Neil Pollock's Web Site

Neil Pollock is a Professor of Innovation and Social Informatics at the University of Edinburgh Business School where he is Head of the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Group. Neil is also an active member of the Institute for the Study of Science, Technology and Innovation (ISSTI).

Joining academia as a mature student, Neil took a degree in Computing and a Masters in Science & Technology Policy. He completed his PhD in Science and Technology Studies (STS) at the University of Lancaster. Prior to moving to Edinburgh he was a Senior Research Associate at the University of Newcastle where he worked at the Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies and within the Management School. Whilst at Newcastle he wrote (with James Cornford) ‘Putting the University Online: Information, Technology, and Organisational Change’.

Neil has carried out a number of successful research projects, the most recent of which inlcude an ESRC project on the Biography of Software Packages, an ESRC E-Society project and a European 6th Framework project investigating the social shaping of e-Commerce standards. Based on these projects he wrotea second book (this time with Robin Williams) called ‘Software and Organisation: The Biography of the Enterprise-Wide System Or How SAP Conquered the World’. The key aim of the book is to set out the 'Biograpy of Artefacts' framework which is an analytical approach for studying the shaping and effects of large-scale technologies (see a presentation of this approach at a London School of Economics seminar).

At the moment Neil is researching the topic of 'market analysts', 'industry analysts', 'IT research firms', and 'commercial research firms'. He was recently awarded an ESRC personal fellowship in order to study and write a book about how industry analysts shape the markets for workplace information and communication technologies.The book will be out late 2013.

Neil supervises a number of PhD students in the School of Business and is always keen to work with prospective students interested in information and communication technologies, particularly those wishing to apply a more sociological approach to their work (see list of current and past students).