Simon Rogerson is lifetime Professor Emeritus in Computer Ethics at the Centre for Computing and Social Responsibility (CCSR), De Montfort University.Computer Ethics Pioneer Retires DMYou Issue 33 P8 available at https://issuu.com/ponderblog/docs/dmyou_33 He was the founder and editor for 19 volumes of the Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society.http://www.emeraldgrouppublishing.com/products/journals/journals.htm?id=JICES Refs He has had two careers; first as a technical software developer and then in academia as reformer (according to Huff and BarnardDescription of Rogerson in Huff, Chuck, Barnard, Laura (2009), Good computing: Moral Exemplars in the Computing Profession, IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, Volume:28, Issue: 3, pp 47-54,. - Huff and Barnard define reformers as being crusaders attempting to change values in social systems and viewing individuals as victims of injustice and attempting to rectify that injustice. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5247002). He was the founding Director of CCSR, launching it in 1995 at the first ETHICOMP conference which he conceived Companies offered ethics advice, Times Higher Education, April 7, 1995 https://www.timeshighereducation.com/features/companies-offered-ethics-advice/97305.article and co-directed until 2013. He became Europe's first Professor in Computer Ethics in 1998. His most important research focuses on providing rigorously grounded practical tools and guidance to computing practitioners. For his leadership and research achievements in the computer and information ethics interdisciplinary field he was awarded the fifth IFIP-WG9.2 Namur Award in 2000Excerpt from the official report: By giving Simon Rogerson the 5th IFIP-WG9.2 Namur Award, we emphasise the need to place the study of ethics on the agenda of international ICT research and practices. https://staff.info.unamur.be/jbl/IFIP/winners.html and the SIGCAS Making a Difference Award in 2005.Excerpt from the official report: Professor Rogerson has made and continues to make a world-wide difference in how people view the complex interactions of computers and society. http://www.sigcas.org/awards-1/awards-winners/rogerson He is author of the World's first Ethical Digital Technology trilogy comprising The Evolving Landscape of Ethical Digital Technology (2021), Ethical Digital Technology in Practice (2022) and Imagine! Ethical Digital Technology for Everyone (2023).(link to Taylor Francis)
Industrial career As a teenager Rogerson wanted to work in the computer industry. On graduating from the University of Dundee he joined Thorn Lighting as a Fortran Programmer in 1972. He progressed to Senior Systems Analyst before transferring to Thorn EMI in 1976 as Technical Systems Manager and where he became Computer Services Manager in 1981. He left his full-time post in 1983 to pursue a career in academia. However, he maintained his link with industry through freelance consultancy and membership of several professional bodies.
Academic career Rogerson joined the Department of Information Systems at Leicester Polytechnic (later to become De Montfort UniversityLeicester Polytechnic became De Montfort University in accordance with the Further and Higher Education Act in 1992.) in 1983. He was appointed under a government initiative to attract IT industrialists in to Higher Education."… the government in 1983 … extra money for universities to spend on information technology courses and 'new blood' posts, mainly in science and technology" p100 in Initially, he focused on lecturing about Project Management, Systems Analysis and Management Support Systems. It was the latter which led him into research starting by co-authoring works with Dr Christine Fidler culminating in the book Strategic Management Support Systems in 1996.Pearson catalogue http://catalogue.pearsoned.co.uk/educator/product/Strategic-Management-Support-Systems/9780273614180.page
Teaching Rogerson is an innovative educator. He created and was the founding course leader of a European-focused Business Information Systems Degree in 1990.ROGERSON, S., European Language Education for information systems undergraduates, in: Student Skills for the New Europe, Cunningham, L., Editor, Higher Education for Capability, 1993, Chapter 10 He developed student guides for undergraduates, publishing Project Skills Handbook ROGERSON, S., Project Skills Handbook, Chartwell-Bratt, 1989 and co-authoring Successful Group Work.ROGERSON, S., RICE, J., SAUNDERS, C. & O'SULLIVAN, T., Successful group work, Kogan Page, 1996 He introduced a series of course modules focussing on computer and information ethics. Rogerson and Tugrul Esendal developed and delivered an innovative course module addressing quality assurance and ethics in Software Engineering for which they received a Research Informed Teaching Award in 2007.ESSENDAL, T. & ROGERSON, S. (2011) A holistic approach to software engineering education. In HUSSEY, M., WU, B. & XU, X. (editors) Software industry oriented education practice and curriculum development: experiences and lessons. IGI Global. Chpt 5 pp83-97 He introduced the Information Society Doctoral Programme which continues to attract research students worldwide. In 2008, funded by HEFCE (Higher Education Funding Council of England) Rogerson developed a virtual learning environment for doctoral students at De Montfort University where they could learn about and discuss research ethics.Research Ethics: Online (REST7 525 ) Course Description, Research training programme handbook 2010/11, p13. available at http://www.dmu.ac.uk/documents/research-documents/graduate-school/current-students/research-development-programme/rtphandbook2010-11.pdf In 2009 he ran a Masters Summer School on the Social Impact of Computing at Gdansk University of Technology, Poland."Simon Rogerson: making a difference 2005" interviewed by Ken Himma,. ACM SIGCAS Computers and Society, Celebrating SIGCAS' 40th Anniversary - Interviews with Past SIGCAS Award Recipients, Volume 39, Issue 2 (September 2009) pp22-23. available at http://www.sigcas.org/awards-1/interview-with-simon-rogerson
Research Through sharing his IS/IT industrial experience with his students Rogerson realised that current professional practice was having little effect on reducing the risk of IS/IT system failure. This led him to focus his research on new interdisciplinary approaches to IS/IT project management, design and implementation which embraced computer and information ethics.ROGERSON, S. (2015) Future Vision, Special Issue - 20 years of ETHICOMP, Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, Volume 13, Issue 3/4, pp.346 – 360. He and Donald Gotterbarn created the Software Development Impact Statement (SoDIS) process which encourages those involved in IS/IT project management to consider the wider ramifications of their work.Gotterbarn, D and Rogerson, S (2005), Responsible Risk Analysis for Software Development: Creating the Software Development Impact Statement, Communications of the Association for Information Systems, Volume 15, Article 40. at http://aisel.aisnet.org/cais/vol15/iss1/40/ An associated decision support tool, SoDIS Project Auditor was developed and successfully used around the world. As a member of the BCS Ethics Strategic Panel, he was one of the creators of DIODE, an ethical assessment tool for new and emerging technologies. He conceived and co-developed a dependency mapping method for the implementation of technological innovations.ROGERSON, S., WILFORD, S and FAIRWEATHER, N.B. (2013) A dependencies mapping method for personal health monitoring. in Schmidt, S. & Rienhoff, O (eds).Interdisciplinary Assessment of Personal Health Monitoring. Vol 187 of Studies in Health Technology and Informatics. IOS Press, . available at http://ebooks.iospress.nl/volumearticle/34521 Rogerson's research extended to IS/IT application areas with notable work in electronic voting and personal health monitoring.Rogerson was a principal investigator on EU-funded PHM-Ethics project see http://ethics.p-h-m.org/consortium.html A second important focus of Rogerson's research is professionalism in computing. His book Ethical aspects of information technology: Issues for senior executives, published in 1998 for the Institute of Business Ethics, remains one the few to address ethics of computing from a corporate perspective.Rogerson, Simon, (1998), Ethical aspects of information technology: issues for senior executives, Institute of Business Ethics, He has made significant contributions to the development of professional standards in several computer related bodies. He was a member of the executive team which developed the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) / IEEE Computer Society (IEEE-CS) Software Engineering Code of Ethics and Professional Practice for which he received the IEEE Certificate of Appreciation in 1998.De Montfort University, RAE 2001 submission to Library and Information Management, RA6a: Additional observations, Evidence of esteem available at http://www.rae.ac.uk/2001/Submissions/Textform.asp?route=2&HESAInst=H-0068&UoA=61&Msub=Z&Form=RA6a He led the development of the code of ethics for the Institute for the Management of Information Systems MCROBB, S., ROGERSON, S., FAIRWEATHER, N.B., Code of Ethics, IMIS Journal, April, Vol 10 No 2, 2000, pp 18-19 and the redevelopment of the Code of Good Practice of BCS, The Chartered Institute of IT. Between 1998 and 2010 Rogerson led a longitudinal survey to explore the attitudes of information systems professionals. It provides a unique snapshot as seen through an ethical lens.IS IT Ethical? 2010 ETHICOMP Survey of Professional Practice https://www.researchgate.net/publication/299485534_IS_IT_Ethical_2010_ETHICOMP_Survey_of_Professional_Practice?ev=prf_pub Practitioner access to Rogerson's research was made possible through his regular ETHIcol column which he wrote for the IMIS Journal from 1995 to 2012.
Leadership