ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks: a literature review

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation is a complex and vibrant process, one that involves a combination of technological and organizational interactions. Often an ERP implementation project is the single largest IT project that an organization has ever launched and requires a mutual fit of system and organization. Also the concept of an ERP implementation supporting business processes across many different departments is not a generic, rigid and uniform concept and depends on variety of factors. As a result, the issues addressing the ERP implementation process have been one of the major concerns in industry. Therefore ERP implementation receives attention from practitioners and scholars and both, business as well as academic literature is abundant and not always very conclusive or coherent. However, research on ERP systems so far has been mainly focused on diffusion, use and impact issues. Less attention has been given to the methods used during the configuration and the implementation of ERP systems, even though they are commonly used in practice, they still remain largely unexplored and undocumented in Information Systems research. So, the academic relevance of this research is the contribution to the existing body of scientific knowledge. An annotated brief literature review is done in order to evaluate the current state of the existing academic literature. The purpose is to present a systematic overview of relevant ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks as a desire for achieving a better taxonomy of ERP implementation methodologies. This paper is useful to researchers who are interested in ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Results will serve as an input for a classification of the existing ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Also, this paper aims also at the professional ERP community involved in the process of ERP implementation by promoting a better understanding of ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks, its variety and history

Environmental modelling of the Chief Information Officer

Since the introduction of the term in the 1980’s, the role of the Chief Information Officer (CIO) has been widely researched. Various perceptions and dimensions of the role have been explored and debated. However, the explosion in data proliferation (and the inevitable resulting information fuelled change) further complicates organisational expectations of the CIOs role. If organisations are to competitively exploit the digital trend, then those charged with recruiting and developing CIOs now need to be more effective in determining (and shaping) CIO traits and attributes, within the context of their own organisational circumstances and in line with stakeholder expectations. CIOs also need to determine their own suitability and progression within their chosen organisation if they are to remain motivated and effective. Before modelling the role of the future CIO, it is necessary to synthesise our current knowledge (and the lessons learnt) about the CIO. This paper, therefore, aims to identify and summate the spectrum of key researched ‘themes’ pertaining to the role of the CIO. Summating previous research, themes are modelled around four key CIO ‘dimensions’, namely (1) Impacting factors, (2) Controlling factors (3) Responses and (4) CIO ‘attributes’. Having modelled the CIOs current environment, and recognising the evolving IT enabled information landscape, the authors call for further research to inform the recruitment and development of the future CIO in terms of personal attributes and the measurable impact such attributes will have on their respective organisation

Cloud Computing Adoption: A Literature Review on What Is New and What We Still Need to Address

Research on cloud computing (CC) recently emerged congruently with the technology’s importance for organizations at a fast pace. This makes it difficult for practitioners to obtain a consolidated overview of what determines CC adoption based on the numerous papers in this regard. Moreover, for further research in the field to add value, it is necessary to identify what still needs to be addressed. In this vein, we conducted a descriptive review of 39 papers, integrating the results of a previous review on 23 papers from 2014, to compare findings across studies. We identify 44 determinant factors that exhibit consistent directional influence on the dependent meta-variable “CC adoption”, extending previous literature reviews with regard to asset, client, and environmental characteristics. We then critically reviewed the research landscape to identify what is there, and what is not yet covered: Future research should specifically regard the adoption of Infrastructure-, Platform-, and Everything-as-a-Service, private, hybrid, and multi-cloud deployment, investigate vendor, solution, and individual characteristics, analyzing information systems, or the decision-maker

Government Cloud Computing Strategies: Management of Information Risk and Impact on Concepts and Practices of Information Management

Research Problem The objective of this research is to investigate the extent to which the government cloud computing strategies of New Zealand, Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Ireland are supported by defined processes for considering the information risks of shifting to cloud computing, and assessing the impact of these approaches on concepts and practices of information management. Methodology The study undertook a qualitative analysis of published policies, strategies and guidance documents published by regulatory agencies within the target jurisdictions, investigating these documents for evidence of a process to assess and manage information risks. Results The study provides an assessment of the adequacy of governments’ guidance frameworks in preparing government organisations to properly assess the risks, opportunities, and necessary controls for information in a cloud service. Implications The gaps in guidance demonstrated by the study identify opportunities for a more rigorous assessments of the effectiveness of information management controls and privacy safeguards implemented by government organisations, and points to characteristics which could be assessed against in more specific case studies

How cloud computing impacts stock market prices

Cloud computing is an evolution of computing technology and reflects a shift in the way it is delivered to businesses and individuals. Enterprises can significantly lower their cost of ownership, reduce time to value and faster adapt to changing needs in a globalized economy. Despite research and practice predict productivity increases and cost savings when migrating to the cloud one question remains unanswered: Does the adoption of cloud computing increase the market value of the firm? We try to answer this question by applying the event study methodology on companies that recently announced the deployment of cloud computing. Overall, we find significant positive abnormal returns. We find that investors specifically reward innovative and strategically motivated adoption of cloud computing. As a key implication of our results, we recommend in particular IT executives in large companies within the service industry to reassess their portfolio and foster the adoption of strategic and innovative cloud services

Cloud Sourcing – Next Generation Outsourcing?

Although Cloud Sourcing has been around for some time it could be questioned what actually is known about it. This paper presents a literature review on the specific question if Cloud Sourcing could be seen as the next generation of outsourcing. The reason for doing this is that from an initial sourcing study we found that the sourcing decisions seems to go in the direction of outsourcing as a service which could be described as Cloud Sourcing. Whereas some are convinced that Cloud Sourcing reduces cost and complexity in advantage for increased labor productivity, others maintain that the negotiation with the cloud provider is crucial to ensure data privacy, security regulations, compliance, standards, tolerance for risk, governance and service level agreements. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the debate on Cloud Sourcing in the top IS conferences and AIS basket of 8 journals goes in the direction of Cloud Sourcing being the future of sourcing as practice predicts, and to identify the space for the development of this research. An introductory literature review showed that there is not much written about Cloud Sourcing as an alternative for outsourcing albeit it seems to have a great potential

Evaluating Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) performance among Malaysian government agencies using organizational learning‐based model

Previous strategic information systems planning (SISP) studies have highlighted that an ideal SISP practice should emphasise on organisational learning (OL) in their SISP approach. Surprisingly, studies focusing on the extent of OL and its contextual factors are lacking. This study aims to develop and validate a model for evaluating SISP performance in the Malaysian government agencies from OL perspective. For this purpose, an SISP performance model was developed based on the absorptive capacity theory where SISP is viewed as a learning process instead of planning process. The theoretical assumption is that the quality of SISP contextual factors will influence the extent of SISP learning which eventually will influence the SISP success. The contextual factors are SISP climate, consultant expertise and CIO capability. Meanwhile, the SISP learning factors comprise of shared ICT/business knowledge and SISP process effectiveness with SISP success as the SISP performance measurement. 706 questionnaires were sent to 234 selected government agencies in Malaysia. Only 27% of the government officers responded to the questionnaire meets the criteria of this study. Measurements were initially validated using SPSS. Subsequent confirmation on the measurements and structural validity were done by adopting the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) analyses using AMOS. The results of this study demonstrated that the hypothesised SISP performance model adequately fits the sample data which assumed the model is acceptable. Generally, the findings of this study indicated that higher level of SISP climate, consultant expertise and CIO capability positively influence the extent of SISP learning factors and later influence the SISP success. In determining the SISP success, this study revealed that it is crucial for the Malaysian government agencies to identify appropriate SISP team members based on their knowledge, skill and attitude to promote conducive SISP learning climate for effective SISP decision making

A Multi Perspective Approach for Understanding the Determinants of Cloud Computing Adoption among Australian SMEs

Cloud computing is proved to be an effective computing technology for organisations through the advantages that it offers such as IT technical agility and scalability, enhancing businesses processes, and increasing enterprises competitiveness. In Australia, there is an emerging trend that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) begin to adopt this technology in the conventional working practices. However, there is a dearth of prior studies on examining the factors that influence the cloud computing adoption among Australian SMEs. To fill the empirical vacuum, this research-in-progress proposes an integrated framework for examining the determinants of cloud computing service adoption with the consideration of the unique characteristics of Australian SMEs, such as relatively low adoption of cloud computing services, less innovative, and limited knowledge about cloud computing and its benefits and hindrances. To this end, we are conducting consecutive studies to investigate this research issue. An exploratory interview study will be applied to observe and verify the characteristics of Australian SMEs toward the cloud computing adoption. This is followed by an organisational level survey that examines the effects of determinants on cloud computing adoption. Finally, a decision model for cloud computing adoption among Australian SMEs will be developed by using a Multi Criteria Decision Approach (MCDA) through rating, prioritising, and ranking of various criteria and alternatives available to the decision makers. Adopting the mixed-method research fashion, this research-in-progress intends to make significant implications to scholars and practitioners alike in the cloud computing research and applications areas