Whose Work Does the Computer Do?

Markku I. Nurminen is Professor Emeritus of Information Systems Research at the University of Turku. His speciality is work informatics. In the course of a quarter of a century (1985-2010), along with his research group (named Laboris) he carried out some two or three dozen case studies focusing on Finnish organizations in both the private and the public sectors. The common thread running through these projects was the beneficial application of information systems. The benefits produced by their use were intended to improve organisational activity, but extracting them from the system turned out to be a surprisingly difficult task. In consequence, there was no shortage of interesting projects. Professor Nurminen discovered many of the fundamentals of work informatics while maintaining connections with research groups in information systems research not only in Finland but also across the whole Nordic area. One of the most important contributions he introduced into his own research community was a multidisciplinary approach that was also used by the Laboris team. Professor Nurminen retired in 2009. Since then, he has participated in teaching work informatics at his old university, while at the same time crystallizing its foundations. Work informatics continues to be researched and taught at the University of Turku. (https://workinformatics.utu.fi/)