Eliciting the Double-edged Impact of Digitalisation: a Case Study in Rural Areas - Supplementary Material
Creators: name: Ferrari, Alessio
name: Lepore, Fabio
name: Ortolani, Livia
name: Brunori, Gianluca
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2023
Subjects: digitalisation, computers and society, requirements engineering

description: This package contains the material associated to the paper "Eliciting the Double-edged Impact of Digitalisation: a Case Study in Rural Areas", accepted at the IEEE International Conference on Requirements Engineering 2023 (RE'23). It contains both the material used to support the method for impact elicitation described in the case study, and guidelines on how to re-apply the method in other contexts. <strong>Content of the Package</strong><br> The package contains the material reported below, translated from Italian. The material shall be considered as an example for those who wish to re-apply the method proposed in the paper to elicit impacts of digital technologies in their specific context. 1. interview questions.pdf: list of questions from the initial interviews with the stakeholders. The questions are from structured interviews oriented to identify the main actors, technologies and relations thereof of the socio-technical system. 2. system description.pdf: a pictorial representation of the socio-technical system, toghether with a textual description of each main component (actors and technologies), and an overview of their interaction. 3. slides - impact workshop.pdf/pptx: introductory slides for the impact workshop, oriented to elicit past and present impacts of digital technologies. 4. slides - scenario workshop intro.pdf/pptx: introductory slides for the scenario workshops, presented in a plenary meeting before dividing the participants into two groups to discuss two different scenarios (technology intensive and technology balanced). 5. slides - scenario workshop balanced.pdf/pptx: introductory slides for the scenario 1 workshop, to trigger discussion on a technology balanced future scenario, and elicit possible future impacts of technology. 6. slides - scenario workshop intensive.pdf/pptx: introductory slides for the scenario 2 workshop, to trigger discussion on a technology intensive future scenario, and elicit possible future impacts of technology. <strong>Application of the Elicitation Method: Guidelines</strong><br> This section illustrates the guidelines on how to re-apply the method illustrated in the paper. The method is oriented to identify past, present and future impacts of digital technologies on a certain socio-technical system. 1) Stakeholder Identification: Identify a pivotal actor of the socio-technical system, create rapport, and elicit a list of relevant stakeholders to interview. Make sure to have both email and phone contacts. 2) Interviews: Schedule interviews with the identified stakeholders, and perform a set of unstructured interviews oriented to: <br> (a) reconstruct the socio-technical system, in terms of actors, technologies and relations thereof, and <br> (b) elicit the present and past impact of digital technologies on the daily job of the interviewed stakeholder. Make sure to: <br> - understand the role of the stakeholder in the system; <br> - ask for additional stakeholders and their contacts; <br> - understand what is the perceived impact of technology; <br> - record the interviews; <br> - transcribe the interviews. We recommend unstructured interviews as this is an exploratory phase in which one does not know the different roles, the jargon of the stakeholders, and the technologies involved. The questions asked during the interviews of the case study are reported in <strong>1. interview questions.pdf</strong>. 3) System Reconstruction: Perform a thematic analysis of the interviews, using the coding guidelines in [1], to reconstruct the socio-technical system, in terms of actors, technologies and relations thereof. Depict the system by means of a visual diagram, and describe its elements. The file <strong>2. system description.pdf</strong> includes a diagram of the system and associated descriptions. Review the diagram with the pivotal actor, to make sure it is complete and correct. Perform additional interviews if some aspects are unclear or missing. 4) Impact Identification - Interviews: Perform a thematic analysis of the interviews, using the coding guidelines in [1], to identify an initial list of the present and past impacts of digital technology. 5) Impact Workshop: the impact workshop is oriented to elicit past and present impacts of digitalisation. The impact workshop can be conducted either physically or through a digital platform. In the first case, we recommend using either a computer with a projector, where the moderator can add the information collected so far, or a large and clearly visible whiteboard, so that all the participants can see the content. In the second case, we recommend the moderator to share their screen and report content based on the discussion. The main steps of the workshop are the following: - Prepare Introductory Slides: these shall describe the activities done so far (interviews and system reconstruction), a simplified representation of the system, and the description of the goal of the meeting (eliciting present and past impacts of digital technologies). The introductory slides of the case study are in <strong>3. slides - impact workshop.pdf</strong>. - Contact Participants: a date shall be agreed with the pivotal actor, and an invitation shall be redacted to be sent to the possible participants. The invitation shall be sent by the pivotal actor, to ensure higher participation. Consider setting a time outside of the working hours, so that more participation can be ensured. If the meeting is physical, you should allocate half a day. If digital, 2 hours and 30 minutes are sufficient. - Conducting the Workshop: The moderator first presents the introductory slides. Then the moderator shall ask: "What is the main technological change you have experienced in ordinary land management over the past 10 years?; How has this technological change affected your work?". The moderator shall give 5 minutes to the participants to reflect on their answers, and ask them to write them down. Then, the moderator shall start a round table, asking each participant to present themselves to the others, read their answers, and freely comment on them. During the discussion, the moderator shall write notes (on the screen or on a whiteboard) that are visible to all the participants. The workshop shall be tape recorded, and transcribed. We recommend the workshop to last 1 hour and 30 minutes maximum. After a break, a 30 minutes interactive session can be performed to reflect about needs and expectations towards digitalisation. 6) Impact Identification - Impact Workshop: Extend the thematic analysis from step 4 based on the content elicited during the impact workshop. 7) Scenario Workshops: The scenario workshops are oriented to elicit future impacts of digitalisation. The same considerations of the Impact Workshop about physical or digital participation apply. - Prepare Slides: Three sets of slides shall be prepared: a) introductory slides (<strong>4. slides - scenario workshop intro.pdf</strong>), which should show a timeline about the set of technologies introduced in the socio-technical system in the past 10 years. The timeline shall continue with possible digital technologies to be introduced, with a perspective of 10 years. This is expected to trigger reflection on the technological landscape, the impact of technology in the past, and the possible future impact. b) slides for technology balanced scenario (<strong>5. slides - scenario workshop balanced.pdf</strong>): the slides shall provide a pictorial representation of the scenario and a description of its main characteristics. c) slides for technology intensive scenario (<strong>6. slides - scenario workshop intensive.pdf</strong>): the slides shall provide a pictorial representation of the scenario and a description of its main characteristics. - Contact Participants: see guidelines for the Impact Workshop (point 5). - Conducting the Workshops: The workshop requires at least two moderators, and consists of three phases. In a first phase, 15 minutes, one moderator presents the introductory slides and clarifies the objective of the meeting. In the second phase (1 hour), the two moderators split the participants into two groups, and conduct separate workshop sessions, each one dedicated to one scenario. Each workshop session will discuss a technology intensive or technology balanced scenario, using the respective slides. After the two workshops, the third phase consists of a plenary session (max 30 minutes) to summarise the results. All workshops shall be tape recorded and transcribed. 8) Impact Identification - Scenario Workshop: Extend the thematic analysis from step 6 based on the content elicited during the scenario workshops. [1] Saldaña, Johnny. "The coding manual for qualitative researchers." The coding manual for qualitative researchers (2021): 1-440. <br>