Technology Change And Working Conditions – A Cultural Perspective

When technology change improves working conditions, the success is often attributed to skilful change agents. When it is not, the blame is on “resistance to change” and “resilient cultures”. How can these failures be understood differently? A cultural perspective on technology change might be a way to facilitate technology change processes that lead to improved working conditions. The research based project described here has developed a special homepage that explains how this might be achieved. The homepage is targeted at working life professionals. The homepage presents theoretical explanations of the concept of organizational culture, a model for analysis and several practical case stories. This paper explains how the project tries to reach a broad spectrum of professionals in order to facilitate their use of a cultural perspective. It also discusses the ethical consequences of the cultural perspective in relation to technology change and working life.