Contributions published at Information Management (Gerhard Schwabe)

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Businesses need information about their clients. Once client data is available, it becomes possible to create a client profile which could be used for personalized marketing, for example. Banks often apply valuable client data in financial advisory services during the needs elicitation phase. This involves gathering information about the client’s personal situation (financial status, family relationships, career situation, and so on) as well as their needs (planning for the future, their risk tolerance, and so on). On the basis of this information, a high-quality client profile can be created. Nonetheless, financial advisors often do not put enough effort into gathering information as parts of the needs elicitation process, resulting in a client profile of lower quality. Accordingly, clients are dissatisfied with inadequately tailored solutions and recommendations. Nevertheless, banks are subject to regulatory requirements to gather certain information. Moreover, in the digital era, banks are faced with the challenge of how to fulfill changing client requirements and integrating in-branch advice in a digital, omnichannel concept. The literature contains multiple instances demonstrating that IT can be used purposefully in advisory services. Nevertheless, no studies have yet been undertaken that research how the quality of client profiles could be improved by supporting the needs elicitation process. In this work, we answer the research question: “How can information technology be used to improve profile quality in financial advisory services?” In our analysis of the problem in the field, we have further established that although all stakeholders (banks, regulators, advisors, and clients) place great stead in the needs elicitation process, relevant client information is not gathered, causing profile quality to suffer in consequence. We further demonstrate that the problem cannot be resolved using currently advicegiving approaches in a service encounter. For example, questionnaires can disrupt the flow of conversation while using blank sheets of notepaper entail the risk that information may be overlooked. In this work, we introduce three design concepts to improve the needs elicitation process with the use of an information system: “joint profiling”, “task aware joint profiling” and “semi-private profiling”. All design concepts are based on the general design idea of guiding the advisor and the client by providing prompts when creating the client profile. Our problem analysis demonstrated that advisors and clients, emphasize the value of natural, open discussion. It has been shown in the literature that participants dislike an explicit process visualization of the advisory process. As such, we seek to guide the participants in the conversation without necessarily compelling them to follow a particular course of action. The nudge theory describes how people can be guided without restricting their freedom to take decisions. Building on findings contained in the literature and on nudge theory, we introduce the first concept of “joint profiling” and its implementation in CoProfiler 1.0. Nevertheless, many advisors and clients reported a sense of being compelled to discuss everything. Analysis of data showed that clients wondered, why the bank needs all this information. Their awareness of the task at hand suffered. The second concept, “task aware joint profiling” was developed with a focus on ensuring task awareness, and implemented in CoProfiler 2.0. This resulted in significantly higher task awareness in comparison to the pen-and-paper advisory sessions. Nevertheless, we observed that the use of a shared IT-artifact disrupted the conversation. Conversational analysis further confirmed that needs elicitation can be broken down into two distinct phases with differing goals and conversational roles. In the third design concept, “semi-private profiling,” the objective was to support these two phases of needs elicitation specifically. Accordingly, during the first phase of needs elicitation, only the advisor was supported by a semi-private IT-artifact. Evaluation of the PrivateProfiler prototype revealed that all design goals had been achieved. In this work, we contribute to the body of research in financial advisory services, IT-supported advisory services, and research about digital nudging.

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Thanks to todays technology students aren’t bound to the personal attendance of lectures anymore. Through lecture-podcasts they can watch the lectures later on at home or on-the-go, be it for revision before an exam or to catch up on a missed lecture. How exactly students incorporate these podcasts into their study behaviors differs from student to student. This bachelor thesis examines the practices which students at the University of Zurich have formed regarding lecture-podcasts. Based on the results of this examination design principles for a software, which could help students to better incorporate podcasts into their learning practices, are presented.

The following work investigates the practices, reasons and effects connected to podcast usage at Swiss tertiary institutions by using a qualitative analysis. This analysis includes interviewing students and comparing the findings of their statements with existing literature. The following evaluation of the findings should yield approaches for a more efficient and attractive composition of the current environment of podcasts at Swiss tertiary institutions. The identified essential practices were the manipulation of the video progress bar, the alteration of the playback speed and the preferred consumption of podcasts in a quiet environment. Furthermore, it was found that an increased usage of self-made podcasts and a uniform distribution of learning materials could offer a better learning and user experience.

Two developments from the recent years could have a sustainable effect on the Swiss financial sector: On the one hand, new regulations on the quality and the accountability of financial advisory encounters, namely the Financial Services Act (FIDLEG). On the other hand, the opportunity for financial service providers to provide their customers with a unique experience in advisory encounters and win their trust. The Information Management Research Group (IMRG) at the University of Zurich (UZH) is testing a Live Paper System with a Swiss bank, a novel approach in the field of financial service encounters providing customers with both a unique experience in advisory encounters and complying with FIDLEG. The Live Paper System supports advisory with technical tools and takes advantage of established paper practices from the field of financial service encounters. The aim of this master thesis is to understand better under the use of which practices an advisor can transfer knowledge to a customer in order to enable the customer to take self-reliant decisions in financial questions. Thus, a classic and a Live Paper based setting were analyzed. The used steps of analysis can be divided as follows: (A.) A literature analysis on the state of the art in research, (B.) an iterative approach in which 36 videos and 24 interviews were explored, (C.) a quantitative and a qualitative analysis of the insights gained. Results suggest that, in the Live Paper Setting, knowledge can successfully be transferred to the customer if (I.) amongst oral explanations visual contents from the Live Paper are used for purposes of illustration and (II.) the attention of the customer can be won when shifting topics though targeted gestures and movements, for instance, moving items.

Technology innovation often included improved user experiences. And feedback belongs into that category. Feedback done right can be a deciding factor when considering the usability of any software. Done wrong it can have the exact opposite effect. Advisory Services are one of the domains that are continuously getting evolved with the help of technology. And the subdomain of financial advisory services is no exception. The Information Management Re-search Group in collaboration with partners has launched multiple different prototypes that enable IT-supported advisory services. This paper analyzes the used feedback methods and inspects their influence on the consultant, in addition to its effects on the conversation flow between the consultant and the client. Furthermore, it tries to solve problems with the exist-ing feedback methods and proposes solutions to missing ones. Finally, it offers developers of new advisory systems some feedback guidelines providing them with some advice of do's and don'ts.

The ongoing digitalization of many corporate functions, including the innovation process, brings about fundamental changes that urge us to rethink established theories. Facilitating digital innovation requires a deep understanding of the actual practices that are carried out by innovating people with the help of artifacts. In this paper, we study the use of artifacts and illustrate their different roles in the underlying innovation practices to provide rich insights into digital innovation from a practice perspective. Grounded in a nearly three year-long, qualitative case study at two Swiss software companies and an extensive set of empirical data, this paper conceptualizes four interrelated digital innovation practices, namely making sense of an idea, aligning mental models, negotiating solution paths, and crafting an idea. We suggest a practice-based model of digital innovation, specify a set of practices for enabling digital innovation in organizations, and clarify the role of artifacts in digital innovation practices.

With more companies using Enterprise Social Networks (ESN) for employee communication and collaboration, the influence of ESN on organizational hierarchies has been subject of discussions in science and practice. Conversely, the question if formal hierarchies affect interaction inside ESN and outside (i.e., personal interaction or interaction via traditional media) in the same way has not yet been addressed. The aim of our research is to analyse those hierarchical effects. By contrasting a rich dataset comprising two years of communication and collaboration inside an ESN with data from an online survey, we found significant differences between the hierarchical effects inside and outside the ESN and their impact on communication and collaboration. Although our findings indicate significant impact of formal hierarchy, we found it to be weaker inside the ESN. We conclude that interaction inside ESN is more inclusive and balanced across hierarchical levels.

The current wave of digitalization has important implications for manufacturing companies. In this article, we suggest applying the theoretical lens of value co-creation as a comprehensive approach to explore the potential of digitalization trends. We use it to identify the potential of better integrating shop floor workers in the shaping of digital solutions and managerial actions. Insights from two case examples show how improved consideration of cognitive needs and the provision of opportunities for social connection to a community of workers makes them feel more valued, confident, empowered and integrated. This can balance other forms of frustrations and negative emotions, leading to a better perception of the overall relationship experience at the shop floor.

The used car marked is today ruled by mistrust. To address this issue, a Blockchain based Car Dossier will be introduced. The revolutionary technology promises, that the cars history can be displayed in a trusted format. This shall then eliminate the information asymmetries between the car buyers and sellers. This work takes first a look at the current car market. For this, various stakeholders that represent this market, are interviewed. Within the work the eco system, that arises due to the new technology, is addressed. Insights will be given on how a possible data model and the data flow for such a Car Dossier could look like. But also, the aspect of possible data driven business models will be discussed.

Using both a quantitative and qualitative approach, this thesis analyses 48 videos of burglary advisory services and draws comparisons between advisory sessions using a tablet computer and the classical advisory sessions in which the advisor brought along a case full of leaflets. This thesis analyses introducing and closing interactions with objects as well as client involvement. It finds that the tablet has a significant effect on the number of client involvement events through the advisors and that clients’ emotions towards the tablet have an effect on the attention span of the client as well as on the whole conversation.

The use of screens is prevalent today. Since they require our constant attention, interpersonal communication and interactions can be negatively affected and hence also the trustful relationship which is based upon them. Especially in financial advisory sessions a personal relationship with the client is key to future collaboration. An IT-system which extends the basic functionalities of everyday objects with technology could provide a remedy to this situation. This bachelor thesis addresses the use of a system in financial advisory sessions which resides in the background in favor of human interactions. The focus lies on the identification of the dominant and differing practices in the first and last part of the advisory session. It arrives at the conclusion that the system – despite its design principles – plays a dominant role in the interpersonal behavior between advisor and client.

Burglary advisory services are part of police prevention strategy for reducing the number of completed burglaries. The present paper examines the practices advisors use for persuasion and motivation pursuing the goal that citizens protect their buildings from burglars. Central questions are the role of fear in burglary advisory services and the impact of IT-support on advisory practices. For this purpose, concepts of advisory service, fear and persuasion are being defined by studying the relevant literature. Additionally, 20 interviews with advisors and their principals are being coded and the data is being analyzed qualitatively. The findings point out fear and fright as important support for persuasion and show the potential of IT for better motivating citizens to invest in safety engineering.

The nonverbal communication is capable of supporting and maintaining human relations in one-on-one consultations and can reveal emotional states of the participants. A particular nonverbal aspect of communication is the handling and manipulation of objects. Unfortunately, the effects of object handling have hardly been explored, especially in the banking sector. The topic and aim of this thesis is to explore the influence and impacts of the interaction with objects such as pen, paper and tokens on the interpersonal communication and collaboration in banking consulting services. The first step of this research is the preliminary exploration of the complex and mutual trust based relationship between the consultant and the customer with the aid of a qualitative content analysis. In the following step, a further qualitative research approach was done on eight video recordings of staged mortgage advisory encounters to determine the uses of objects. According to the results, the influence of objects on the consultant-client relationship has been further studied in detail by using the conversation analysis and following the multimodal analysis. Based on the analysis, two hypotheses and one explorative question has been constructed, which serve as a basis for following quantitative data analysis with 24 video recordings. The results demonstrate that both the intentional and unintentional use of objects in advisory services can by all means play a significant role in the interpersonal communication and cooperation between the consultant and client.

The goal of the following Master thesis is to contemplate Watson piloting projects conducted in Switzerland from four different research perspectives. These perspectives can be subdivided into an input, process and output model. First and foremost, the input perspective scrutinizes different application domains for Watson technology and addresses requirements needed in order to successfully implement Watson within an organization. The process perspective addresses Watson project management and different best practice development models. Lastly, the output perspective examines how Watson ultimately affects work and processes of an organization once being fully deployed. During the elaboration of this thesis, nine different use cases were contemplated by means of qualitative data analysis. Results show that Watson projects have a tremendous potential to increase a companyís efficiency in many various application domains. However, this type of project occurs in an uncertain and highly innovative environment and therefore, adequate and adjusted project management practices and an adherence to certain requirements are needed. Keywords: Cognitive Computing, IBM, Watson, Watson Piloting Projects, Watson Application Do-mains, Watson Project Management, Watson Requirements, Human-Watson Collaboration.

In cooperation with a large Swiss insurance company, the Information Management Research Group (IMRG) of the University of Zurich conducted field trials in the area of client advisory. The studies were performed during actual consulting practises, thereby offering ëin-the-wildí insights. During these consulting encounters with clients, supporting IT applications were used, which respective analysis will stand in the center of this paper. An open area of evaluation that will be reviewed throughout this paper is the optimization of consulting supporting IT applications of the insurance industry in regard to advisory best practises. The aim of this master thesis is to analyse how to optimize the currently used mobile applications of insurance companies and propose optimization suggestions, which are tailored to the needs of the insurance advisors. This will be conducted through the coding and analysing of ethnographically-inspired methods of gathering work place relevant research data. To achieve this goal, advisory best practises as well as three suggestions for a short, middle and long term solution will be suggested.

Cognitive computing promises businesses innovative possibilities. IBM Watson is the most prominent representative for the introduction of cognitive computing to a business. The introduction is different to regular information system projects. IBM Watson pilot projects in Switzerland are analysed in a multi case study to study these differences. The case studies cover project requirements and preconditions as well as suitable application domains. Furthermore the project management approach and the human Watson collaboration is studied. The pilot projects can serve as examples for innovation based on IBM Watson. The results present the most promising application domains in low-hanging fruit solutions that satisfy business and human needs. The requirements resemble a combination of those for innovation, IT and data science projects. The project management is based on a concurrent integration of Design Thinking and agile development with a strong involvement of business users. The human Watson collaboration has a strong focus on empowering employees and changing their mindset towards probabilistic information systems.

A new generation of information technology (IT), promises significant benefits for manufacturing companies in their daily work. However, the companies are rather slow in taking advantage of the opportunities offered by the current wave of digitalization. This paper starts with an overview of emerging sociotechnical trends in manufacturing. We discuss technology as catalyser of this transformation process and its impact on individual and organisational levels. The intense collaboration with six manufacturing companies in a European project allowed us to identify and further specify four digital challenges: 1) Digitally augmented human work, 2) Worker-centric knowledge sharing, 3) Self-learning manufacturing workplaces, and 4) In-situ mobile learning. The four digital challenges illustrate how companies (can) embrace emerging sociotechnical trends in manufacturing and thus contribute to a better understanding of the changing role of IT on the Shop Floor.

Advisors providing non-commercial service encounters are neither trained nor explicitly incentivized to persuade the advisee. However, a whole range of encounters may benefit from enhanced persuasiveness to prevent the advisee from taking counterproductive decisions. Persuasion literature from the field of social psychology points to the persuadee’s involvement as a central factor of persuasive effect. Never- theless, little is known on how persuader addresses persuadee’s involvement and how those efforts can be supported by means of modern technology, especially in the non-commercial service encounters. Based on a detailed analysis of experimental service encounters and supported by the in situ studies of real advisory sessions, this study identifies a set of involvement practices, i.e., conversational practices that advisors engage in when trying to improve the advisee’s involvement and illustrates how these practices can be afforded with modern multimedia technology. Thereby, the manuscript proposes to bridge the notions of involvement from the conversation studies and from the persuasion literature. By pointing to the influence of IT on persuasive behaviour in service encounters, it brings together the concept of persuasive technology and service support as a subfield of IS. The manuscript offers novel perspective for framing the conversations and the practices in service encounters.