Keywords

IT adoption and use, work system, digital agents, work system theory, facets of work, modes of engagement with digital agents, patterns of interaction with digital agents

Abstract

This conceptual contribution explains an integrated approach for describing and analyzing adoption and use of IT-based entities that are encountered in today’s business enterprises, society, and personal life. Its many concepts and models provide a scaffolding that practitioners and researchers can use at different levels of depth for understanding instances of IT adoption and use. Its integrated treatment of work systems, information systems, and digital agents leads to practical applications and research possibilities that do not flow from quantitative methods that have dominated research in this area. This paper’s approach to IT adoption and use is based on the work system perspective. Work systems delegate responsibilities to digital agents, which are algorithmic agents that operate by executing algorithms encoded in software. Numerous capabilities that digital agents may exhibit with different degrees of smartness are identified. An AI-related example illustrates a work system’s delegation of responsibilities to digital agents. The adoption of work systems and digital agents is outlined using the work system life cycle model. An agent-responsibility framework reveals many possible uses of digital agents. The framework’s horizontal dimension is a spectrum of roles that digital agents may perform. Its vertical dimension is 18 facets of work from prior research. Modes of engagement and patterns of interaction between people and digital agents are discussed. After summarizing this paper’s ideas, the conclusion briefly discusses this paper’s divergence from much of the literature on IT adoption and use, possible applications by practitioners, and implications for conceptual, case study, and variable-centered research.

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