Case tool use and job design: A restrictiveness/flexibility explanation

Research on CASE tools includes conflicting accounts. Many report high productivity gains and improved quality of systems developed. Others report high costs and few gains, organizations abandoning the use of CASE, or seldom using the CASE tools. Organizational differences may, in part, be attributed to the underlying support philosophy of the CASE tool. We explore the tool philosophy in terms of restrictiveness or flexibility. Systems developers in four organizations were surveyed for perceptions of their CASE tool and of their jobs. We found that systems developers, who perceive their tool as restrictive, enjoy CASE less and think it less useful than those who perceive their tool as flexible. The people who perceived their tool as being restrictive also perceived their job as being lower quality by offering lower autonomy and lower skill variety.