Exploring the Potential of the Ethical Grid for Informing Decision-Taking Practices in the Soft Information Systems and Technologies, Methodology

In line with the overall conference theme of ‘Ethics, Design and Consequences of IT’, this paper seeks to show how ethics, in the form of Seedhouse’s Ethical Grid, can inform the use of a particular methodology, the Soft Information Systems & Technologies Methodology (SISTeM). This paper shows how the ethical elements are often missing from IS development, and how although SISTeM approaches IS development from a sociotechnical perspective, the ethical defense of the decisions made is lacking. The paper further shows how the Ethical Grid can be incorporated into the SISTeM process, to support the consideration of and more explicit voicing of the ethical view. Examples, drawn from the UK healthcare setting, provide practical illustrations of how this integration of the Ethical Grid into the IS development process might be achieved.