In an era when technologies have become a backbone of most organizations, IT support functions are under immense pressure not only to ensure provision and reliability of IS and technologies but also to resolve IS incidents of different severity when they disrupt organizations’ “business-as-usual.” This article addresses this challenge by investigating how organizational IT functions coordinate their work under different degrees of uncertainty in order to provide reliable IT services. We conceptualize coordination in IT support functions as a process that unfolds over time through interactions between four underlying coordination practices employed to provide reliable IT services: prioritizing tasks, following procedures, using roles and responsibilities, and utilizing networks. Furthermore, we show how these coordination practices change when IT incidents cause a shift from normal (i.e. “business-as-usual”) to emergency conditions. Our empirical research in two IT functions supporting two types of organizations (traditional and fast-response) demonstrate that IT functions in these two types of organizations respond to emergencies differently. Specifically, in emergencies, an IT function supporting a fast-response organization shifts to emergency coordination practices momentarily, as it abandons “normal” coordination practices to rely on an extensive set of formal practices specifically designed for such situations. In contrast, an IT function supporting a traditional organization is unprepared for emergencies—coordinating under emergency conditions involves improvisation, because coordination practices designed to support business-as-usual are not suitable for dealing with emergency situations.

中文翻译：

---

在压力下：了解在一切照旧和紧急情况下 IT 功能的协调动态

在技​​术已成为大多数组织支柱的时代，IT 支持职能面临着巨大压力，不仅要确保信息系统和技术的供应和可靠性，而且要解决不同严重程度的信息系统事件，因为这些事件破坏了组织的“业务即通常。” 本文通过研究组织 IT 职能如何在不同程度的不确定性下协调其工作以提供可靠的 IT 服务来解决这一挑战。我们将 IT 支持功能中的协调概念化为一个过程，该过程通过用于提供可靠 IT 服务的四种基本协调实践之间的相互作用随着时间的推移而展开：确定任务的优先级、遵循程序、使用角色和职责以及利用网络。此外，我们展示了当 IT 事件导致从正常（即“一切照旧”）转变为紧急情况时，这些协调实践如何变化。我们对支持两种类型组织（传统和快速响应）的两种 IT 职能的实证研究表明，这两种类型组织中的 IT 职能对紧急情况的反应不同。具体而言，在紧急情况下，支持快速响应组织的 IT 职能会暂时转向应急协调实践，因为它放弃了“正常”协调实践，而依赖于专门为此类情况设计的大量正式实践。相比之下，支持传统组织的 IT 职能部门没有为紧急情况做好准备——在紧急情况下进行协调需要即兴发挥，