The Level of Use of Innovation Survey Developed by Hall and Hord - Essay Example

According to the survey, individuals have different levels of behavior toward technology and these are as follows: Level 0 – state of non-use; Level I – state of orientation; Level II – state of preparation; Level III – state of mechanical use; Level IV A – state of routine; Level IV B – state of refinement; Level V – state of integration; Level VI – state of renewal. The behavior of the majority of the users or specific groups of users will dictate the decision of the organization in terms of intervention, planning and preparation for the technology or technologies that they will have to adapt. Orr and Mrazek (2008) have used the LoU along with Stages of Concern (CoN) to assess the “professional growth of among the professionals pursuing graduate course work in educational technology” (p. 2) at the University of Lethbridge in Alberta, Canada.

What they did was formulate statements that describe the level of their use or the extent of their confidence with respect to their manner of using technologies instead of just labeling the choices with numbers similar to a Likert scale. This was deemed much better since the respondents will not be biased in their answers. Examples of the statements used in their study are as follows: I really don’t know anything about this technology, or am not sure that it would be useful for my classes – to reflect level 0; I am collaborating with colleagues to develop ways in which we can use this technology to better meet our common objectives for our classes – to reflect level V; and finally, I still use this technology, but I am exploring other technologies to replace it that will better meet the objectives for my classes – to reflect level VI.

The interpretation of the data gathered from this survey is a simple computation of the mean, the median and the standard deviation of the responses of the respondents. The data gathered will of course reflect the common technologies being used by the respondents and what they do not know how to use or what they don’t use. This will somehow provide insight into what technologies they need to be trained on and the possible technologies that would be practically fit for adoption in the organization.

This survey can be used to determine the extent to which the faculty have adopted or used certain technologies. From this, the survey can also lead to determining whether the faculty need to be trained or need to be introduced to other technologies. As said earlier, this is normally done in educational institutions but can also be done in other organizations that are planning to adopt new technologies or are embarking on a change in the organization.

A specific example of the use of the survey is in the planning of training for nurses in a particular hospital.

The use of distance education that involves the use of various technologies like digital still and video cameras, video conferences, interactive whiteboards, emails, and chats will prove to be of much help to them. The conduct of the LoU survey is deemed important in the planning since this will determine the level of use of technology by the prospective clients (nurses). As such, the technologies that they are familiar with the will of course be used or, they will be trained on the use of these prior to the program if they are not familiar with these. Read More