In Conclusion

Armed with the ADT, it was time to return to the surface and take a look at practice again; this time with the ADT as new glasses. The findings from this work are reported in Section 4 of the book. If these findings are convincing, which I hope they are, ADT might illuminate some issues and point to new ways of managing complex projects and systems. This, however, remains to be seen. So, what has been achieved? Which are the main findings from the endeavor related in this book? I believe that these can be summarized as follows.

The Dawn of the Activity Domain Theory

In this chapter, the evolution of the domain construction strategy is recapitulated. This story is divided into a number of phases that can be seen as “life ages” of the strategy at Ericsson. It was born during particular circumstances in the late 1990s, it had its peak during the millennium shift and it died with the collapse of the telecom market around 2002-2003. Its remains still linger on at Ericsson, but in a completely transformed way where the essential elements of the strategy have evaporated into thin air.

In Search of an Integrating Construct

The purpose of this chapter is to analyze prevalent conceptions of basic organizational realms such as coordination, communication, business processes, etc., using ADT as a guiding framework. Based on this analysis, I will suggest the activity domain as the fundamental integrating construct in organizational inquiry, and discuss the implications of this proposal. I argue that the persistent confusion about the definitions of organizational realms is due to the lack of an integrating perspective. Taking any of these realms as a basic perspective for inquiry implies that a multi-dimensional problem is “compressed” into a one-dimensional one where other dimensions are concealed or unfocused. A consequence of this superficial way of approaching a multi-dimensional problem is that interdependencies are veiled. Without an integrative perspective that lays bare these interdependencies, and thus makes them accessible to operationalization, it is likely that the inherent difficulties in managing organizational change programs will be even more aggravated.

Alignment

The purpose of this chapter is to permeate the alignment area from the ADT perspective. In doing so I will focus on the alignment of B and K strategies, since this can be apprehended as a wider scope than the more tangible alignment of, say B strategies and IT strategies. The reason is that knowledge according to ADT is directly related to the work object of the activity domain. It is in the activity domain that capabilities of both humans and mediational means are enacted, and mediational means are, among other things, ISs and IT. Thus, business strategies and IS/IT cannot be directly aligned since that would “short-cut” the enactment process in the activity domain.

The Anatomy-Centric Approach Towards Managing Complex Projects

The purpose of this chapter is to describe and discuss the anatomy-centric approach towards coordinating complex development projects. The content of the chapter is mainly based on my empirical experience from Ericsson.

Product Lifecycle Management Revisited

The scope of this chapter is PLM (Product Lifecycle Management). I point out some concerns with the traditional way of understanding PLM, and discuss potential benefits from tackling these concerns from the Activity Domain Theory (ADT) perspective.

Activity Theory

In this chapter I will give an account of some ideas in the Russian Theory of Activity or Activity Theory (AT) that have influenced the Activity Domain Theory (ADT): activity, mediation, and meaning. The activity domain in ADT is a direct descendant from “activity” in AT, while “mediation” and “meaning” are necessary prerequisites for the activity modalities construct in ADT. The AT was an attempt to apply the ideas of Marx and Engels to psychology in the early decades of the new socialist state, the Soviet Union. The front figure in this pioneering movement was the Russian psychologist and semiotician L. S. Vygotsky (1896-1934) together with his collaborators A. N. Leont’ev (1903-1979) and A. R. Luria (1902-1977). Other prominent researchers in this spirit were V. N. Vološinov (1895-1936) and M. M. Bakhtin (1895-1975). With the advent of the Stalinist era the momentum of the AT was more or less crushed. However, small but marginalized groups kept the ideas of AT alive. One of the most prominent philosophers was the previously mentioned E. Ilyenkov (1924-1979). During the last couple of decades, AT has gained a renewed momentum among Western researchers and been further developed by the works of M. Cole, J. Wertsch and Y. Engeström and others.

Operationalizing the Theory

By operationalization, I refer to the transformation of the theoretical elements in ADT into mediational means that can be manipulated, measured, or observed in order to construct an activity domain. In line with the correspondence between mind and the socio-cultural environment, such means should be aligned with the activity modalities as much as possible to alleviate the construction of communal meaning. Moreover, the operationalized elements must be treated as dialectically related to each other; a change in one will impact all the others.

Enterprise Architectures

In this chapter, I reconceptualize enterprise architectures by using the activity domain as the basic architectural entity, thus emphasizing the elements of communal meaning and transition between domains. I compare this view of the enterprise with influential EA frameworks such as the one proposed by Zachman. I discuss implications of the ADT approach and suggest how to operationalize the construction of enterprise architectures from the ADT perspective.

Cognitive Grounding

A crucial element in the ADT is the assumption of congruence or correspondence between observable “traces” of the activity modalities in our environment, and the cognitive constitution of humans. In this chapter, I will provide some arguments in favor of this assumption. Given the enormous amount of research in cognitive science, these arguments can only of a “rhapsodic” character; a first indication of paths to follow in further research.