Designing a centralized admissions system in a loosely‐coupled organization: an episode in screen design

This article describes an episode at a large U.S. state university in which a computer‐based student admissions system was being developed and implemented. A verbatim extract from an interview with the project leader is presented and this is analyzed using exegetical guidelines. The systems personnel were attempting to introduce the admissions system by linking several previously autonomous admissions units across the university. The paper describes how the undergraduate unit, the first to be computerized, resisted the original, multi‐screen design, favoring instead a single screen solution. It traces in some detail the various encounters between the systems staff and users and shows how the episode was resolved. The paper illustrates how resistance to systems can arise in practice. It also demonstrates the inherent difficulty in introducing integrated information systems across loosely‐coupled administrative units.