Abstract:
Current approaches to technology innovation often fail because they are conceived
and assessed from a single perspective or dimension. Thus, current considerations in
expert systems development are characterised by a strong focus upon the technology
and technical issues without a prior process of wider appraisal and technology
assessment. A central theme of this study is that the business, organisational and
human factors, which determine how effectively the technology will be used in
practice, must be an integral part of the assessment process. The thesis describes a
‘multiple perspective approach’ to technology assessment applied to expert systems
innovation in a large manufacturing organisation.
This research therefore embraces detailed technical, organisational and individual
perspectives of expert systems assessment and development and describes how each
perspective adds new concepts, methods and tools. In practice, this has meant
modelling activities and information flows in a two-site manufacturing organisation,
the identification of a variety of potential areas for expert systems development, the
narrowing down and selection of particular areas according to technical,
organisational, business and personal criteria, and the eventual design,
development, ‘operationalisation’ and evaluation of a single application. This study
is placed in a wider context by complementary analyses of other manufacturing
users and suppliers of expert systems. The work aims to contribute towards an
understanding of expert systems innovation and to improved methodologies for
technology assessment and technology transfer.
