23443: Technology and Unintended Consequences in Organizations (session 26351)

This paper considers unintended consequences within organizations from the perspective of materiality to account for how technology solutions can override choices made by humans. To do so, we focus on actions, which are observable and attributable to both humans and technology, as opposed to intentions or plans. In a multisite case study of Body-Worn Camera technology implementation in police organizations, we examine how unintended consequences emerge from the interaction of contextual factors and actions of humans and technology. Based on an inductive analysis of observations and interview data from multiple case studies, we identify four practices—Projecting Technology, Protesting Technology, Projecting Authority and Preserving Self. Together, these practices produce unintended consequences that confound police organizations’ use of BWC technology. These confounding unintended consequences defy a solely social or technology explanation. They illustrate how practices enacted in organizations become consequential by combining human and technology actions. Our study contributes to the literature on technology-induced organizational change and unintended consequences. First, we provide a novel way to theorize organizational change through the mechanism of unintended consequences. Second, we demonstrate how actions examined from the perspective of technology provide new and powerful explanations of how technology matters in shaping emergent consequences in organizations. Third, we advance understanding of how to harness unintended consequences to enlighten decision-making in organizations.

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