Dr. Alain May

Associate Vice President, Student and Faculty Relations

Contact

• Email: alainm@athabascau.ca

Biography

Dr. May joined Athabasca University on January 1, 2006. Her research interests are enterprise systems, system implementation, and gender and information technology; she has also done work around user competency and IT outsourcing. In most of her research, she takes a critical theory perspective and employs qualitative research methods. Her research explores the constraints and supports to participation in the software implementation process, with the goal of creating a space for more participatory implementation methods. She is currently researching the implementation of an electronic health record (EHR) system in Kibera, Africa’s second largest slum (located in the heart of Nairobi).

Dr. May obtained both her BSc (Computing Science) specializing in Software Design and her MBA from the University of Alberta. Leveraging this education, she worked as an Information Technology consultant, gaining expertise in the development and implementation of decision support systems and retail enterprise software. Through her industry experience, she became interested in researching the system implementation process to explore why, despite the best intentions of all involved, implementations are often less successful than stakeholders desire. This prompted her to return to school; she obtained her PhD in Business (Management Information Systems) from the University of Calgary in 2007.

Dr. May has taught MBA and undergraduate courses at both Athabasca University and the University of Calgary. Her teaching areas include all areas of management information systems but especially enterprise systems, information systems management, e-commerce, systems analysis and design, and project management. She has also been involved in teaching organizational behaviour.