations and the implementation of dynamic support for them within an integrated ISEE. Fi...

This paper describes the conceptual integration and computer-based support of two important groups of conceptual data models, Entity Relationship Models and Object Role Models (e.g. NIAM). We perform conceptual integration using the conceptual data modelling language CoCoA to specify separate data models of individual notations. We then merge these...

The development of complex Information Systems requires many Information Systems engineering tools. These diverse tools need to be integrated in order to be effectively used by multiple developers. In addition, these developers require features that facilitate effective cooperation, such as support for collaboratively planning work, notification of...

User perceptions of e -business systems' security are, at best, that such systems are not as secure as more traditional ways of doing business. As security is now considered to be so crucial to e -Business success, the question of how security requirements are identified and how users can become involved in identifying security requirements for the...

This paper describes research into utilising a Group Support System (GSS) to enable the use of the Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) in distributed situations, which prohibit face-to-face application of SSM. The design goals, issues, major decisions, and initial pilot evaluation of a prototype GSS for SSM are described. 46 subjects and 2 facilitators...

This paper describes an initial prototype for an Information Systems Digital Library (ISDL) for the free or low cost input, storage, full-text search, and retrieval of all kinds of publications relevant to the field of IS. The prototype is intended serve as a discussion point for the worldwide IS community, with the aim that an enhanced ISDL eventu...

Consulting organisations that develop web information systems (WIS) were surveyed by postal survey to determine their development activities and their usage of formal WIS development methodologies (WISDMs) as well as methodologies embedded in web development tools. The results showed that fewer than 10% of survey respondents use a WISDM to guide th...

This paper proposes that the worldwide, virtual community of information systems researchers develop a digital library system to support the needs of its members and those of the larger community that IS researchers serve. It describes an initial vision for an information systems digital library (ISDL) and the potential contribution of an ISDL to t...

In this issue, the paper by Nordbotten & Crosby, entitled ‘The effect of graphic style on data model interpretation’, attempts to establish a causal link between the graphic style of a conceptual data model (or data modelling language) and the success of users attempting to interpret instances of the use of that data model. It employs the novel tec...

School of Information Systems Curtin University of Technology Perth, Western Australia tr avisj c bs. curtin. edu. au This paper describes a group support system (GSS) to support distributed requirements investigation using Soft Systems Methodology (SSM). SSM is useful in complex problem situations involving many stakeholder roles with conflicting...

In order to facilitate better Information Systems Development (ISD), Method Engineering technqiues and tools are needed that support flexible creation, modification, and reuse of ISD methods and tools for use on specific problem domains. A metamodelling notation is needed for specifying and integrating different design notations. MetaCASE support i...

The development of complex Information Systems requires many Information Systems engineering tools. These diverse tools need to be integrated in order to be effectively used by multiple developers. In addition, these developers require features that facilitate effective cooperation, such as support for collaboratively planning work, notification of...

This paper describes teaching practices designed to help novice data modellers become expert data modellers. We base these practices on extant empirical research which highlights the strengths of expert data modellers and reveals the weaknesses of novices. After reviewing this research and analysing the causes of the novices' difficulties, we descr...

A new method for providing integrated support for multiple development notations (including analysis, design, and implementation) within Information Systems Engineering Environments (ISEEs) is described. Our method supports both static integration of multiple notations and the implementation of dynamic support for them within an integrated ISEE. Fi...

This paper discusses the recent work of the authors in developing Integrated CASE (ICASE) tools which support multiple development notations. We use a four-step methodology to develop these integrated tools. The conceptual data models of different notations are first developed, and then merged into an integrated conceptual data model. Dynamic mappi...

This paper describes the conceptual integration and computer-based support of two important groups of conceptual data models, Entity Relationship Models and Object Role Models (e.g. NIAM). We perform conceptual integration using the conceptual data modelling language CoCoA to specify separate data models of individual notations. We then merge these...

This dissertation research describes and evaluates the suitability of a conceptual data model named CoCoA (for Complex Covering Aggregation) for the description and modelling of complex problem domains. The dissertation additionally proposes a software architecture for information systems which support work in complex problem domains. A complex pro...

Non-profit organisations provide a large number of services of public interest and play an important role in the Australian society and economy. These organisations can very often improve or expand the services they provide to the public through the implementation of appropriate information systems and technologies. Effective choice and implementat...

The development of complex Information Systems requires the use of many Information Systems engineering tools. These diverse tools need to be integrated in order to be effectively used by multiple cooperating developers. In addition, the users of these environments require features that facilitate effective cooperation, such as support for collabor...

Cognitive Mapping is a form of Causal Mapping developed and popularised by Colin Eden and Fran Ackermann (Eden, 1988, Eden & Ackermann, 2001, Ackermann and Eden, 2001). This paper reports on research in progress to develop, test, and employ extensions to cognitive mapping to support decision making in the context of problem formulation and solution...

This paper describes an initial prototype for an Information Systems Digital Library (ISDL) for the free or low cost input, storage, full-text search, and retrieval of all kinds of publications relevant to the field of IS. The prototype is intended serve as a discussion point for the worldwide IS community, with the aim that an enhanced ISDL eventu...

This paper describes research into utilising a Group Support System (GSS) to enable the use of the Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) in distributed situations, which prohibit face-to-face application of SSM. The design goals, issues, major decisions, and initial pilot evaluation of a prototype GSS for SSM are described. 46 subjects and 2 facilitators...