INVESTIGATING FEATURE CYCLES OF INFORMATION SYSTEM PRODUCTS

The theory of attractive quality describes how product features cause user satisfaction in fundamentally different ways. Some feature types have potential to only cause satisfaction on implementation into the product but no dissatisfaction on non-implementation, others only dissatisfaction on non-implementation by no satisfaction on implementation and still others both satisfaction on implementation and dissatisfaction on non-implementation. But the theory also suggests that feature types are not static but change over time for the same feature. Two multi-year studies were conducted to empirically investigate if this change in feature type can be observed for information systems (IS) product features. The results of both the studies show that IS product features do transition from one type to another over time. These findings have implications for product feature selection and can help IS product managers make strategic product feature upgrade decisions. This article describes the design and results obtained in one of the studies