Date of Graduation

2002

Document Type

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

Anyone who is a participant in today's workforce can attest to the fact that change is a constant and that workplace changes are often brought about by new or upgraded technology, which often means that a worker may become accustomed to a particular system, only to discover that it will soon be replaced with a new one. Today's technology is often packaged in the form of an enterprise resource planning (ERP) system that revolutionizes the company's processes and brings about massive changes in the production of goods and services. These systems promise both the integration of different departments of a company and the smooth, rapid flow of information across the enterprise. ERP systems, however, are complex; and they warrant careful planning and focused execution of the implementation program. These significant and frequently occurring technological changes in the workplace are, in addition, accompanied by the requirement for continual learning on the part of the worker, which means that successful system implementation is dependent on a successful training effort. The human impact of this change/learn/change cycle will, therefore, continue to be a critical issue for corporate leaders, for the workers themselves, and for the instructors/trainers who support the change effort. In order to determine the impact of technological change and its accompanying training, the opinions of the humans who are impacted should be sought. These opinions can inform project teams and assist them in making better decisions as to how future technology projects can be more effectively introduced and implemented. This research study assesses the impacts on the employees of a corporate technology implementation and training initiative by examining how the training effort for a new computer system implementation at a fully integrated steel-manufacturing corporation was conceived and delivered.

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