Working around technologies—invisible professionalism?

• Published date: 01 July 2017
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ntwe.12093
• Author: Katia Dupret
• Date: 01 July 2017

174 New Technology, Work and Employment © 2017 Brian Towers (BRITOW) and

John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

New Technology, Work and Employment 32:2

ISSN 1468-005X

Working around technologies—invisible

professionalism?

Katia Dupret

This study discusses how professionalism and work ethics in-

fluence how health care professionals work around new tech-

nologies. When people avoid using technologies, they are not

necessarily ceasing to engage in their work activities. The

workaround strategies presented here are rather practical ex-

pressions of professionals’ active encounter with the complex-

ity of work situations, and can therefore be important signs

of professional ethical judgement. Drawing on science and

technology studies and the concept of invisible work, the study

discusses workaround situations that arise in health care work

in Denmark. The aim and contribution of the study is twofold.

First, it attempts to revitalise the discussion on technology

workaround strategies as responsible professionalism. Second,

it will direct attention to and contribute to an understanding

of how the normativity embedded in technological develop-

ment in the health care sector is central to the work of health

care professionals.

Keywords: technology, health care, science and technology

studies, professionalism, invisible work, ethics, workarounds.

Introduction

Organisations often have great aspirations regarding how the new technologies intro-

duced in the workplace will prevent human error and improve efficiency. However,

implementing these new technologies still involves following standardisations and

rules of conduct formulated with a functional or instrumental approach that tends to

simplistically assume that the task the technology is to perform is isolated from the

other aspects of everyday working life (Orlikowski, 2010). As such, these technologies

are often considered value free. In spite of this tendency, research within science and

technology studies (STS), post- structural and practice approaches (Gherardi and

Nicolini, 2000; Vikkelsø, 2005; Orlikowski, 2007; Oudshoorn, 2008) has suggested that

whether the use of technology in itself poses ‘good’ or ‘bad’ challenges in the work-

place cannot be determined. These approaches have delivered valuable insight into the

unintended or hidden consequences of organising practices (Cooper and Burrell, 1988;

Star, 1991; Hassard and Parker, 1993; Pols, 2006; Oudshoorn, 2008), making it possible

to identify and account for the invisible work undertaken in the changing contours of

technological and organisational systems and processes and thus to enhance under-

standing of the many dimensions of the everyday practices that technological change

Katia Dupret, (katia@ruc.dk), is associate professor in the social psychology of working life at Roskilde

University, Denmark. Her research concerns innovation and change of labour and organizational life.

She examines the introduction of various types of technologies and how these interrelate with man-

agement, employees, costumers and patients. She has edited books and written extensively on social

interventions and technological literacy