6.3. Extending expertise in work practice based participatory design

6.3.1. Practitioners’ expertise

The practitioners’ participation in analytic work has not received much attention in previous studies on bridging work practice and system design as analysis has been seen as a realm reserved for researchers and designers (section 5.3.1 and Karasti 2001, publication V, p. 38). In fact, the practitioners’ analytic abilities have been called into question: “no set of practitioners, no matter how expert, can articulate analytic frame­works and categories. Not for that matter can they abstract out of context, and HCI researchers and developers cannot immediately use their experience information” (Graves & Nyce 1992, referenced in Nyce & Löwgren 1995, p. 40). The practitioners’ expertise of their work has not been used to its full potential even in undertakings where a PD approach has been involved in the integration. The role of practitioners in analytic work has remained rather passive, though analysis is usually conceived as the activity in a development project that involves users the most (Mogensen & Trigg 1992). Further­more, the notion of mutual learning prevalent in PD preconceiving the idea of each party learning from one another has not promoted an actual analysis of work pervading to issues that are not already known.

In the first place, locating the practitioners’ expertise is the responsibility of the field­worker. The participant observer needs to be aware of the different types of invisibility with regard to practitioner expertise in everyday work (see e.g. Star & Strauss 1999, Balka 1997b). A fieldworker who has grasped the different types of invisibility and silent expertise in everyday work practice can create possibilities for the practitioners to have a chance for analytic distance to learn to analyse and reflect on their work, and to be able to explore and articulate the taken-for-granted and/or tacit aspects of their activities and the expertise involved in their duties.

For example, in attempting to make visible and intelligible radiology work I encountered two types of invisibility proposing different challenges and requiring special measures to be taken (Karasti 1996). Studying the radiologists’ work required intensive fieldwork coupled with collaborative analyses with radiologists in order to be able to gain an understanding of their diagnostic work and the interpretation of images achieved through seeing medical meanings in the shades of grey. The complexity of the expertise involved in the radiologists’ professional work is rather obvious. And thus – though learning about radiologists’ work was demanding - making radiologists’ work visible and their expertise acknowledged was not that much of a challenge as others readily perceived its significance and accordingly adapted their efforts to gain an understanding of it.

On the other hand, studying the film developers’ work was easier. However, making their expertise visible and intelligible was more challenging as, according to the existing assumptions of the participating communities, their work was not perceived as knowl­edge-intensive. Medical organisations are typically based on assumptions of medical expertise and related power hierarchies. The film developers’ support work of material film logistics could not have been further away from the assigned and accustomed significancies of expertise prevalent in the radiology work communities. Furthermore, the essential nature of the film developers’ work, as also more generally of supportive or service work (cf. Clement 1993, Star & Ruhleder 1996, Suchman 1995a), is that it is best carried out when least visible to those who depend upon it, thereby, it is bound to remain invisible amidst the everyday practice. Though the film developers have gathered an extensive local and historical knowledge of the everyday functioning of radiology departments as well as the adjacent units of the hospital at large, this expertise rarely becomes visible or acknowledged when the smooth organisation is achieved.

In fieldwork, I could as a participant observer explore the practitioners’ knowledge with them and make use of my emic-etic understanding in helping them to articulate their expertise, e.g. with radiologists this began in stimulated recall interviews (section 3.2.3) and with film developers in shadowing (section 3.2.2). As a participant interventionist I could continue to appreciate the inherent nature and intrinsic expertise of all work contributing to the fluency of everyday practice by rendering various expertise legitimate for work practice based design and I could support the construction of shared understandings in collaborative analyses.

The tool constructed for design practice (section 5.2) and the dimensions of work practice sensitive participatory design exposed (section 5.3) in this research rely for a substantial part on the participation and expertise of practitioners. They allow for the exploration of different occupations’ work and various expertise needed in the accomplishment of every­day work practice. Thus they seem appropriate for situations where practitioners have gained extensive knowledge and understanding of work during long periods of practice and the work is about to be transformed. Technological change from materially to digitally mediated practice is currently affecting increasing areas of work, in addition to the several areas of medical work, also such varied domains as navigation, type-setting and architecture to name a few.

Furthermore, the approach for increasing sensitivity towards actual work practice proposed in this work seems particularly suitable for technology development and system design where the preservation of practitioner expertise is critical, such as in domains of work with human lives at stake. There the emphasis should be laid on supporting practitioners’ expertise and existing work practice, rather than attempting to automate or to solve particular problems in the current practice. Therefore, it paramounts in importance to be able to understand everyday work practice and to maintain this sensitivity also in system design.

The possibilities that open up from the participation of practitioners in the analysis of their work directly contribute to the development of technologies used in the everyday practice, most particularly perhaps in the sense that the practitioners’ expertise makes it possible to proportion and project the fluency, tacit aspects, local knowledge, historical understanding and lived experience of everyday work practice to the envisioned future contexts of technology use and work practice. This promotes an overall gravitation to actual everyday work practice and especially new awareness of what is important to attend to in design, such as the essential aspects of work that need to be preserved regardless of the technological environment. Such awareness cannot be deliberated without detailed and comprehensive understandings of actual work practice (Karasti 2001, publication V). This suggests for the importance of the grass-roots possibility of practitioners to get involved in the development of their work and technologies to be used in future practice.

6.3.2. Participant interventionist’s expertise

Several ethnographers have encouraged designers to engage in a more analytic stance towards work practice (Button & Harper 1996, Anderson 1994, Nyce & Löwgren 1995, Nyce & Bader 1999). On the other hand, we have also been made excruciatingly aware of the accompanying doubt and suspicion with regard to the designers’ willingness and capabilities of embracing an analytical mentality towards work. Designers have often been accused of borrowing data-gathering techniques without also borrowing the analytic approach of ethnography (e.g. Nyce & Löwgren 1995).

And admittedly, an analytic stance towards work practice is not an easy task for designers. For instance, the claim that designers “tend to mistake themselves for their informants” (Bader & Nyce 1998, p. 6) can be seen in at least two aspects of the designers’ epistemological choices with regard to experiential knowledge in research. First, system designers - either without realizing it or sometimes also knowingly - rely on their own experience as designers but rarely engage in reflecting how this actually affects their researcher position and knowledge. As an example of this customary and commonly accepted practice, I quote Simonsen[1]5 who has stated in the conclusions of his thesis that the results were - among other contributing resources - drawn “from my own former experiences as a designer” (Simonsen 1994, p. 155), which, however, have not been discussed to any further length in his thesis.

Secondly, designers either fail to see the difference between the emic and etic views, or they find it difficult to discern between insider and outsider perspectives, or they falter in keeping an epistemological discipline between the two knowledges. This has become manifest in reflections of having difficulties in taking as little as possible for granted in fieldwork: “an ethnographic approach tries to avoid using any ‘pre-defined’ concepts and categories in describing observations: they should be based on the concepts and catego­ries the people studied use themselves. This implies analysing and using members’ categories rather than imposing your own. Though this may seem as an appropriate aim, I believe it must be quite difficult in practice. As an observer, you will always interpret and make sense of your observations through your own experiences. And this naturally implies using concepts that you had beforehand. It is simply impossible to interpret any observations with a ‘clear mind’ and without using pre-existing concepts and categories” (Simonsen 1994, p. 74).

The difficulties with discerning emic-etic views and keeping an epistemological discipline between them intimately relate to the role of a participant observer which is strange and foreign to designers. It introduces an entirely different kind of mode of being a researcher as it is based on an inquiry as a novice. To give one example, though very simple it is also of paramount importance, as the construction of fieldworker understand­ing relies on what kinds of social encounters and researcher-researchee relationships the fieldwork is carried out upon. In explaining their rationale for integrating ethnographic techniques for data collection into the overall design activities, Simonsen and Kensing describe their role in fieldwork: “As designers we need to establish and maintain credibility in our engagement with users in order to initiate a mutual learning process. ... A professional discussion with users requires a thorough insight into their current work practices.” (Simonsen & Kensing 1998, p. 23, italics mine.) They have resorted to ethnographic field methods because they see the need to know enough about the users’ current practice to be able to have a professional discussion with them. As designers they are so used to the taken-for granted expert role and expertise that it becomes involuntary and instinctive to establish and maintain that credibility within the eyes of practitioners, even with regard to knowledge about the practitioners’ current work practice.

Had I been compelled to retain a similar credible and professional designer role in fieldwork, I believe it would have gravely compromised the possibilities for learning about the member’s point of view. My experience is that it is especially the novice asking, not professional conversation, that has taught me most about the practitioners’ emic views and knowledges. Becoming a participant observer requires a different attitude from being a designer with images of professional expertise to be fulfilled. Being a neophyte in the field necessitates a new kind of vulnerability, the engagement in which simultaneously takes courage and humbleness, especially in professional environments (Forsythe 1999, Barley 1990b). Designers are unfamiliar with questioning their expertise, even when working as fieldworkers, because belief in expert knowledge is so automatic and firmly rooted within the designer role, be it software engineer, system designer or participant designer. Adherence to the unconscious attitudes is difficult to change until the tacit orthodoxies are uncovered and confronted.

The question whether it is possible for a designer to do ethnography has been posed (e.g. Simonsen 1994, p. 75). I believe we should continue producing different kinds of ethnographies and carefully exploring them in order to understand their differences and what is important in them. Though system designers are probably not capable of producing analytic explications of work that would satisfy all demands of social scientists there is still possibility in the plurality. It is counterproductive to repress those attempts that try to break disciplinary boundaries and adopt something new as in them may be the seeds and sprouts of change.

I also see that designers need more diversified interdisciplinary training in order to be able to engage in more foundational explorations. Therefore, I whole-heartedly agree with taking initiatives to change university curricula (e.g. Kling 1993, Kautz 1996, Helgeson et al. 1996). It should be possible to educate interdisciplinary professionals (including researchers) who are able to sensitize system design towards actual work practice. Though the epistemological exploration has just begun, the participant interven­tion­ist, among other border-crossing roles, suggests ways for reconstructing more socially conscious and responsible designer (and researcher) roles.