Reframing Success in Embodied Work: Competing Perspectives on Occupational Exoskeleton Adoption

Technology adoption is often framed in binary terms of acceptance or resistance, oversimplifying the complex dynamics of workplace integration. This study introduces the Normalisation-Situated Practice Matrix (NSPM), an analytical heuristic that maps the degree of organisational embedding (normalisation) against the degree of experiential user engagement (situated practice), providing a new way to understand how different stakeholders negotiate the deployment of new technologies. Focusing on occupational exoskeletons in a warehouse setting and drawing on observational fieldwork and 34 semi-structured interviews with frontline employees, managers, and technical and academic experts, this study explores the competing goals, approaches, and lived experiences of these diverse groups.

Our thematic analysis identifies three key dynamics: (1) a disconnect between managerial decisions and employee work realities, pointing to the challenges of top-down implementation; (2) the active role of employees in adapting technology through informal, practice-based strategies that operate alongside official guidelines; and (3) the existence of competing narratives around exoskeleton use that reflect broader organisational tensions, where decision-making authority is concentrated at the executive level while frontline workers bear the embodied consequences. Rather than defining success solely through implementation efficiency or binary adoption metrics, our study demonstrates that technology adoption is a dynamic and contested process shaped by power relations, situated practices, and multiple stakeholder perspectives. The NSPM structures examination of these complexities and reframes success in human-centric terms, offering a diagnostic tool applicable across diverse technology integration contexts.