Implementation of automation as distributed cognition in knowledge work organizations: Six recommendations for managers

Knowledge work organizations are increasingly leveraging automation to enhance and transform their business processes. Many types of automation tools are being deployed in a large variety of information processing tasks, requiring effective management of human–automation co-operation. Yet, conceptual understanding of human–automation hybrid work remains thin and current literature lacks practical recommendations for managers. To address this gap, we synthesize findings from our three earlier case studies with organizations pursuing a wide array of automation tools and examine them through the lens of distributed cognition. We demonstrate how distributed cognition informs about the organizing for human-automation interaction when deploying automation. Our contribution lies in the presentation of six recommendations on three issues: human–automation task allocation, mitigation of the risk of deskilling, and management of collective knowledge across human and automation.