PhD student in Information Systems and Innovation
Thesis outline
Murat's thesis explores the phenomenon of the social construction of IS investment evaluation in the financial services industry. The extensive literature on information systems (IS) evaluation stretches back more than thirty years and it is widely agreed that IS evaluation is an important and complex issue. Constructivist evaluation, which serves to develop the interpretivist strand of the literature, concentrates on the notion that evaluations are the outcomes of an interaction and argumentation process between various interested parties.
Murat aims in his research to shed further light on the IS investment evaluation area as explaining the practice of IS evaluation within the dynamic and technologically sophisticated financial services industry would benefit academics and financial services firms alike. This context is relatively neglected in the existing literature.
Murat's chosen case study reflects the demands in the financial services industry to upgrade their infrastructure in order to manage an ever increasing number of transactions, as well as increased regulation. His fieldwork produced extensive data concerning traditional trading, brokerage, high frequency algorithmic trading and transaction clearing. The rapid rise of derivative transactions during the last few years caused problems in terms of clearing and managing the transactions. At the same time hedge funds' growing demand for low latency execution services and changes in regulations increased, pressuring firms in the industry to invest heavily. He uses Actor Network Theory (ANT) in order to describe and explain the formation of networks between human and non-human actors. The theory's specific vocabulary allows IS evaluation to be seen in a new light and the study uses ANT analysis to produce insight into the longstanding problem of IS evaluation, human and non-humans interactions and roles within the context if IT investment appraisal. Building on ANT his thesis is an in-depth case study of the employment process of an IT evaluation method at global financial services companies.