| A complex IT system is a socio-technical system with many independent and interdependent components that are difficult to describe, predict, and design. Organizations and society, more generally, increasingly depend on complex IT systems, often developed through Public Private Partnerships (PPP), for day-to-day and mission critical activities. The development of complex IT systems place unprecedented demands on the organizations who work together to develop them. Those same organizations, and those who lead and work in them, recognize that there is a need for new processes and procedures to manage these demands. This research seeks to create a new and better understanding of the factors that affect complex IT system development, to contribute to such efforts, and to examine the extent to which these factors are accounted for in existing development methodologies.;This cross-disciplinary study of factors affecting the development of complex systems is framed in the literature from four disciplines: Public Administration, Software Engineering, Management Information Science, and Management. A case study methodology is used to explore the development of a complex IT system, specifically, a wireless monitoring system (WMS). Both deductive and inductive approaches were used. In-depth semi-structured interviews with key participants in the WMS project, as well as a variety of secondary data sources provided the data for this study. ATLAS.ti was used for the qualitative data analysis. This study advances what is known about research on social and technical (individual, organizational, technology, and process) factors by building a new understanding of the relationships and challenges encountered while developing complex IT systems through PPP. The research shows that none of the development methodologies currently in use consider all of the factors found to be influential. Findings from this research will help decision-makers better understand which social and technical factors in complex IT systems development are influential and as a consequence help advance efforts to implement such systems. |
