1 Planning or Improvising? An Exploration into the Bayswater Hotel Syndrome in IS development and Implementation Bendik Bygstad The Norwegian School of Information Technology (NITH) Schweigaards gt 14 0185 Oslo bendik.bygstad@nith.no Abstract The paper introduces the Bayswater Hotel Syndrome as a metaphor to describe a situation with an impressive façade but a rather messy backyard. Based on the IS success and failure literature and evidence from a longitudinal case study, this paper has two propositions. First, the Bayswater Hotel Syndrome is a useful metaphor to improve our understanding of IS success and failure. It illustrates a phenomenon that is assumed to be fairly common; that IS malfunctioning and improvisations are hidden behind corporate facades. However, it also highlights that the result may, somewhat surprisingly, be successful, at least in the short term. Second, our instruments do not enable us sufficiently to discover this phenomenon. This applies to both quantitative and qualitative research. Although we may ask control questions in our surveys, and use the principle of suspicion in qualitative designs, it is seldom documented that a researcher has access to this kind of evidence. . Introduction In our regular (football and shopping) travels to London many Scandinavians have been booked in at tourist hotels in the Bayswater district near Hyde Park. The hotels usually look quite impressive on the front, with white columns, arches and decorated windows, thus apparently justifying the high price. However, after entering the room you discover that it (always!) has a view into a surprisingly dark and unpainted backyard, with trash, rusty ventilation equipment and dangerously looking electrical cables. All right, you think; they spent the money on the façade! However, next time in London we return to the same or a similar hotel… I will use the Bayswater hotel as a metaphor to ask some questions both on IS development and on qualitative research.