Pertemuan 7 Journal : Toward an ‘IT Conflict-Resistance Theory’: action research during IT pre-implementation
European
Journal of Information Systems (2010) 19, 540–561
& 2010 Operational Research
Society Ltd. All rights reserved 0960-085X/10
www.palgrave-journals.com/ejis/
Toward an ‘IT Conflict-Resistance Theory’:
action research during IT pre-implementation
Emmanuel Houze´2
1CREGOR, Montpellier II
University, France;
2CREGOR, IAE, Montpellier II
University, France
Correspondence: Re´gis Meissonier, Ecole
Polytechnique, Universite´ Montpellier II,
Place Euge`ne Bataillon, 34060 Montpellier,
France.
Tel: þ 33 4 67 14 31 60;
Fax: þ 33 4 67 14 45 14;
E-mail: regis.meissonier@univ-montp2.fr
Received: 27 July 2009
Revised: 2 February 2010
2nd Revision: 3 March 2010
3rd Revision: 7 April 2010
4th Revision: 22 April 2010
Accepted: 1 May 2010
Abstract
Most empirical research on users’ resistance toward Information Technology (IT)
has been conducted
after implementation of IT in organisations. Little research
has been done on the
way individual and group resistance emerges and evolves
during prior stages of
projects. This focus on pre-implementation phases is
important since
Information Systems (IS) managers need to anticipate potential
conflicts and users’
resistance that can involve project failure. While IS literature
has separately
developed theories on resistance and conflicts, we conceptualise
a whole
theoretic-system we call ‘IT Conflict-Resistance Theory’ (IT-CRT). This
theory is used as
driver for a 2-year action research project conducted at Netia
Corporation (a
worldwide leader in video and audio broadcasting) during
preliminary phases of
its Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation
project. According to
our findings, while conflicts toward IT implementation are
often considered to
have negative effects and require being actively managed
by top managers, the
case study delivers an alternative observation: a passive-
like attitude of
managers during the IT pre-implantation phase does not prevent
the resolution of a
socio-political oriented conflict between two groups of
employees. Our
observations illustrate how the avoidance management style
invites team members
to cope with conflict situations and to express tacit causes
of resistance. While
most Management Information System methods tend
naturally to maximise
users’ satisfaction and to reduce potential resistance, the
IT-CRT theory
developed in this article supports an alternative approach:
enhancing resistance
in order to anticipate and resolve latent conflicts that are
directly or indirectly
related to the project. The underlying message of this
article for
researchers and practitioners is to consider users’ resistance toward IT
as a key process
embedded into IT choices and IS design.
European Journal of
Information Systems (2010) 19, 540–561.
doi:10.1057/ejis.2010.35;
published online 8 June 2010
Keywords: resistance; conflicts; avoidance;
pre-implementation; ERP
Introduction
Understanding key
factors contributing to Information Technology (IT)
adoption in
organisations is a central concern in Information Systems (IS)
research. Among key
factors associated with IT project failures, users’
resistance is one of
the most salient because it is related to human
resistance
to change ( Jiang et al., 2000b).
Existing literature provides
practical knowledge
about conflict types and conflict management styles
(Miranda &
Bostrom, 1993; Markus et al., 2000a; Barki & Hartwick, 2001;
Cramton,
2001; Montoya-Weiss et al., 2001).
However, most of this
research was
empirically conducted after IT had been implemented in
organisations
surveyed; thus, it can be considered to be observations made
on downstream results
of the upstream resistance process. As a conse-
quence,related to the non-appropriateness of IT that users have
to cope with. Few empirical studies have investigated
how individual and group resistance emerges and evolves
during prior project stages (Lapointe & Rivard, 2005).
However, negotiations during IT implementation can
raise affective-oriented resistance if users perceive threats
concerning their values or power relationships because of
expected organisational changes. A focus on pre-imple-
mentation phases is thus important, as IS managers need
to anticipate potential conflicts and users’ resistance that
can lead to project failure (Marakas & Hornik, 1996;
Joshi & Lauer, 1998;
Robey et al., 2002; McAfee, 2007).
Because enterprise systems are considered to impact
IT on future actions (Lee & Myers, 2004) because of their
cross-functional perspective
(Markus et al., 2000a, b)
and readiness to change (Kwahk & Lee, 2008), we report
resistance evolution toward the ERP adoption project
during the pre-implementation phase.
The rest of the article is structured as follows. The
literature analysis reviews conceptual foundations of
resistance, conflict and conflict management styles associated
with IT implementation. While IS literature has sepa-
rately developed related theories, we conceptualise a
whole theoretic-system we call ‘IT Conflict-Resistance
Theory’ (IT-CRT). The case study analysis delivers the
results of a 2-year action research project conducted at
Netia Corporation (a worldwide leader in video and audio
broadcasting for TV and radio channels). First, our
observations reveal
that task-oriented conflicts expressed
by employees actually hide a socio-political oriented
conflict. These instances of resistance require the abortion
of the ERP initially considered for a less impacting
application on some specific process changes and on
underlying power redistribution across groups of emp-
loyees. Second, whereas conflicts toward IT are often
considered as being required to be actively managed by
the CEO (Markus et al., 2000a, b; Barki & Hartwick, 2001),
our case study delivers an alternative observation. IT
describes how a passive-like attitude of managers during
the IT pre-implantation phase does not prevent the
resolution of a socio-political oriented conflict between
two groups of employees. Our observations illustrate how
the avoidance management style invites team members
to cope with conflict situations and to express tacit causes
of resistance. We also observe how this conflict between
developers and administration employees switches to a
compromise. In conclusion, the article views users’
resistance toward IT not as systematic negative beha-
viours aiming at project abortion, but invites researchers
to explore how task-oriented and socio-political
oriented
conflicts can turn out to be key processes embedded in IS
design.
Literature review
In management and organisation theories, the political
school of thought developed by famous authors such as
Mintzberg et al. (1998, 2002) or Crozier &
Friedberg
(1977) considers strategy formation and implementation
to be shaped by
political ploys. As a consequence, a
strategic project
usually involves shifting coalitions of
dominant actors of
parochial interests (Lee & Myers,
2004). Even if some
research in IS views IT users’
resistance as a deep
approach ( Joshi, 1990; Krovi, 1993;
Joshi & Lauer,
1998), it seems marginal compared to the
many articles
published on the subject. Lapointe &
Rivard (2005, p. 462)
reveal that among the 43 articles
published during the
last 20-year period on users’
resistance toward IT,
only four do not consider resistance
to be a factual
characteristic of the context. The majority
of these studies treat
users’ resistance as a component of
an organisational
system at the individual and group
level
(Markus et al., 2000a, b), and only a
minor part of
these
studies focuses on causal conflicts (Jiang et
al.,
2000a).
While
literature stresses resistance or conflict without
making clear
differences between both concepts, our
analysis, both based
on psychology and sociology
theories, considers
resistance as a behavioural dimension
of conflict: the way a
person expresses a conflict. Refer-
ring to the Theory of
Reasoned Action (Ajzen & Fishbein,
1980),
we consider resistance as an actual
behaviour
preceded
by conflict, and conflict as
a form of attitudinal
beliefs corresponding
to an affective or evaluative judge-
ment of a person about
the likelihood of the object or
event consequences.
Resistance
User’s resistance is
defined as a subjective process psycho-
logically based at the
individual level (Jermier & Knights,
1994). In an important
semantic analysis, Lapointe &
Rivard (2005) describe
behaviour as the primary dimen-
sion of resistance (p.
464). In this sense, behaviour is a
reaction to a present
or ongoing situation perceived as
being negative (Ang
& Pavri, 1994), as inequitable (Joshi,
1991), as a threat (Dent
& Goldberg, 1999) or as a stressful
feeling (Marakas &
Hornik, 1996). According to Joshi
(1991), resistance
appears when the user perceives
changes involved by an
‘unfair’ project in regard to his/
her personal work or
in regard to the group he/she
belongs to.
Users can express resistance toward IT in an active form
(visible and
relatively easy to detect) or a passive form
(harder to detect and
difficult to deal with) (Tetlock,
1999; Tetlock, 2000;
Jiang et al., 2000a). Empirical studies
show that resistance
is higher at the group level than the
individual level
(Lapointe & Rivard, 2005). In other
words, a group of
persons (depending on their profes-
sional category,
professional competencies, age, gender,
etc.) represents the
most likely unit to develop high
resistance toward IT.
Indeed, at the group level, users’
resistance is often
socio-political, whereas at the indivi-
dual level, it is more
psychological (Markus, 1983).
Coetsee (1999)
identifies four types of resistance:
Apathy corresponds to behaviour of disinterest and
inaction of a person toward the situation. Also named
‘neutral zone’, it represents the situation in which
people are aware of changes, but their perceptions are
neutral and their behaviours characterised by a sort of
passive resignation. According to Coetsee, this situa-
tion represents a transitional state between resistance
and acceptance.
Passive resistance: a person adopts some behaviours
aimed at slowing down changes and keeping the
previous system (examples: voluntary delays in tasks
to do, argumentation in favour of so-called advantages
of existing rules and processes).
Active resistance is considered as a ‘constructive form’
aimed at the improvement of the project (examples:
expression of different points of views, negotiation
about a consensus, accommodation).
Aggressive resistance: users can resort to threats, black-
mails, boycotts and all other actions whose objective is
blocking the situation.
According to the author, these forms are not exclusive
and should be considered as part of a continuum
that encompasses, on the extreme, user acceptance and
involvement. The way persons can behave toward an
object can vary a lot. Some persons can accept changes
involved, while others may reject them. In other words,
persons can perceive differently the threats of a same
object in function of the initial distribution of power
(Markus, 1983) or established routines (Marakas &
Hornik, 1996).
Conflict
Conflict is defined as a disagreement of persons or groups
of persons perceiving a situation as being inconsistent
with their own interests (Boulding, 1963; Robbins, 1974;
Putnam & Wilson, 1982; Hocker & Wilmot, 1985). While
acts of resistance concern forms of behaviours, conflicts
are about the object of resistance and perceived threats
(Lapointe & Rivard, 2005, p. 467). Several definitions
made in Organisational Science (Putman & Poole, 1987),
Psychology (Thomas, 1992) or IS (Barki & Hartwick,
2001) consider three
conditions of conflicts: interdepen-
dence, interference and disagreement. By itself, each condi-
tion cannot be considered as a sufficient condition.
Conflicts are more dependent on overlapping.
Interdependence exists when each party reaches a
specific goal, at least because of the actions of the
other party. In essence, interdependence is a structural
condition for conflicts in a professional context
because of respective consequences of the way the
other party acts (Kumar & Dissel, 1996).
Interference is a behavioural condition for conflict and
occurs when one or several parties oppose the other
party’s attainment of its interests, objectives or goals.
Interference thus represents the central behavioural
node of any conflict (Barki & Hartwick, 2001, p. 198).
Disagreement is a cognitive condition for conflict and
corresponds to divergence of interpretations toward
values, objectives, needs, methods, etc. Disagreement
refers to disputant behaviours and is considered as
the central process associated with conflict (Wall &
Callister, 1995).
While first and second
properties sound like structural
configurations
associated with conflict, the latter deals
with upward causes. At
the individual level, a conflict
can represent opposition
to oneself (internal conflict),
to other persons,
groups of persons or to institutions
(Thomas, 1992).
According to Coser (1956), a conflict can
be ‘realistic’ or ‘unrealistic’.
A ‘realistic conflict’ arises
from a frustration of
a specific demand, and ceases
if the actors’ demands
are satisfied or if they can find
alternative ways to
achieve their ends. On the other
hand, an ‘unrealistic
conflict’ is the result from one
antagonist’s need to
release tension; the conflict is an end
by itself and there is
no alternative to means.
At the group level (or intradepartmental level), con-
flicts can be task-
(or process-) or relational-oriented
(Deutsch, 1969;
Pinkley, 1990; Jehn, 1995; Jehn &
Bendersky, 2003).
Conflicts about tasks or processes are
issue-oriented,
arising from differences between profes-
sional missions to be
performed, whereas relational
conflicts refer to
personalised disagreements or individual
disaffections. The
former can be considered as differences
of points of view
rarely associated with negative emo-
tions, while the
latter can raise frictions and tensions,
consequently affecting
team performance (Jehn &
Mannix, 2001).
Research in psychology distinguishes
this ‘affective
component’ in two ways: a conflict can be
‘intellectual’ when
persons focus on facts and thoughts
involved, or ‘emotional’
when it is caused by feelings like
jealousy, anger or
frustration (Pinkley, 1990, p. 120).
At inter-group (or interdepartmental) level, Pondy
(1967) identifies
three types of conflicts among the
subunits of formal
organisations: (1) bargaining conflict
that concerns interest
groups in competition for scarce
resources; (2)
bureaucratic conflict between the parties to
a superior–subordinate
relationship; and (3) systems
conflict about
coordination issues among parties to a
lateral or working
relationship. Then, beyond task-related
asymmetries
(Walton et al., 1969), social and
political
‘subsystems’ (Pondy,
1966) (about ideologies, values,
power tensions, etc.)
play a significant role in inter-unit
conflicts. As
consequences, obstacles to communication
are considered to be
main factors associated with this
category of conflicts
(Walton & Dutton, 1969), whereas
frequent contacts
(Nelson, 1989) or communication
quality (Massey &
Dawes, 2007) are observed as having
a calming effect.
Conflicts associated with ERP implementation can
encompass intra- and
inter-department levels and mix
several aforementioned
dimensions. Our literature ana-
lysis in IS allows us
to identify five different conflict types
(see Table 1), which
we aggregate as functions of their
task vs
socio-political orientation.
Conflicts about the system are about the IT design by
itself, its
functionalities and efficiency. These conflicts
Task-oriented
Socio-political oriented
Conflicts about the system
Conflicts about the
definition and
the execution of tasks that
users
must fulfil
Conflicts about the new
professional skills required
Cultural conflicts
Conflicts due to a loss of
power
Markus et al (2000a, b);
Bernard et al. (2004); Walczuch et al. (2007);
Kwahk & Lee (2008)
Markus et al. (2000a, b);
Besson & Rowe (2001); Robey et al. (2002)
Markus et al. (2000a, b);
Besson & Rowe (2001); Newman & Westrup
(2005)
Besson (1999); Kohli &
Kettinger (2004); Menard & Bernier (2004);
Wagner & Newell (2004);
Leidner & Kayworth (2006)
Markus (1983); Hart &
Saunders (1997); Besson & Rowe (2001);
Jasperson et al. (2002)
of well-known acceptance
models (Davis et al., 1989,
1992; Venkatesh, 1994), and are related to the attitude of
individuals to use a new technology. Empirical research
has provided useful observations about personal char-
acteristics associated, such as readiness to change (Walczuch
et al., 2007), personal competences and organisational com-
mitment (Kwahk & Lee, 2008).
Conflicts about task
definition and execution are caused
by the way organisational processes have to be adapted
or transformed to fit with IT process requirements (for
example: how invoices and orders must be established,
new data codification, signature validation process).
These conflicts can be ‘internally initiated’ when users
compare the way they achieve their tasks and perceive
modus operandi and operational definitions (Besson &
Rowe, 2001). They can also be ‘externally initiated’
because of the process constraints imposed by the IT to
be implemented. For instance, ERP standard modules
represent one of the most well-known conflict drivers
because of ‘best practices’ imposed on employees without
too much consideration of organisational specificities
(Davenport, 1998; Markus et al., 2000a, b; Lim et al.,
2005). This type of misalignment with organisational
processes (Hsiao-Lan et al., 2005) is all the more impor-
tant, as problems in Management Information Systems
(MIS) are more about the ability of users to under-
stand how they must carry out their new tasks than
about the ability of the firm to manage change (Robey
et al., 2002).
Conflicts about new
professional skills deal with
compe-
tences users must develop in order to be qualified for job
transformations involved by IT (Markus et al., 2000a, b;
Besson & Rowe, 2001). Accountancy is one of the most
salient professional illustrations: before ERP implementa-
tion during the 1990s, an important part of daily work of
these employees consisted of collecting, aggregating and
synthesising a huge quantity of financial data. Enterprise
applications dramatically change their assignments:
being no more the ones who collect financial data, they
are asked to interpret the information ex-post, in order to
make sense and
recommendations to top managers
(Bernard et al.,
2004).
Cultural conflicts are psychologically based. They refer
to ideology by which
some people share beliefs and make
sense of their worlds
(Trice & Beyer, 1993). Firm subunits
may have their own
subculture varying in their ideolo-
gical content (Stewart
& Gosain, 2006). In IS, value con-
flicts may arise from
inconsistency between cultural
principles of users or
groups of users and the perceived
underlying strategic
objectives assigned to IT imple-
mentation (Leidner
& Kayworth, 2006). Several empi-
rical studies (Besson,
1999; Kohli & Kettinger, 2004;
Bhattacherjee &
Hikmet, 2007; Bhattacherjee et al., 2008)
reveal how these
conflicts can arise in the hospital sector.
For example, Besson
(1999) observes that financial
control allowed by the
ERP regarding hospital activities
is perceived by
medical employees to be an attempt of a
market-based activity
inconsistent with fundamental
principles of health
public services. The empirical ana-
lysis of Wagner &
Newell (2004) reveals complementary
observations according
to which ERP can be problematic
for organisational
subcultures because mandating one
epistemological
position through the software design is
based on ‘best
practices’.
Power conflicts concern the way hierarchical authorities,
autonomies and
capabilities of influence of employees
and management are
likely to be redistributed after IT
implementation. Power
conflicts among managers are
also sometimes
referred to as governance conflicts or
leadership conflicts
(Besson & Rowe, 2001). Research in IS
challenges
understanding of IT development and im-
plementation
deviations by pointing out intricacies due
to power influence
exerted by actors (Markus, 1983; Davis
et al., 1984; Markus
& Bjorn-Andersen, 1987; Jasperson
et al., 2002; Avgerou
& McGrath, 2007). On the one hand,
IT can give more power
to key users by allowing them to
use real time data
access to functionalities (Davenport,
1998); on the other
hand, IT can reduce the autonomy of
employees (Markus,
1983). Despite hierarchical monitor-
ing supported by IT,
power losses for employees may be
caused by more
interdependencies with colleagues. For
instance, in civil engineering project management, ERP
implementations change the way main actors (project
supervisors, architects, electricians, plumbers, etc.) colla-
borate (Gilbert & Leclair, 2004). Formerly, they did
not have to communicate to colleagues the details of
calculations on which their analyses were based. The
integration of processes associated with IT looks like a
management of interdependencies (Rockart & Short,
1995) by which an actor becomes a prescriber for his
colleagues. As a consequence, the political perspective in
terms of power distribution misfit appears to be primarily
applicable for cross-functional IS (Markus, 1983) like
enterprise systems.
Actually, conflict types are not exclusive, as they
can occur simultaneously and have mutual influence.
For example, Munster (2007) analyses the presence of
simultaneous inter- and intra-group conflicts and ob-
serves that when the intra-group contest becomes less
decisive, there are more inter-group conflicts. According
to the avoidance theory (Knowles & Linn, 2004), a person
can be simultaneously for and against change. For
instance, somebody is likely to have a task-oriented accep-
tance of an IT project and,
at the same time, a socio-
political conflict by perceiving some unfair threats and
abuses. Thus, resistance turns out to be a complex
behavioural process. Manifest conflicts in organisations
result largely from value, power or status factors that
originate outside the particular lateral relationship
under consideration or which antedate the relationship
(Thompson, 1960; 1961; Walton et al., 1969). In the same
vein, MIS literature based on the interaction theory
(Joshi, 1992) suggests that the fundamental reasons of
resistance toward IT systems are not the ones expressed
about the system, nor personal characteristics, but users’
perceived values and social content gain or
loss before/after system implementation (Kendall, 1997;
Jiang et al., 2000a). Indeed, advocating system incon-
sistencies or organisational misalignment is probably a
more comfortable resistance strategy than the one
consisting of expressing underlying individual socio-
political challenges. In this research, we assume that
users having socio-political oriented conflicts related
to IT projects are likely to use a bypassing strategy and
to express only
task-oriented conflicts. Following this
reasoning, we
formulate the following research proposition:
Proposition
1: Task-oriented conflicts expressed
toward IT
to be implemented may hide socio-political
oriented conflict.
Conflict management
styles
IT projects can rarely
be properly completed without
implications of the
CEO. Often, top managers appear as
‘sponsors’ of the
project in order to promote its credi-
bility toward
employees (Davenport, 1998; Markus et al.,
2000a, b). A CEO
should be able to balance the choice
that must be made
between satisfaction of individual
expectations and the
general objectives of IT projects.
Sillars (1980)
distinguishes three common conflict reso-
lution
approaches: The integrative
approach aims to
identify and achieve
outcomes perceived as satisfactory
to
all team members. The distributive
approach tends to
assert outcomes that
favour some persons only. The
avoidance approach
concerns managers not intervening in
the conflict and
relying rather on the team capability to
self-resolve the
conflict.
Burke (1970a, b) identifies five different management
styles concerning
conflict resolution. These conflict
resolution modes have
been validated and used in many
management and IS
projects (Marciniak, 1996; Barki &
Hartwick, 2001), as
well as virtual teams (Kankanhalli
et al., 2006). We
decided to adopt these five conflict
resolution styles (see
Table 2).
Previous studies have demonstrated the preference of
IT users toward collaborative
resistance management
methods in opposition
to direct management methods
imposed by managers
(Robey & Taggart, 1981; Ives &
Olson, 1984).
According to Montoya-Weiss et al. (2001),
integrative and distributive
approaches appear to facilitate
team performance,
whereas the avoidance approach seems
to hinder it. In her
longitudinal study of 24 IT projects
Marciniak (1996) found
that the avoidance approach was
inefficient and
ineffective. However, she also noted that
when the stakes were
not so important, this management
style could be
recommended. In their empirical analysis
conducted on IS staff
and future users of 162 IS projects,
Integrative
approaches
Table 2 Management
styles of IT resistance
Problem
solving Managers identify conflict
causes and solve them by looking for an optimal solution. Problem-solving
occurs when managers try to fully satisfy the concerns of all
parties.
Compromise This
occurs when there is no optimal solution to the conflict. Managers try to reach
a consensus by a
solution perceived as satisfactory by each party.
Distributive
approaches
Asserting
Authoritarian decisions are
made and imposed by managers to all parties. The conflict is considered as
a win/lose situation.
Accommodating Managers give up their preferences and
satisfy parties’ claims. Accommodating occurs when the
priority for managers reduces the conflict.
Avoidance approach
European Journal of Information Systems
Managers do not intervene in
the conflict and hope for the self-resolution of the conflict. Avoidance
occurs when managers prefer
letting parties find a solution by themselves.
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