Information systems projects in Kenya: A study of user involvement

Abstract

This research explores the level of user involvement and the importance attached to it by ICT consultants, it also seeks to identify the challenges, which are faced as users are involved. This was occasioned by the dilemma posed in the literature as to the importance of involvement and the extent to which to involve users in systems development. The objectives of the study were to establish the importance that ICT Consultants attach to users' involvement, to determine the extent to which ICT Consultants involve users and the challenges of user involvement faced by ICT Consultants in Information systems projects in Kenya. The report includes a description of the research methodology employed, which was mainly descriptive, and the data analysis techniques, which were tabulation and factor analysis. The data was collected from 41 ICT consultants who represented 68.33% of the target population. On performing data analysis it was found that the respondents were aged between 20 and 35, with almost 39% and that experience levels are not quite high in ICT consultancy in Kenya. It was found that ICT consultants involve users at all stages of systems development. Even then, there is variation in terms of users involvement. Stages such as design, programming and coding there is minimal involvement, while stages such as Investigations, conceptualization, implementation, requirements analysis and performance evaluation u- sers are highly involved. This is in line with . the expectation and the importance they attach to the exercise. The analysis resulted in extraction of six (6) factors were extracted as the main challenges. These factors revolves around the quality of IT staff employed by organization, internal organizations constraints and priorities, fears of users and their resistance to embrace change, company politics, and cost implications on the new system to the organization. The study reveals that user involvement as an important ingredient for success implementation of Information systems needs support and has been taken into consideration by leT consultants in Kenya. But there are challenges in achieving these important aspect of IS which are mainly organization related. It is recommend that management should be sensitized by all means to win their support and that leT consultants should ensure all stakeholders are involved in IS projects as much as possible. The conclusions reached are that a relationship exists between the extent to which users are involved during development of their computer system and the perceived importance the leT consultants attach to users involvement. Thus confirming existence of policies governing systems development life cycle among the leT consultants in Kenya as expected.