Towards the development of a social capital approach to evaluating change management interventions

Many of the issues associated with the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of information systems development (ISD) have been attributed to the poor relationship between business and IT colleagues. Relational issues relating to collaboration and communication before, during and after ISD lead to dissatisfaction with information systems and services. To address these relational issues, many organisations have introduced relationship management initiatives (RM). Yet, their effects have been debatable. This paper argues that this is partly because there is no appropriate evaluative framework for RM. In response, this paper proposes a framework, based on social capital theory, for conceptualising the effects of change management interventions in the poor relationship between business and IT colleagues. The research adopts a case study approach to this end. It explores the strengths and limitations of the approach and suggests new directions for its further development. Overall, the research shows that there is a potential merit in using a social capital approach for the evaluation of change management interventions that aim to improve the collaboration between business and IT, during ISD and beyond.