1-2-3 Project Summary - Action Processing System

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In this paper, I attempted to theorize the findings from and conclusions to my 1-2-3 Project mini-case study that investigated the literacy process called the Action Processing System (APS). The APS is a computerized business process and content management system.  The conceptual framework was the social practice view of literacy. This framework was utilized to understand the complex, interwoven view of which literacies are practiced, how they are lived and why (Belfiore, et al., 2004, p. 4).  The analytical lenses utilized to evaluate the fieldwork findings in the study where Discourse analysis and the concept “meanings-in-use.”

There were three major findings for this 1-2-3 Project.  The first is the existence of a “clash of cultures” between two Discourses.  For the workforce education community, this type of finding could have a tremendous impact on the design and delivery of their education and training programs and their teaching strategy if they realize they are instructing two distinct Discourses using the same computerized business process system.

Finding two revealed a disconnect between the ideal system operation and the actual workplace operation.  Workplace educators should be sensitive to this type of situation whenever they are assessing workplace literacy requirements associated with a computerized business process to preclude the misdiagnosing of the reason(s) why the target user population does not utilize the system properly.

Finally, the study revealed the power of the concept of “meanings-in-use” to discern “why” workers don’t comply with a literacy practice as intended by management. In this case it helped explain why workers chose to accomplish staff actions working outside the APS.

 In the case of all of the findings, they would probably have been missed if the focus of the study had not considered intervening social factors by utilizing the “social-cultural” view of literacy or literacy as a social practice as a framework for analysis.