Jonas Sjöström
email: jonas.sjostrom@im.uu.se

Brian Donnellan
email: brian.donnellan@nuim.ie

Markus Helfert
email: markus.helfert@computing.dcu.ie

Product Semantics in Design Research Practice

Keywords: Design, research, practice, meaning, artifact

The concept of product semantics and its focus on meaning is used to interpret design research as design. It is argued that we may conceive of design research as design in two realms: The practical and the academic. In doing design research, there is a reciprocal shaping of artifacts: Better artifacts (contributions to practice) through appropriation of knowledge and methods from the academic realm, and better knowledge artifacts (contributions to academia) by drawing relevance and experiences of appropriation from the practical realm. We adopt a product semantics view to discuss research as design. Product semantics highlights the meaning of artifacts with respect to their (i) stakeholders, (ii) artifacts-in-use, (iii), artifacts-in-language, (iv) artifact lifecycle, and (v) ecology. Based on this interpretation, we propose activities that should characterize the practice of doing design research. Finally we provide an example of Design Research Practice in action.

Introduction

The IS field has paid an increased interest in design research (DR) over the last two decades. Design research is becoming recognized as equally important to behavioural information systems (IS) research [START_REF] Hevner | A three-cycle view of design science research[END_REF][START_REF] Iivari | A paradigmatic analysis of information systems as a design science[END_REF]. Design is depicted as 'fundamental' to the IS discipline [START_REF] March | Design and natural-science research on information technology[END_REF]. DR is manifested through special issues in leading journals, conference tracks, and dedicated conferences for design science research in IS. Purao et al [START_REF] Purao | The Sciences of Design: Observations on an Emerging Field[END_REF] and Baskerville et al [START_REF] Baskerville | A response to the designoriented information systems research memorandum[END_REF] provide a rich account of the development of DR in the IS field.

There is an on-going discussion about the norms that should govern DR, including both (i) what type of knowledge we can expect as a result of research, and (ii) how to accomplish rigor in the design process in order to substantiate claims. This corresponds to the process of research and the product (outcomes) of research. In design science research [START_REF] Hevner | A three-cycle view of design science research[END_REF][START_REF] Iivari | A paradigmatic analysis of information systems as a design science[END_REF] knowledge outcome is defined as design science artifacts, i.e. constructs, models, methods and instantiations. Hevner et al [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF] also propose that design science research may lead to new evaluation techniques. The idea of building design theory has been proposed [START_REF] Gregor | The Anatomy of a Design Theory[END_REF][START_REF] Kuechler | On theory development in design science research: anatomy of a research project[END_REF], while action design research (ADR) suggests that the minimum requirement of the ADR approach is to formulate design principles that are applicable to design solutions for a class of problem [START_REF] Sein | Action Design Research[END_REF]. The ambition in ADR initiatives should be to contribute to theory [START_REF] Sein | Action Design Research[END_REF]. 'Scholarly contributions' are endorsed by major journals [START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF]. Orlikowski & Iacono [START_REF] Orlikowski | Research commentary: desperately seeking the "IT" in IT research-A call to theorizing the IT artifact[END_REF] identify five views of the IT artifact; (i) Tool view -functions and capabilities to perform tasks, substitute for labour, or improve productivity, (ii) Proxy view -perceptions as something to use and of value, (iii) Ensemble view -embedded relationship within social, organisational, and economic context, (iv) Computational viewcomputational capabilities including processing and representational model and (v) Nominal view -abstract, non-specific, collective view. A very inclusive definition of IT artifacts is provided by Gill & Hevner [START_REF] Gill | A Fitness-Utility Model for Design Science Research[END_REF]: "IT artifacts are broadly defined as constructs (vocabulary and symbols), models (abstractions and representations), methods (algorithms and practices), and instantiations (implemented and prototype systems). More generally, artifacts can be viewed as the symbolic representation or physical instantiation of design concepts. Even within a discipline such as MIS, they are not necessarily limited to information systems. Rather, MIS artifacts include organizational designs, process designs, and other intentionally constructed entities relating to information systems."

Our interpretation of the discourse summarized above is that there are co-existing ideas about what the outcome of DR should be (models, methods, instantiations, constructs, new evaluation techniques, design principles, or design theory). Here, for the sake of our argument, we speak of design research as design of knowledge artifacts.

While this meta-theoretical development of DR in the IS field emerges, there has still been little effort to factor in other design traditions into the IS field. Although some IS research has promoted design thinking (e.g. [START_REF] Winograd | Understanding Computers and Cognition: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF][START_REF] Ehn | The Art and Science of Designing Computer Artefacts[END_REF]), it has not yet had considerable impact on the design research discourse in IS. Design thinking (e.g. [START_REF] Cross | Designerly ways of knowing: Design discipline versus de sign science[END_REF][START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF]) and its notion of product semantics highlight stakeholders in design and their sense-making of artifacts. Product semantics stresses contextual approaches that focus on the meaning of artifacts in use and typically consider the design of affordances, constraints, feedback, coherence, learnability, multi-sensory redundancy, variability, robustness, and so forth as experienced by different stakeholders. Some recent IS publications incorporate concepts from design thinking (e.g. [START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF][START_REF] Gill | A Fitness-Utility Model for Design Science Research[END_REF][START_REF] Sjöström | Designing Information System -A pragmatic account[END_REF]). Interestingly, there has been little or no discussion about how DR can be conceived from a design perspective. Baskerville et al [START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF] show that lessons learned in design studies prove useful to further the meta-theoretical models in the IS field. Baskerville et al [START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF] employ the works of Cross [START_REF] Cross | Designerly ways of knowing: Design discipline versus de sign science[END_REF] to distinguish conceptually between design and research in DR. In this paper, we make a similar contribution. We challenge the supposed distinction between design and research, claiming that design researchers in essence are designers of knowledge artifacts. A practice perspective is adopted to characterize design research as practice.

We employ ideas from product semantics to factor in fundamentals of design thinking into IS design research [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF]. We explore design research as practice; and the multiple realms in which design research operates (section 2). The notion of product semantics, and the axiomaticity of meaning in design is elaborated (section 3), and used to elaborate on a case of design research practice as design (section 4). In section 5, implications for design research practice are discussed.

Realms of Design Research

Sociologists have elaborated the concept of practice for a long time, and there is no 'unified' view of what it means [START_REF] Gherardi | Introduction: The Critical Power of the 'Practice Lens[END_REF]. Schatski [START_REF] Schatski | Introduction: Practice theory[END_REF] explains practice as "embodied materially mediated arrays of human activity centrally organized around shared practical understanding". The use of artifacts ("materially mediated") in action is recognized, while at the same time human action is acknowledged as part of a social context. Schatski's account of practice theory resonates well with the idea of a reciprocal shaping of action and structure, as proposed by Giddens [20]. Orlikowski [START_REF] Orlikowski | The duality of technology: Rethinking the concept of technology in organizations[END_REF] elaborates on Giddens' ideas through her notion of a duality of technology (as begin shaped by, and shaping, human action). In this paper, we adopt the view that design and appropriation of technology is strongly 'fused' with human action.

A key proposition in design research is that research results should be relevant and useful for practice [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF]. At the same time, IS researchers are expected to contribute to the academic knowledge base (e.g. [START_REF] Gregor | The Anatomy of a Design Theory[END_REF]). Goldkuhl [START_REF] Goldkuhl | Design theories in information systems-a need for multi-grounding[END_REF] articulates a distinction between contributions to local practice (e.g. through a DR effort within a specific company) and contributions to general practice through re-usable knowledge (e.g. workshops and practitioner-oriented text books). Apart from contributing to both practice and academia, design researchers should draw rigor from the knowledge base and draw relevance from practice [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF]. Design researchers thus operate in at least two different (but interdependent) social structures. We refer to these here as the practical realm and the academic realm (Figure 1). Each realm may be broken down into more specific practices, such as a single company in the practical realm or a specific subcommunity (e.g. a journal or a conference) in the academic realm. [START_REF] Hevner | A three-cycle view of design science research[END_REF][START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF]. The realms of practice and academia can be recognized from Baskerville et al [START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF]. Our adaptation of the IS DSR framework is based on the notion that the DR practice interacts with other practices, either in the practical realm or in the academic realm. This corresponds with the ideals of relevant and useful research outputs from a practice point of view, while at the same time adhering to academic ideals. We acknowledge that ideals in practice and academia may partially overlap. In contrast to Hevner et al. [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF], we seek to explicitly view the relation between the DR practice and the academic realm as action, governed by the ideals emerging in interplay with relevant stakeholder communities in the two realms. This way, ideals are situated rather than fixed, instead we highlight that any DR practice needs to be based on a process both to monitor and influence the discourse in the two realms. Research in IS and other disciplines is characterized by ideals that emerge through social interaction within the research community. An example of this is expressed by DeSanctis [START_REF] Desanctis | The Social Life of Information Systems Research␣ -A Response to Benbasat and Zmud's Call for Returning to the IT Artifact[END_REF]: "Scholarly publication is a jointly constructed process, reflective of dialogue among researchers, reviewers, editors, and readers." Within a community, ideals emerge and evolve.

Within the practical realm, we find local practices (e.g. public and commercial organizations). Practices in the academic realm may include research communities (such as AIS and ACM), governed by emergent value systems that are applied in the assessment of proposed contributions to the knowledge base. Practices in both realms may also be more narrowly defined, e.g. non-profit organizations in the practical realm or specific journals or communities in the academic realm.

In design research, learning occurs through moral inquiry [START_REF] Dewey | Logic: The theory of inquiry[END_REF]; i.e. an attempt to improve a situation. Evaluation is a core activity in DR, and there are several ideas about how to approach evaluation (what to evaluate, when to evaluate and how to evaluate). Arguably, the DSR approach [START_REF] March | Design and natural-science research on information technology[END_REF] evaluation, while the ADR approach [START_REF] Sein | Action Design Research[END_REF] emphasizes an interpretive approach to assessing artifacts when appropriated in practice. Similarly, Venable [START_REF] Venable | A framework for Design Science research activities[END_REF] suggests that we should distinguish between artificial versus naturalistic evaluation of artifacts. Artificial evaluation is conducted through experimental or analytical techniques (evaluating the artifact-as-such), while naturalistic evaluation concerns use qualities and emergent phenomena that cannot be assessed without an actual appropriation of the artifact in a 'real' empirical setting. Through appropriate evaluation efforts, design researchers can demonstrate the qualities of their artifacts. Gregor and Hevner [START_REF] Gregor | Positioning and Presenting Design Science Research for Maximum Impact[END_REF] elaborate further on the relation between artificial and naturalistic evaluation and its relation to design science vs. behavioural science.

For design researchers, the ideal is to design artifacts that are highly valued, having an impact in both the practical realm and in the academic realm. An underlying DR assumption is that a DR practice will be able to design better artifacts by drawing from both realms. The practical realm ingrains design with relevance and allows us to perform naturalistic evaluations of artifacts, while the academic realm provides a knowledge base for design and evaluation, both with respect to the process and the product of research. Further, we are expected to contribute to both realms, and to communicate our results to multiple audiences [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF].

Adopting Product Semantics to Characterize Realms

Krippendorff defines product semantics as "a vocabulary and methodology for designing artifacts in view of the meanings they could acquire for their users and the communities of their stakeholders". Although Krippendorff uses the term product semantics, we agree with Ehn [33] that it is in fact more appropriate to refer to Krippendorff's ideas as a pragmatic view of design. That being said, the notion of meaning and its impact on design is still at the core of product semantics. Krippendorff [16, p. 47] explains that meaning has a central role in design thinking: "Humans do not see and act on the physical qualities of things, but on what they mean to them." He refers to this as the 'axiomaticity of meaning' and argues: "There is no escape from the axiom. It states an undeniable truth that is so strong that one might as well embrace it fully for the strengths it provides for the design discourse. Without realizing its strength, designers are doomed to chase the ghosts of other discourses." [16 p. 50].

The notion of meaning is recognized in the social sciences. Krippendorff's notion of meaning resonates well with Peirce's semiosis, Bühler's symbolic interactionism, Polanyi's sense-reading and sense-giving, as well as Weick's sense-making, to mention a few. Polanyi [34 p. 181] states: "Both the way we endow our own utterances with meaning and our attribution of meaning to the utterances of others are acts of tacit knowing. They represent sense-giving and sense-reading within the structure of tacit knowing". As humans, we continually make sense of the world around us on the basis of our cumulated experiences. The interpretive view of the world is well recognized in IS research [START_REF] Walsham | The emergence of interpretivism in IS research[END_REF][START_REF] Klein | A set of principles for conducting and evaluating interpretive field studies in information systems[END_REF]. Krippendorff [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] emphasizes that designers need to seek a 2 nd order understanding -i.e. employ design methods that allow them to gain some degree of understanding of the meaning different stakeholders ascribe to artifacts. Krippendorff suggests that designers increase their chances to design successful artifacts by taking into account four different perspectives on how individuals attribute meaning to artifacts: (i) The meaning of artifacts in use, (ii) the meaning of artifacts in language, (iii) the meaning of a lifecycle of artifacts, and (iv) the meaning of an ecology of artifacts.

The success of an artifact depends on the meaning ascribed to them by stakeholders in each realm. We do not claim that every practice within each realm is identical, but that practices that belong to the same realm share similarities, and that there are notable differences between practices in the academic and the practical realm.

Table 1. Five aspects to consider in design

IT-CMF: An Illustration of Design Research as Practice

In this section, we introduce the design research practice Innovation Value Institute (IVI) and their IT-Capability Maturity Model (IT-CMF). We include the case to illustrate the explanatory power of product semantics in design research. IT-CMF is a high-level process capability maturity framework for managing the IT function within an organization. The framework identifies a number of critical IT processes, and describes an approach to designing maturity frameworks for each process.

The IT-CMF is a novel approach to managing IT resources due to its structured Design Science-based methodology [START_REF] Helfert | The Case for Design Science Utility -Evaluation of Design Science Artefacts within the IT Capability Maturity Framework[END_REF]. The IT-CMF Content Development and Review Process is implemented by the IT-CMF development community of stakeholders in the Innovation Value Institute (www.ivi.ie). The IT-CMF is comprised by a set of interrelated artifacts. In terms of design science research [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF] it consists of constructs, models, methods and instantiations. The IT-CMF constructs are basic definitions and templates to describe various IT managemens issues. IT-CMF models include, among other things, critical process definitions and models to

Aspect

Description Stakeholders Individuals and/or organizations that are affected by the artifact(s);

or that have influence over the dissemination of artifact(s).

Artifacts in use

The way that stakeholders appropriate artifacts; and the way they make sense of some them through their appropriation experiences. Understood as the interplay between appropriation of artifacts (materiality) and the social structure.

Artifacts in language

How stakeholders speak of artifacts. Especially adjectives that signal how stakeholders assess the quality of artifact(s).

Lifecycle of artifacts

The way that stakeholders conceive of the 'status' of some artifact(s) within the realm -the way it has been appropriated and its projected future role within the realm.

Ecology of artifacts

Other artifacts in this realm (competing, supporting) that affect the way that stakeholders attach meaning to the artifact(s) in focus. compare frameworks. IT-CMF methods include descriptions on how to assess maturity, and steps in the transition to new maturity levels. Finally, there are instantiations; software tools that are based on and facilitate the use of the IT-CMF constructs, models, and methods. In the case of the IT-CMF we see that both practical contributions and theoretical contributions are artifacts (products of design). Stakeholders from practice and academia interpret the idea of 'use', 'language', 'lifecycle' and 'ecology' differently.

In the remainder of this section, we appropriate Krippendorff's [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] notion of meaning to characterize IVI as a design research practice, and scrutinized the potential meanings of the IT-CMF using aspects of meaning derived from product semantics (as characterized in table 1).

Stakeholders

Krippendorff [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] emphasizes that "no artifact can be realized within a culture without being meaningful to those who can move it through its various definitions." Product semantics consequentially advocates a design process with a strong focus on -and participation of -stakeholders.

In the practical realm, stakeholders may be understood as local practitioners, such as companies or government agencies. In addition, general practice may benefit from practical theory/design science artifacts/design principles to improve their organizations. Further, R&D organizations benefit from commercialization of DR outcome/innovation/patents.

In the academic realm, stakeholders include (but are not limited to) individual researchers, the DR practice as such, and the institution(s) to which the DR belongs, funding agencies/organizations et cetera. However, stakeholders also include other researchers (reviewers, editors, other scholars).

The IVI community is comprised of university-based academic researchers and industry-based practitioner-researchers drawn from over 80 companies located throughout the world. Researchers collaborate with practitioners and subject matter experts within research teams to learn from key domain experts. Catering for constraints often faced when working in collaboration with practitioners, and individual expertise a design science oriented research process has emerged within the community. A key role of IVI -which we conceive of as a design research practiceis to facilitate guided emergence [START_REF] Sein | Action Design Research[END_REF] of the IT-CMF in the IVI web of stakeholders.

IT-CMF design is divided into four phases separated by stage reviews with key deliverables at each stage. At phase 1, details relating to the artifacts are consulted and expanded with input from group of key opinion leaders, subject matter experts, industry, and academic literature. At phase 2 comparisons are made with artefacts in industry frameworks and industry best practices. At phase 3 the artefacts are reviewed with 3-5 external organisations and key opinion leaders. At phase 4 the artefacts are exercised through field experiments in at least three organisations.

The meaning of artifacts-in-use

In terms of DR outcomes in the practical realm, the aim of design is (arguably) to develop knowledge oriented towards change in a socio-material assemblage. Krippendorff [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] emphasizes the meaning of artifacts in use. The phenomena of 'design in use' has been discussed by IS researchers in terms of, for example, drift [START_REF] Trigg | From implementation to design: Tailoring and the emergence of systematization[END_REF], tailoring [START_REF] De Sanctis | Capturing the complexity in advanced technology use: adaptive structuration theory[END_REF], reinvention [START_REF] Orlikowski | Using technology and constituting structures: a practice lens for studying technology in organizations[END_REF] and appropriation (e.g. [START_REF] De Sanctis | Capturing the complexity in advanced technology use: adaptive structuration theory[END_REF][START_REF] Trigg | From implementation to design: Tailoring and the emergence of systematization[END_REF]. There has been a lot of interest put into how artifacts, e.g. IT systems, are appropriated in the practical realm. In addition, appropriation is a pre-requisite to 'naturalistic' evaluation [START_REF] Venable | A framework for Design Science research activities[END_REF] of our artifacts.

The phased design approach in IVI leads to a step-wise refinement of artifacts, from ideas to actual appropriation by local practices. IT-CMF has also been appropriated by several of the industrial stakeholders, in some cases through researcher-practitioner collaboration based on action research, in some cases using other evaluation techniques appropriated at different implementation stages [START_REF] Donnellan | The IT-CMF: A Practical Application of Design Science[END_REF].

Experiences from the development of the IT-CMF show that the everyday engagement in an information process "shows unexpected consequences: events, behaviors, and features of systems and the people who use them fall outside the scope of the original specifications" [32, p 44]. Use patterns are irregular, often contradictory, untidy, and subject to approximation. Current design science literature tends to separate the design of the artifact from the teleological goal of the artifact (i.e. its use in on-going but changing information processes) while at the same time declaring that these two aspects are inseparable. Our position is that it is impossible to completely specify an information process ex ante. The information manipulated by an actor engaged with an information system is intended to be consumed by human actors in some fashion, rather than to satisfy the whims of a technology or an a priori design.

In a similar manner, knowledge artifacts are actually evaluated based on their 'appropriation' in the academic realm. Local and international workshops, special interest communities, and conferences provide opportunities to 'prototype' artifacts in the academic realm. However, true 'appropriation' of knowledge artifacts will only occur when the artifacts are adopted in new design situations, by their own DR practice or by other researchers who incorporate knowledge artifacts in their own studies. By appropriation in new situations, we will be able to perform 'naturalistic' evaluations of these knowledge artifacts in a new design setting. A DR practice can exploit this opportunity, as a means to evaluate and further improve their work.

The meaning of artifacts-in-language

Krippendorff claims that an important role of a designer is to interpret the discourse among stakeholders, stating "The fate of all artifacts is decided in language". Communication between designers and other stakeholders is a core issue. Several approaches to improving sense-making have been proposed over the years, such as various types of user-centered approaches, e.g. prototyping in interaction design, and arenas and concepts for customer-developer interaction in agile development. They all share the idea that designers need to promote communication and learning between stakeholders. In product semantics [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF], the importance of language is manifested in several ways, e.g. through user-centered design processes and through questionnaires that are used to assess how stakeholders perceive the artifact and its potential usefulness during the design process.

The IT-CMF stage reviews provide a communicative arena where stakeholders assess artifacts-in-use and new design proposals. In addition, the academic arena is considered important to scrutinize artifacts in terms of (for example) conceptual coherence, rigor and theoretical justification. By exposing 'scholarly adapted' representations of the IT-CMF -i.e. research papers that address certain aspects of the framework and the design research process -peers from the academic community provide constructive criticism that support the development of artifacts further.

The peer review mechanism provides a feedback loop between the practical and the academic realm, where the practical realm feeds design researchers with relevance and appropriation experiences, while the academic realm supports assessment of 'scholarly' oriented qualities of artifacts. Thus, different representations of the IT-CMF artifacts reside in multiple discourses, and design researchers shift focus between these. A challenge for an institute like IVI is to strategically appropriate the publication process as a type of 'scholarly evaluation' of artifacts. Clearly, there are career incentives for academic scholars to relate to academic norms (otherwise they do not get published). Other stakeholders will not support the scholarly work if there is no evident value for their industrial practices.

In the academic realm, the difference between 'use of artifacts' and 'artifacts in language' becomes somewhat fuzzy. If the artifact is a concept, we may conceive of it as being appropriated when it becomes part of a discourse. Indeed, Krippendorff [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] characterizes discourse as a type of complex and human-centered artifact. Use of knowledge artifacts may consist of how we interpret those artifacts, represent them in our own discourses and appropriate them into our own research. However, researchers attempt to sensitize themselves to how their knowledge artifacts are interpreted and assessed by other researchers in the scholarly discourse (e.g. what reviewers express and how their work is cited). This is a type of feedback, both with respect to the way knowledge artifacts are appropriated and how they are framed in language by others. Academic ideals, especially in DR, promote communication to different audiences (e.g. [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF]). We emphasize here that the way others speak of our artifacts (both in the practical and the academic realm) is valuable for improvement of knowledge artifacts.

The meaning of a lifecycle of artifacts

Krippendorff 's emphasis on the lifecycle perspective suggests that designers should focus on the "before" the project, the "procurement" process of aligning actants in a design project and how the object of a design becomes this specific design object. This view has been discussed in the DR discourse. The socio-material notion of emergence resonates well with the idea of mutability of artifacts ( [START_REF] Gregor | The Anatomy of a Design Theory[END_REF], [START_REF] Gill | A Fitness-Utility Model for Design Science Research[END_REF]). Although artifact mutability has been elaborated ( [START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF]; [START_REF] Gregor | The Anatomy of a Design Theory[END_REF]), it is still peripheral in the DR discourse. The idea of mutability, however, is clearly a basis for Gill & Hevner's [START_REF] Gill | A Fitness-Utility Model for Design Science Research[END_REF] utility-fitness model, which proposes that we focus on (i) the ability of an artifact to prove useful in a specific situation, and (ii) that the artifact proves useful over time in various situations in its socio-material context, (iii) in competition with other artifacts that address the same class of problems. Gill & Hevner's model thus introduces a perspective on the value of artifacts that is similar to Krippendorff's [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] emphasis on understanding the meaning of artifacts from a lifecycle perspective as well as an ecological perspective (next section).

The lifecycle perspective may also prove useful for the design of 'knowledge artifacts'. If the ultimate goal of DR is to make a difference, it is imperative to consider artifacts from a lifecycle perspective. This can be done both with respect to the practical realm and the academic realm. Figure 2 illustrates our view on the emergent contributions that DR practices can make into the two realms. In the practical realm, artifacts 'advance' in steps, such as formative design workshops with prototypes, appropriation into local practices and subsequent evaluation of the results, dissemination to general practice, and sometimes 'success' in general practice. In those cases, artifacts become an integrated part of the ecology of artifacts (e.g. the relational database model and its implementations in database management technologies). In the academic realm, ideas are initially discussed within the design practice or in smaller workshops in institutions or networks. After that, results are exposed through workshops and conferences, followed by attempts to publish in journals. Finally, the artifacts may be adopted, cited, and part of the cumulative research within the academic realm.

In practice, we attempt to build IT artifacts that are mutable to fit into the emerging social world. In academia, we attempt to generalize artifacts beyond limited contexts and specific technologies. The lifecycle perspective is also highly political: A designer (design researcher) needs to plan ahead and manage the needs of multiple stakeholders to promote continued resources for design and future success of an artifact.

Adademic advancement

Practical advancement

Purely practical contribution

Purely scholarly contribution

Hybrid contribution

No contribution

At some point, advancements in both realms may become obsolete or fade away due to a changed world or new artifacts that outcompete the old ones.

The establishment of IVI is the result of a shared interest among stakeholders to develop artifacts that are valuable in a long-term perspective. Various versions of the IT-CMF are currently appropriated (to different degrees) in companies in the IVI community. Experiences from cases of situated appropriation feed re-design of the framework on the generic level. Revised versions of IT-CMF may be adopted by the local practices. The idea is that the DR practice supports improvements -thus the survival -of the IT-CMF over time.

The lifecycle of artifacts in the two realms may be out of phase. In the IVI context, the main progress has taken place in the practical realm, rather than in the academic realm. There is not necessarily a correlation between success in the two realms. However, a fundamental idea in design research appears to be that the interplay between practice and academia promotes the quality of artifacts. Following this idea, artifacts that are reviewed in accordance with ideals from both realms should be more likely to be valuable in a long-term perspective.

It is not unlikely that a heavily used artifact in the practical realm will be subject to more scholarly attention. Conversely, artifacts that are successful in academia, such as balanced scorecards [27], may lead to practical design solutions.

The meaning of an ecology of artifacts

Krippendorff's [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF] perspective on ecology, influenced by Bateson [START_REF] Bateson | Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology[END_REF], proposes that designers need to recognize the meaning of an ecology of artifacts, stating that "Designers who can handle the ecological meaning of their proposals have a better chance of keeping their designs alive." People attach meaning to artifacts in relation to other artifacts. This relationship can span a number of dimensions e.g. cooperation, competition, interdependence, reproduction and retirement of artifacts in specific contexts. An example from a technical perspective is that artifacts depend on infrastructure. There are other relations in an ecology of artifacts, such as competing artifacts, or artifacts that 'thrive' through the existence of other artifacts [START_REF] Gill | A Fitness-Utility Model for Design Science Research[END_REF]. From the perspective of technical stakeholders, the ecology looks different. IT strategists / architects would try to see how a specific IT artifact 'fits in' and contributes to an existing IT infrastructure. When it comes to models and methods, those would be assessed against the current methods and models in use in a particular organization.

In the academic realm, our artifacts are similarly connected to an ecology of knowledge artifacts. We are expected to draw from the knowledge base e.g. [START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF] and strive for a cumulative tradition [START_REF] Gregor | The Anatomy of a Design Theory[END_REF]. When designing a new artifact (i.e. producing knowledge) designers/researchers need to build upon existing artifacts and clearly relate their new artifacts to the knowledge base. Further, for design researchers, there is a need to build artifacts targeting the practical realm in order to meet the ideals of relevance and utility.

The IT-CMF is comprised of different but inter-dependant critical capabilities that grow and develop in relation to each to each other. It is a system of artifacts in its own. However, for its stakeholders, it will also be made sense of in relation to their existing base of artifacts (and other available governance-related concepts). For instance, several companies in the IVI community are using parts of the IT-CMF, adapted to fit in with other governance frameworks such as ITIL. The second phase in the IVI design process provides a structure to reflect about the 'ecology' and its implications for the continued design of the IT-CMF. For design research practice, this implies a need to identify activities to support the evolution of design artifacts over time (lifecycle perspective) to make them part of the 'ecology' of artifacts.

The qualities of an artifact alone cannot explain its survival in a competitive world. Organizational development and decision-making is a political process. Thus, any artifact that is not supported actively by stakeholders become a "prey" to other artifacts -"predators" that are more extensively promoted, e.g. for commercial reasons. When it comes to academic promotion of ideas, publications in high impact journals increase the readership as well as the likelihood of citations. Furthermore, researchers may engage in various activities to expose their ideas to others in academia. Commercial organizations have strong incentives to promote their products. An implication for a DR practice like IVI is that they also need to reflect about the promotion of their artifacts, either through commercial strategies or through other mechanisms. Consequently, any DR practice aiming for innovation needs to actively monitor the appropriate 'ecology' of artifacts and promote their own artifacts within this ecology.

Concluding Discussion

The product semantic perspective provides a lens to make sense of design research practice, as illustrated by the IT-CMF case. The development of the IT-CMF illustrates a situation where both practical contributions and theoretical contributions are artifacts. Although stakeholders from industry and academia may interpret the idea of 'use', 'language', 'lifecycle' and 'ecology' differently, nevertheless the community is able to obtain a second order understanding of stakeholder views within the two realms, and promote the success of artifacts in both realms.

We have addressed a number of issues faced in design research practice, issues not previously in focus in the DR discourse. The outcome of DR practice should be valuable for other practices that are governed by their own set of values and history (knowledge base). In contrast to previous research we do not presume that any specific values -such as rigor and relevance -are in focus. We conclude that an important activity in a DR practice is to continually investigate the ideals that need be met in both realms, and also to try to affect those ideals. We recognize the emergent characteristics of the realms, and the reciprocal shaping of values between any practice and its environment. Even though some values may be rather stable over time (such as relevance and rigor in IS research), they are indeed dynamic and contextspecific. A conclusion from this is that continuous interpretation and active participation in the discourse on ideals are important activities in DR practice. The way that we conduct research and succeed in publishing reinforces and/or weakens ideals in the research community.

The idea of emergent and reciprocally shaped ideals may prove useful in further conceptualizing DR evaluation. Evaluation takes place formatively to improve design, but also as a means to demonstrate artifact qualities to stakeholders. As stated by Krippendorff [START_REF] Krippendorff | The Semantic Turn: A New Foundation for Design[END_REF]: "No artifact can be realized within a culture without being meaningful to those who can move it through its various definitions". Evaluation needs to be understood from the political perspective as well as the formative perspective. Exposure of an artifact, whether in the practical realm or in the academic realm, is multi-functional. As a design researcher, academic publication as well as appropriation of artifacts in practice, needs to be conceived of as interwoven yet analytically distinguishable activities. The very reason to operate as design researchers is based on the assumption that the quality of the emerging compound of artifacts is increased through the interplay between evaluation in the academic realm and evaluation in the practical realm. We conceive of the exposure of an artifact into either realm as a form of 'naturalistic evaluation'. In addition to this, DR practices may conduct artificial evaluation 'in-house', e.g. through qualified discourse within the DR team and simulations. This leads us to a more elaborate concept of evaluation in design research, which occurs in many forms: (1) artificial evaluation; through evaluation measures taking place within the DR practice, (2) naturalistic evaluation; through appropriation of ideas in local practices, and through feedback from those practices to the DR practice, and (3) scholarly evaluation; through the discourse that takes place within the academic realm through peer-review and other forms of interaction between researchers.

The proposed product semantics perspective on DR practice harmonizes with 'the practice turn' in organizational research. By addressing DR as design, we recognize the politics and value-ladenness of design research. As stated by Gherardi [18,p. 124]: "[..] practice as epistemology articulates knowledge in and about organizing as practical accomplishment, rather than as a transcendental account of a decontextualized reality done by a genderless and disembodied researcher."

Figure 1 .

 1 Figure 1. The Multiple Realms of Design Research

  Figure1illustrates our view of design research as practice. The framework is clearly influenced by the IS design science research framework[START_REF] Hevner | A three-cycle view of design science research[END_REF][START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF]. The realms of practice and academia can be recognized from Baskerville et al[START_REF] Baskerville | Unpacking the Duality of Design Science[END_REF]. Our adaptation of the IS DSR framework is based on the notion that the DR practice interacts with other practices, either in the practical realm or in the academic realm. This corresponds with the ideals of relevant and useful research outputs from a practice point of view, while at the same time adhering to academic ideals. We acknowledge that ideals in practice and academia may partially overlap. In contrast to Hevner et al.[START_REF] Hevner | Design Science in Information Systems Research[END_REF], we seek to explicitly view the relation between the DR practice and the academic realm as action, governed by the ideals emerging in interplay with relevant stakeholder communities in the two realms. This way, ideals are situated rather than fixed, instead we highlight that any DR practice needs to be based on a process both to monitor and influence the discourse in the two realms. Research in IS and other disciplines is characterized by ideals that emerge through social interaction within the research community. An example of this is expressed by DeSanctis[START_REF] Desanctis | The Social Life of Information Systems Research␣ -A Response to Benbasat and Zmud's Call for Returning to the IT Artifact[END_REF]: "Scholarly publication is a jointly constructed process, reflective of dialogue among researchers, reviewers, editors, and readers." Within a community, ideals emerge and evolve.Within the practical realm, we find local practices (e.g. public and commercial organizations). Practices in the academic realm may include research communities (such as AIS and ACM), governed by emergent value systems that are applied in the assessment of proposed contributions to the knowledge base. Practices in both realms may also be more narrowly defined, e.g. non-profit organizations in the practical realm or specific journals or communities in the academic realm.In design research, learning occurs through moral inquiry[START_REF] Dewey | Logic: The theory of inquiry[END_REF]; i.e. an attempt to improve a situation. Evaluation is a core activity in DR, and there are several ideas about how to approach evaluation (what to evaluate, when to evaluate and how to evaluate). Arguably, the DSR approach[START_REF] March | Design and natural-science research on information technology[END_REF] is biased towards a positivistic tradition of

Figure 2 .

 2 Figure 2. Artifact advancement in the two realms of DR

Acknowledgements

This work has been partially funded by the Swedish Research School of Management and Information Technology (MIT).


Eric Monteiro
email: ericm@idi.ntnu.no

Petter Almklov
email: pettera@svt.ntnu.no

Vidar Hepsø
email: vidar.hepso@ntnu.no

Living in a Sociomaterial World

Keywords: Sociomateriality, performativity, representation 1

The Internet of Things (IoT) -the proliferation of networked sensors, gadgets, artefacts and measurement devices -increase the presence, scope and potential importance of mediated information in collaborative work practices. This underscores the material aspects of sociomaterial practices. We study an extreme case where work practices rely heavily, almost entirely, on representations. In line with the research programme on sociomateriality, we acknowledge the performative role of representations. Representations are thus actively embedded in practice rather than passive re-presentation of data. Extending the programme of sociomateriality, we contribute by identifying and discussing three strategies detailing how sociomaterial practices get performed: extrapolate (filling in gaps), harmonise (ironing out inaccuracies) and abduct (coping with anomalies). We draw empirically on a longitudinal (2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011) case study of the subsurface community of NorthOil. This community of geologists, geophysicists, reservoir engineers, production engineers and well engineers rely on sensor-based (acoustic, electromagnetic, radioactive, pressure, temperature) data when exploring and producing oil and gas resources several thousand meters below the seabed where direct access to data is difficult and/ or limited.

Introduction

Sociomateriality is a label for a research agenda into the conceptualisation of the interplay between (material) technology and (human) use [START_REF] Orlikowski | Sociomateriality: Challenging the separation of technology, work and organization[END_REF]. Rather than an independent theory or set of concepts, sociomateriality summaries and highlights salient aspects and insights gained in information systems research over the last couple of decades, emphasising the inherent contingency involved with enacting technology [START_REF] Kling | The control of information systems after implementation[END_REF][START_REF] Orlikowski | A Practice Perspective on Technology-Mediated Network Relations: The Use of Internet-Based Self-Serve Technologies[END_REF], the considerable discretion for users [START_REF] Suchman | Plans and situated action[END_REF][START_REF] Gasser | The integration of computing and routine work[END_REF] and the modular/ interconnected/ networked nature of ICT [START_REF] Pentland | Narrative Networks: Patterns of Technology and Organization[END_REF].

A defining feature of sociomateriality, stemming from its commitment to the 'entanglement' of human and material practices [START_REF] Orlikowski | Sociomateriality: Challenging the separation of technology, work and organization[END_REF], is to dismiss a representational view of technology in favour of a performative one. Here the meaning (hence use) of representations is neither fixed nor stable but emerge through practice (as they are 'performed'). Representations, then, are not passive re-presentations but active, constitutive features of (sociomaterial) practice.

Building on, but ultimately extending, the research programme of sociomateriality, the purpose of our paper is to identify and discuss how practice get entangled with technologically mediated representations i.e. we study the strategies at play. Sociomateriality states that use/ technology is entangled; we analyse how these entanglement play out. We empirically identify three strategies of entanglement: extrapolate (fill in the gaps), harmonise (sorting out errors and inaccuracies) and abduct (coping with anomalies). We have consciously selected an extreme case where work practices are saturated by ICT based visual and textual representations of the data, a consequence of access to the 'reality' (i.e. referent, in a representational vocabulary) being either unattainable or very limited. Moreover, the work practices we study matter: their implications pose significant risks to economic value, the environment and human safety as made painfully clear by Obama's commission following the Deepwater Horizon blowout [START_REF]BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill and offshore drilling, Report to the President by the National commission[END_REF]. Empirically we draw on a longitudinal (2004)(2005)(2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011) case study of work practices within the so-called subsurface community in NorthOil (a pseudonym), a community crucial to efficient, innovative and safe oil and gas exploration and production.

Conceptualising technology: sociomateriality in context

The discourse on how to conceptualise technology runs long in information systems research. As a counter-reaction to overly deterministic accounts, the significant discretion for users to appropriate information systems was established decades ago from both empirical studies [START_REF] Kling | The control of information systems after implementation[END_REF][START_REF] Gasser | The integration of computing and routine work[END_REF][START_REF] Barley | Technology as an Occasion for Structuring: Evidence from Observations of CT Scanners and the Social Order of Radiology Departments[END_REF] and theoretical concepts (e.g. the 'situated' nature of action proposed by Suchman [START_REF] Suchman | Plans and situated action[END_REF]), the presence of 'workarounds' by Gasser [START_REF] Gasser | The integration of computing and routine work[END_REF] and Giddens' structuration theory as proposed by [START_REF] Orlikowski | Information Technology and the Structuring of Organizations[END_REF]). In their historical recapitulation, Orlikowski and Scott [START_REF] Orlikowski | Sociomateriality: Challenging the separation of technology, work and organization[END_REF] describe three, broad categories of approaches: (i) discrete entities (with uni-directional causal effects of technology), (ii) mutually dependent ensembles (with bi-directional relationship) before outlining (iii) sociomaterial assemblages. The decisive distinction between the former two and the latter, Orlikowski and Scott (ibid., p. 455) point out is that the latter see "tools…as constitutive of both activities and identities". Sociomateriality is a 'banner' or 'signal' (opus cit., pp. 455 and 456) for this agenda rather than an independent theory in itself. In our perspective, the thrust of insights of sociomateriality is essentially drawn from science and technology science (STS), especially actor-network theory. The constitutive use/ technology entanglement defining sociomateriality, corresponds exactly to the 'strong principle of symmetry' found in actor-network theory [START_REF] Scott | negotiations, and new times: the implementation of enterprise resource planning into an academic administration[END_REF][START_REF] Walsham | Actor-network theory and IS research: current status and future prospects[END_REF]. Illustrating actor-network theory based work in information systems research prior to [START_REF] Orlikowski | Sociomateriality: Challenging the separation of technology, work and organization[END_REF], Quattrone and Hopper [12, p. 216] explain how "agency and an object's identity reside neither in an individual nor a technology but in a chain of relations between actors (and actants)".

Similarly echoing the principle of symmetry between the social and the technical, [START_REF] Hanseth | Developing information infrastructure: The tension between standardization and flexibility[END_REF] discusses the 'inscription' of behaviour (i.e. agency) into a variety of materials including technical standards, habits and training programmes.

The constitutive entanglement [START_REF] Barad | Posthumanist performativity: toward an understanding of how matter comes to matter[END_REF] of use/ technology embedded in the notion of performativity is a "central idea entailed in" [1, p. 460]. We argue this insight was arrived at prior to its formulation within sociomateriality. That use/ technology is entangled is a shared insight with e.g. STS. The true, remaining challenge is how to push further, how to explore entanglement in more detail.

An interesting avenue of the pursuit of performativity is the emphasis on extreme cases i.e. cases where representations (constitutively entangled with practice) saturate or dominate the empirical settings. In STS, this has for some time prompted a strong interest in work settings relying heavily, at times almost entirely, on representations. The work-settings thus take on an almost semiotic character. Knorr-Cetina's [START_REF] Knorr Cetina | Epistemic cultures: How the sciences make knowledge[END_REF] study of high-energy physicists illustrates this well. Studying the behaviour of (sub)particles that are inaccessible by direct means, the empirical material of highenergy physicists is exclusively drawn from visual and numerical representations extracted from the apparatus surrounding particle accelerators. The heavy reliance on sensor and measurement devices -inherently error-prone -is challenging [START_REF] Shapin | Leviathan and the air-pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the experimental life[END_REF]. Sensors decay, contain bugs or need calibration. This dilemma is central also to our case from the oil and gas sector. Another setting attracting STS attention is electronic markets [START_REF]The sociociology of financial markets[END_REF]. The work practices of traders lean heavily on the real-time representations (readings, computational analysis, visualization) of selected events in the electronic market. In a widely cited study of the option market, MacKenzie and Millo [18, p. 107], cited in [1, p. 461]) explicitly set out to demonstrate the performativity of a formula (the so-called Black-Scholes model) by that it "succeeded empirically not because it discovered pre-existing price patterns but because markets changed in ways that made its assumptions more accurate and because the theory was used in arbitrage".

What the STS studies compellingly demonstrate is the constitutive entanglement of use/ technology. This provides strong empirical evidence for sociomateriality. What remains elusive, however, and the aim of our paper, is to spell out the structure and content of entanglement. We analyse the sociomaterial practices of a subsurface community focusing on how they develop, maintain and revise so-called reservoir models. Operating in an almost semiotic world, the subsurface community have to live with the imperfections, glitches and shortcomings of the reservoir model stemming from its input from incomplete, error-prone and uncertain sensor-based data.

3

Method and Case

Approach and access

We employ an interpretative approach that is geared towards an understanding of the context of the information system and the process over time of mutual influence between the system and its context. A deep-seated conviction we held was that a longitudinal case study was crucial for providing the level of detail that we sought regarding the process of organisational dynamics [START_REF] Pettigrew | Longitudinal field research on change: theory and practice[END_REF]. In line with [20, p. 537]'s advice for facilitating generalisations from case studies of single organisations, we relied on a theoretical sampling of the case site. We were actively seeking a work setting where the performativity of representations would stand out due to the particularly heavy reliance on representations: we selected a case where 'direct' access to the data referred to was cumbersome at best. The selection of the organisation for the case study was also influenced by pragmatic concerns of access; we know NorthOil well. The first author is an experienced IS researcher with a prolonged research project portfolio within NorthOil e.g. a study of standardization of well maintenance. The second author has an MSc in geological engineering, and based his PhD in social anthropology on a yearlong ethnographic fieldwork in the subsurface departments of one of NorthOil's field organisations. He has since worked on several (applied) research projects within the Norwegian petroleum industry. The third author has been an employee of NorthOil for 20 years. He has been involved in a variety of projects in and around the subsurface community. He was involved in intervention-oriented research projects as part of his fieldwork for a PhD within NorthOil.

Data Collection

Pollock and Williams [START_REF] Pollock | Moving Beyond the Single Site Implementation Study: How (and Why) We Should Study the Biography of Packaged Enterprise Solutions[END_REF] 1).

Participative observation was of different types. Predominately conducted by two of the authors, we have participatory observations from subsurface operation centres, departments and on offshore rigs. One author has participated in asset workshops where future production plans are discussed. Participatory observations provided insight into everyday practices as we followed people around, informal chatting over coffee, attending meetings and work at their desks.

Interviews were semi-structured and lasting 45 minutes -1,5 hours. Some have been interleaved with participatory observation, as a way to clarify and expand on observations. Seven selected interviews particularly discussing the use of the reservoir model in operational settings have been fully transcribed. 260 pages of field notes were written during observations and the interviews closely linked to the observations. Document study of both paper based but more importantly electronic documents have been conducted. Electronic documents include electronic archives, database readings, PowerPoint presentations, well plans, email discussions and policy-and operational regulations.

Data Analysis

We alternated between data collection and analysis. Following van Maanen's [START_REF] Van Maanen | Qualitative studies of organizations[END_REF] suggestion, we made extensive use of field notes, making sure to separate 'raw' data from own comments, reflections, and questions. Given that all authors, albeit unequally, were involved in both data collection and analysis, we were able to conduct numerous sessions comparing, contrasting and challenging each other's (preliminary) interpretation, thus enjoying the benefits noted by [20, p. 538]. The three authors of this paper have over a period of more than a decade worked together in various configurations of research collaboration. Though collaboration has been in bursts rather than continuous, we are fairly close research partners. By using temporal bracketing and graphical process maps, which are two strategies for data analysis that were proposed by [START_REF] Langley | Strategies for theorizing from process data[END_REF], we generated visual illustrations of how the chronological development, including technology implementation projects, within the subsurface community resonated with broader themes and trends within NorthOil.

Beyond internal discussions, our data analysis relies on a series of workshops, meetings, and informal discussions with NorthOil managers, subsurface members, IT department, in which we presented our findings and preliminary data analysis. This contributed importantly to an external validation and criticism of our analysis. For example, when presenting empirical findings on how one reservoir model is used operationally, professionals will often contrast our findings with how things are done differently at other fields. Thus we are painfully aware that our account, complicated as it may be for outsiders, of how the reservoir model is used operationally is simplified and stereotypical.

In our data analysis, we strived to adhere to Klein and Myers' [START_REF] Klein | A Set of Principles for Conducting and Evaluating Interpretive Field Studies in Information Systems[END_REF] principle of multiple interpretations. This hinges crucially on an ability to discern distinct, potentially diverging, voices among the actors. An example of the results of our efforts in this direction is that the differences between the subsurface community and management when it comes to reservoir estimates, a highly political assessment. Also within the subsurface community clear differences in perspectives were manifest. An example of this is the difference in perspectives between drilling engineers, who wants a clear-cut drilling target in order to build an operationally robust drilling project, and the geologists and reservoir engineers, who often want to keep options open for eventualities and opportunities that may appear during operations.

We utilized the added flexibility in data collection that results from overlapping data collection with analysis [START_REF] Eisenhardt | Building Theories from Case Study Research[END_REF]. Our data analysis moved between inductively generating aggregated categories from codes (manually: using colour, post-it notes, annotations) and drawing deductively on prior theoretical ideas, notably actornetwork theory. We were thus anything but clean slates [START_REF] Suddaby | What grounded theory is not[END_REF]. The first construct in our theoretical template underpinning our analysis (see Table 2: extrapolate) drew inductively on aggregated categories on practices of navigating in extensive but illstructured historical data, and resonated with notions of workarounds and improvisation known from practice-based research. The second construct (harmonise) drew inductively on aggregated categories about heuristics for producing trustworthy information that resonates with performativity found in actor-network theory. The third construct (abduct) is drew inductively on break-down situations where 'small' observations challenge overall understanding. This ties in with the way subsurface members in general and geologist in particular collectively arrive at interpretations [START_REF] Frodeman | Geological reasoning: Geology as an interpretive and historical science[END_REF].

Construct Illustration

Extrapolate

In the absence of complete data sets, e.g. when you have but a few wells in designated locations but nothing in-between, "you interpolate between these wells" Harmonise Smaller inconsistencies or outright errors are not worth spending a lot of time and resources to iron out e.g. "Local changes based on single observations in new wells are, at least on fields with fairly complex models, often too resource demanding to integrate into the [reservoir] model".

Abduct

When "data doesn't make sense" there is sometimes a need for a more fundamental new understanding of the reservoir e.g. "this fault [line] has been misinterpreted. It's shifted downwards, not upwards. The faults we see here are the results of a landslide pattern".

3.4

Case context: the reservoir model NorthOil (a pseudonym) is a company in northern Europe with some 30.000 employees operating in about 40 countries worldwide. The focus in this paper is on the work within the subsurface community in NorthOil. The subsurface community is involved intimately with the core value generating activities of any O & G company as they are principally responsible for locating commercially interesting fields, planning, development and optimizing daily production. Subsurface departments consist of numerous specialized disciplines: geophysicists, geologists (with different sub-specialties), reservoir engineers, production engineers, drilling engineers and well completion engineers to name the most common. The subsurface professionals partly work in interdisciplinary teams co-located around the different O & G field organizations and partly in disciplinary defined networks cutting across geographically separated field sites.

The empirical focus of our paper is on the reservoir model. It consists of grid cells ascribed with a set of properties based mainly on interpretation of geological data. The model in Figure 1 consists of roughly 45.000 active cells. Information about the reservoir is fragmented and incomplete. The reservoir model is a concerted effort of creating one model representing the whole reservoir. The grid cells of a model are, depending on geology and available data, "about the size of this office building". Seismic data are digital recordings of the reflections of acoustic waves sent down to the reservoir in seismic surveys. It is a very advanced echogram, able to "see through" at least thousands of meters of overlying rock. By specific arrangements of sound sources and microphones and extensive computer processing, geophysicists are able to outline layers and other structures in the rock based on contrasting acoustic properties (see Figure 2, left picture). Most importantly, such contrasts reveal density differences between porous and non-porous rock, the former being more likely to contain hydrocarbons. The data sets from modern seismic surveys are normally threedimensional and they cover the whole volume of a reservoir. The main weakness of seismics is the low resolution, at best around 30 meters.

Well logs are collections of sensor-based measurements from logging assemblies lowered into the wells, normally in connection with drilling or well operations. The sensors measure physical properties associated with geological properties, e.g., gamma radiation is higher in shale than in sand stone and electrical resistivity is higher in oil than in water. The log plots different measurements and observations along the well (see Figure 2, middle picture) along a downward axis representing length of the well.

Production data are real-time measurements of the oil and gas, volumes transported out of (and in the case of injection for pressure support, pumped into) the reservoir. These can be plotted in various ways, for example as in Figure 2 (right). The pressure development in the reservoir also is monitored. These data give the subsurface group clues about how much oil there might be left in the reservoir, and aid them in day-to-day optimizing existing wells and planning production. Building a reservoir model is an extensive project lasting months to years. The model (Figure 1) is used throughout the lifetime of the field to simulate fluid movement in the reservoir, and it is updated by history matching towards recorded production data.

Our informants willingly admit to the shortcomings of the reservoir model: "The only thing we know for sure is that the [reservoir] model is wrong". Our concern with the reservoir model is how this imperfect representation gets entangled with, and is constitutive of, everyday work practices.

Results

Extrapolate: filling in the gaps

Modelling the reservoir is a creative endeavour where the reservoir is conjured into existence by active interrogation of the available data. We analyse how detailed observations with coarse remote sources are combined in creative extrapolations into the unreachable volumes, between and beyond well observations and beneath the resolution of remote sources.

Wells are just thin lines of high quality data points in kilometre-wide reservoirs. These are interpreted in combination with the vague patterns seen on the seismics. A geologist explains how he proceeds to build an understanding of a new reservoir that has only three wells:

"Obviously, if you have three wells they're going to tell you a lot about the vertical [well paths]. So you have at least the understanding of the vertical sense of the layers and you can build your sedimentological understanding…You have three wells and … you try to interpolate between those wells with your information and then you try to extrapolate away from those wells into areas that are further away. And then with the help of the seismic, you try to calibrate and use the seismic to help you, and then come up with some sort of feeling about whether, you know, how much reservoir you've actually captured with the data you have?" Individual have some value of their own in specific situations, but it is in the combinations of data that conceptions of the reservoir as an entity are constructed. This is concretely manifested in the log as a visual representation: The individual measurements of radioactive and electrical parameters plotted on the log do not primarily speak directly of the geology themselves; rather it is certain patterns in the combinations of the different measurements that reveal the reservoir behind them. The log, as a visual presentation also promotes specific combinations. Maybe the most striking example of this is shown in Figure 3. The measurements of two independent physical properties are superimposed on the plots with their scales adjusted so that the one is higher in sand and the other in shale. Thus, when the curves cross, it represents a transition between shale and sand, and the space between them will be green (representing shale) when one is higher and yellow (representing sandstone) when the other is higher. Like in the tale of seven blind Indians and an elephant, each sensor picks up only fragments of the reservoir, but when combined based on theory and experience their referent appears. Fig. 3. A section of a well log superimposing two independent measurements, gamma radiation and neutron density. The axes of these measurements are adjusted to make the lines intersect, and the area between them change colour, when there is a transition from shale to sandstone.

Thus, only a glimpse on the readings will indicate sandstone (yellow) or shale (green).

New, detailed information from the well path gives a lot of information about the surroundings beyond its actual range, if one is able to interpret it in combination with the seismic of the general structures in the area. We have on several occasions observed collective interpretation where boundaries are drawn in the reservoir based on such combinations. A typical example is when a well log displays a transition from tight shale to sandstone at a certain depth. If the depth corresponds with a reflection on the seismic chart, the well observation "confirms" the seismic and one may assume that the reflection represents this transition. Consequently, one can assume that the areal distribution of the seismic reflection represents the boundary between two layers, and one can, more speculatively guess that the properties of these volumes, for example the porosity of the sand stone, are represented by the properties registered in the log.

Harmonise: resolving inaccuracies and (smaller) inconsistencies

The subsurface professionals cope with imperfect representations of the reservoir every day. One way of coping is by making informal adjustments or selectively dismissing inconsistent data. We discuss practices by which smaller inaccuracies, errors and inconsistencies are handled, not primarily to represent the reservoir better, but rather to respond to the organizational need to get on with work. As information arrives from new wells and from production data, the reservoir model should ideally be updated to fit this information. However, local changes based on single observations from new wells are normally too resource demanding to fit into the model. Local changes may have ripple effects to connected areas of the reservoir: "[Then] we have to figure out, how the heck are we going to update this monster? Because, if you start fiddling with two wells, then you do something with the rest as well."

The most common way of updating reservoir models, and a method that is subject to much current research, is history matching. History matching is basically a mathematical method where the static properties of the reservoir model are adjusted to best fit the actual historical (dynamic) production development. This operation is very demanding in terms of computer processing resources. It is also demanding in terms of manual labour with programming and constraining of the mathematical problem, so that the resultant history matched model makes sense geologically:

"Without history matching the model is just an academic exercise with little practical predictive value. When we get production data [..] we actually find out if things match or if the model fits reality." However, the resultant model will not be perfect and "[i]n the end it is almost always the case that the history matched models violate some important geological constraints". History matching is a calibration of the model towards measured production and will, if it is successful, improve the accuracy of the model. Still, one of our informants stresses that the updated model is not something that passively represents the reservoir:

"[I]f we can do history matching that is the best. Because then you learn something about the flooding processes in the reservoir, in the process. But that doesn't mean that you should use the model afterwards [laughs]. It is the understanding, the understanding of the reservoir, which is important to gain from it. And if you have that, then a good engineer will be able to work intuitively with the model he has in his head and be able to do much of his work" The understanding of the reservoir is relatively robust in the sense of being able to absorb both contradictory and missing data. Given the truly extensive network of sensors and measurement devices and the considerable physical stress they are subject to, equipment is anything but fault-proof. One informant explained how they resolved errors generated from erroneous equipment:

"We've given up fixing that choke. It's too costly to replace. I tell [the production engineer] that he simply has to shut his eyes and disregard the readings from it."

Abduct: Challenged by anomalies

In this section we discuss what happens when new information radically challenges the existing knowledge of the reservoir. We observe that whereas local ad hoc interpretations of new data can be creative and open ended, the reservoir model has a certain inertia upheld by workarounds and other modifying practices.

The model of the reservoir may be challenged in many ways. We illustrate contradictions stemming from information from well logs from new wells. Drilling a new well is the moment of truth for subsurface specialists. They may have planned wells for years. In the course of a few days when the drill bit with its logging sensors penetrates the reservoir, their interpretations and predictions are tested. The results will hardly ever fit their expectations, and they always imply adjustments of their ideas of the reservoir:

"But when we begin to drill, the only thing we know from all our experiences is that when we drill we find out things are not the way we think they are. " One of the authors did his fieldwork at a subsurface department when several wells were drilled Though the field is one of the most studied on the continental shelf, with logs and production data from over 100 wells, each well contributed with new information. Most of the time, new well data meant that they had to make smaller adjustments but on a few occasions the well log, as it ticked in meter by meter, left the whole group in utter confusion. At the time of the fieldwork, most wells were drilled on the fringes of the reservoir. The geological theory of the area is that when the reservoir was a mountain on dry land, some large blocks on its fringes have loosened and slid downwards. Though located on one of these fault blocks, the well was expected to penetrate the common stack of known sedimentary layers in the reservoir. As drilling progressed, however, the observed geology "did not make sense". Expected sandstone-layers were "missing" and they lost track of "where they were" in the stratigraphic layers. Unexpected data during drilling was commonplace (cf. previous sections), but this was one of the rare occasions where it seemed impossible to make sense of it. The communal workroom of the geologists turned into a hothouse as experts and the curious seeped in from the entire department, conducting discussions along several paths. Some were discussing technical issues, like whether the positioning equipment in the drill string could be damaged. A geologist commented that the log looked upside-down and suggested that the fault block may have been rotated. Some tried to look at details in the log for a positive identification of the zones they had penetrated. Some discussed (more or less) similar situations with other well projects and the outcomes of those. Taken-for-granted assumptions were critically revisited. The project manager for the new well rather briskly tried to keep the crowd away as he studied the seismics intensely, shifted perspectives and visualization modes on his screen to study a vague vertical shape. He pointed at the screen and concluded, "this fault has been misinterpreted. It's shifted downwards, not upwards". This error did not in itself explain the data directly, but it supported a hypothesis, that the geologist explained later on. The fault was indicative of a certain landslide pattern that he had seen on a field trip to another geological site. According to this understanding there could be several smaller faults beneath seismic resolution (thus invisible) associated with the fault he could see. One of these smaller faults could have shifted the rock structures in a way that could explain the strange data. He drew on a piece of paper and told a geological story of how a major landslide had resulted in a pattern of smaller faults in the block. Gradually new data strengthened his hypothesis. When confronted by anomalies that challenge not only details of their understanding, but also whether they understand anything at all, all resources are drawn upon including field visits to geological fields on dry land in England.

Discussion

Proclaiming the performativity of sociomateriality is in itself not very bold. Our analysis is intended as a necessary detailing of sociomaterial practices. How, then, to characterise the emerging performativity?

Representations simplify. The subsurface community are painfully aware of the many details, nuances and variations lost when captured in the representations. Latour [27, p. 71] makes a relevant observation when discussing trade-offs, i.e. what you gain and what you loose, related to his notion of a circulating reference. Reporting from a team of researchers' efforts to analyse certain developments in the Amazon rainforest (whether a designated area of the forest was expanding or retreating), the scientists employ a number of different representations for the 'same' section of the forest: embodied observations from the area, dividing the forest into a grid pattern to select designated cells of forest, a sample of earth from one cell and a set of measurement/ tests from that sample. The richness of the former representations gets successively traded for increased mobility and ease of communication in the latter. Geologists are systematically trained, to use Latour's notion, to move up and down the steps of a circulating reference i.e. moving back and forth between rich representations to abstracted models/ representations. The touch and feel of the reservoir, its structures and tactile qualities, and its scale and complexity are not presented to their bodies and perception, and must be conjured out of the data. Figure 4 shows a picture from a field trip where geologists travel to 'analogous' sites to the O & G fields they are primarily interested in. The reservoir model is largely taken for granted in the sense that there is no anxiety over the fact that it is not 'real'. The subsurface community are of course acutely aware of the many shortcomings, inaccuracies, inconsistencies and debatable assumptions embedded in the representation, but the strategies dubbed extrapolate and harmonise in the previous section demonstrate vividly how far they are willing to press the reservoir model. The construction of the reservoir model needs to be understood in light of its purpose. Given the very significant resources involved in revising it ("we do it perhaps every tenth year"), the reservoir model functions like a kuhnian paradigm insofar as being robust despite conflicting data. Rather than spending valuable resources keeping the reservoir model up to date with the latest data, the performativity is strikingly pragmatic: you happily sacrifice perfection and completion of the representation for something good enough for the purpose at hand. The representations are expected to answer the pragmatic question par excellence, what to do next? Are the predicted volumes big enough to justify the cost of a new well? Should they drill or not? Relying on representations presuppose trustworthy representations. Why should anyone trust representations positively known to neither accurate nor complete? Trustworthiness, as pointed out by scholars [START_REF] Porter | Trust in numbers: the pursuit of objectivity in science and public life[END_REF][START_REF] Ellingsen | Mechanisms for producing working knowledge: enacting, orchesterating and organizing[END_REF], is not an attribute of the data but an acquired quality (a performed achievement, if you want). The underlying performances in NorthOil's subsurface community include: triangulating between different representations and data sources (e.g. during history matching when the reservoir model is calibrated with real-time production data), maintaining multiple versions (including historicised ones) of the data (e.g. when some engineers make and rely on a stock of private and local data and analysis) and, arguably the ultimate safety net, numerous formal and informal arenas to collectively discuss, assess and converge on interpretations of the representations (e.g. the weekly meetings between reservoir and production engineers on production optimization or during asset management workshops).

Radical, discontinuous changes in the in the interpretations of representations rely on an ability, systematically harnessed, to zoom in and out of representations i.e. to move from detailed accounts to the larger picture. This ability is manifest on different levels. At an analogous site, one geologist explained why sketches were often more useful than photographs:

"Photography makes things simpler but might lead to situations where you do not see the big picture and significant issues. One has to develop clear mental pictures of the structure up front." The drawings are not mere low-resolution images, but have representational qualities of their own, emphasizing the 'big picture' and 'significant issues'.

Conclusion

The proclaimed performativity of sociomateriality is in itself valuable but inadequately specific for compelling theoretical, methodological and practical implications. Our detailing into three strategies is intended as a necessary step towards a more fine-grained grasp of the 'entanglement'. As in STS, also IS research demonstrates an increased attention to settings saturated by representations. Supplementing what has traditionally been a cornerstone of IS research -workplace oriented studies and the role of technology -more mediaoriented studies are emerging. For instance, [START_REF] Nardi | My Life as a Night Elf Priest: An Anthropological Account of World of Warcraft[END_REF] reports from an ethnography of the practices and presentation of identities of game-playing users of the online game World of Warcraft (WoW) and [START_REF] Schultze | The Avatar-Self Relationship: Enacting Presence in Second Life[END_REF] explore the embodied character of avatars in virtual space. An important motivation for our paper is the relative paucity of workoriented studies of the performativity of sociomateriality. This underscores Barley and Kunda's [START_REF] Barley | Bringing work back in[END_REF] point of "bringing work back in". We focus on the strategies of performativity in work-practices saturated by representations. Hence the purpose of our study is to analyse how performativity -in a work setting with cross-pressure from managerial obligations for efficiency, safety issues and professional identity [START_REF] Perin | Shouldering risks: the culture of control in the nuclear power industry[END_REF] -is shaped.

Practical implications that follow from our work are related to perspectives on safety as known from the notion of high-reliability organisations (HRO). Though not explicitly addressing safety in this paper, our observations of the work of the subsurface professionals display clear HRO characteristics. The reservoir models, so central to everyday practices and operational decisions, are never really taken-forgranted. They are constantly, to use HRO vocabulary, willing and able to suspend simplifying assumptions. Left to themselves, studying the reservoir, workers display a "reluctance to simplify interpretations" and a "preoccupation with failure", important aspects of the "collective mindfulness" making up the cornerstone of HRO [START_REF] Weick | Managing the unexpected: assuring high performance in an age of complexity[END_REF].

Table 1 .

 1 Overview of the three modes of data collection: participatory observations, interviews and document study Participatory observations • Participatory observation of production optimization 18 days during 3 months in 2005 • Participatory observation of product optimization of another asset for 14 days during 4 months in 2006 • Participant observations 3 months in 2004 every day of one of the assets • Two field trips to offshore installations, 5 days in 2007 • Participatory observation of subsurface departments, 4 days during 2008-2010 • Participatory observations from 4 asset workshops • Participation in numerous small, informal meetings and discussions with subsurface and management (2004 -2011) Semi-structured interviews • IS/ IT management: 13 interviews 2005 -2010 • Subsurface members: 55 interviews 2004-2011 Documents • Electronic archives (presentations, memo, documents) • Database readings (from subsurface tools) • Email discussions • Intranet: policy-and operational regulation • Extranet: newletters and corporate presentations

Fig. 1 .

 1 Fig. 1. Visual representation of a reservoir model

Fig. 2 .

 2 Fig. 2. Typical visual representations of the 3 principal types of data: seismic data (left), well logs (middle) and production data (right).

Fig. 4 .

 4 Fig. 4. Tactile experience of the porosity and permeability of the rocks from geologists' field trip to an analogue field accompanied by one of the authors.

Table 2 .

 2 Our interpretative template with the 3 constructs underpinning our analysis.