Theorizing Universal Socio-Technical Mechanisms

The aim of designing and managing workplaces as socio-technical systems, is to deliver balanced outcomes of both efficiency and well-being. However, in a world where digital workplace technology and digital ecosystems are rapidly evolving, upholding the balance has become increasingly difficult. The present situation conveys that the social system seems unable to absorb and adjust to the high rate of IT-investments and deployments of digital technologies. At the same time, we see low job-engagement and high IT-project failures. To improve the situation of unexploited human and economic potential, I suggest embracing a socio-technical systems philosophy rooted in critical realism. Ontologically, the philosophical perspective sees a dynamic between a set of universal, generative socio-technical mechanisms, that trigger self-organization, if activated synchronically. Having these mechanisms in mind when deploying new technologies can bring about a new dynamic with balanced outcomes.