What socialworkers do to compensate digital default

When humans interact with technology, they are often perceived as the weakness of the systems.

The expression "the human factor" emphasizes human´s inability to function flawlessly, in relation to technical systems.

However, if we instead talked about the "human contribution" to technology and assume that human is needed for technology to work, it would instead be visible how we actively find solutions to what technical systems are unable to do. For isn´t it so that humans is the one crucial factor for technology to work?

The focal interest of the study is to make visible the “professional contribution”, in relation to digital tools, in social services.

In order to achieve our purpose we investigate social secretary´s use of digital tools in financial aid and child protection.

Our aim is to make visible how social secretaries complement digital tools in order to highlight the professional contribution in relation to technology. In other word, our purpose is to answer the question "what the professionals do that the computer cannot"?

Sub-questions are; How do social secretaries collaborate and interact with digital tools, When do positive synergies arise between digital tools and social secretaries, When does the social secretary need to complement and compensate for digital technology, How are the social secretaries´ work roles shaped and reshaped in the wake of digitalization?

The present study intends to focus on how professionals use their knowledge and experience to cover the shortcomings of digital technology.

In other word, we highlight professional knowledge and skill and professionals are nog treated as obstacles to the implementation of digital tools, due to uncertainty and resistance, as is a more common point of departure in previous research on the matter.

Results meet the knowledge gap that exists regarding what in social work can be replaced by digital technology, and what can not, and thereby contribute to a reduced risk that we build a digitalized social service with no room for professional judgment.

With theoretical starting points in research on professions and “street-level bureaucrats”, and an ethnographic methodological approach, the study will shed light on professional practice in detail and highlight the knowledge, as well as tacit knowledge, that guides social secretary´s actions in their work, in relation to digital tools.