The e-government implementation directions in Oman: A preliminay investigation

Electronic government has established itself as the primary enabler for transforming the way government services are offered to citizens. In the gulf countries, public sector transformation efforts are focused towards increasing accessibility, availability, competitive advances and enhancing services in civil administration. The Sultanate of Oman is one such example of the Gulf countries where large investments have been made since 2003 to implement electronic services in the public sector. Using a qualitative research approach, this research investigates the improvements that have been made to facilitate these electronic services in three public organisations, and their resulting impact within the organisations. The empirical results reveal that among others, top management support, integration and IT staff skills and capabilities are the most important factors that facilitate e-government initiatives in the Omani public sector

Factors affecting continued usage intention of electronic government among public servants in Iraq

Electronic government (eG) system has become an important component of Information and Communication Technology provided by governments to facilitate all the transactions. This system has gained the popularity in developed and developing countries alike. Due to the inconsistency of the findings regarding the antecedents and consequences of usage behaviour of eG services, this study attempted to further explain this phenomenon in an unstable environment. Specifically, this study attempted to investigate the mediating role of Usage Behaviour on the relationships between the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use Technology (UTAUT) antecedents and Continued Usage Intention. Additionally, this study attempted to investigate the moderating effect of Perceived Intensity of Civil Conflict (PICC) on the relationship between Usage Behaviour and Continued Usage Intention. In the relevant past literature, many theories have emphasized the necessity to establish the fit between various factors and Usage issues as the key success factor. However, this study integrated many theories such as the Expectation-Confirmation Theory, Conflict Theory, and UTAUT to examine the effect of various factors on Usage Behaviour and Continued Usage Intention of eG. To examine the hypothesized model, the data for this study were collected from the employees in the public universities. Out of 700 questionnaires distributed, 436 usable questionnaires were returned. This study employed the partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) to confirm the validity and reliability of the measurement model and to examine the structural relationships. The findings of the study confirmed the positive influence of Effort Expectancy, Performance Expectancy and Facilitating Conditions on the Usage Behaviour. In addition, the results supported the strong positive influence of usage behaviour on continued usage intention. While the moderating effect of PICC was not supported, usage behaviour was found to have a significant power to explain the effect of UTAUT variables on continued usage intention

Strategies for Cloud Services Adoption in Saudi Arabia

The adoption rate of cloud computing is low among business organizations in Saudi Arabia, despite the cost-saving benefits of using cloud services. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore the strategies that information technology (IT) leaders in the manufacturing industry in Saudi Arabia used to adopt cloud computing to reduce IT costs. The target population of this study consisted of 5 IT leaders from 5 different manufacturing companies in Saudi Arabia who successfully adopted cloud computing in their companies to reduce IT costs. Rogers\u27s diffusion of innovation theory was the conceptual framework for this research. Data collected from face-to-face, semistructured interviews and a review of relevant corporate documentation were analyzed using Yin\u27s 5-step data analysis method, which included compiling, disassembling, reassembling, interpreting, and concluding the data. Five themes emerged from the data analysis: identify business needs and requirements, apply value realization metrics, plan for migration, choose the right cloud service provider, and provide adequate training and awareness sessions. The implications of this study for positive social change include the potential to improve the local economy in Saudi Arabia by ensuring the sustainability of firms in the manufacturing industry through the implementation of cost-saving strategies associated with cloud computing adoption

Willingness of accepting mobile data positioning technology in Chinese market

This research aims to study the willingness of accepting Mobile data positioning technology in tourism, traffic and population statistics in China. Despite big data is popular in different industries, the Chinese government is still conservative, using traditional methods for statistics, such as transportation, population, and tourism. For the time being, mobile phone selling market grows rapidly around the world. Billions people generate tons of data every second through their mobile phone. The big challenge is to get to know about those data. With the analyzing big data technology has a great improvement, it is a good opportunity to start analyzing mobile data positioning market in China. As the fastest-growing developing country in the world, China has a large potential market. At the same time, China's digitalization process has also developed rapidly, laying a good foundation for Mobile data positioning(MDP). As mobile data positioning technology mainly provides to the government, so in this study, it adopted questionnaire to 67 civil servants about their attitude to use MDP in their daily work. Meanwhile, this study using Structural Equation Modeling SEM, SPSS, technology acceptance model(TAM) model and smartpls to determine the model of their willingness to adopt this technology. The results show that perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use are direct and important predictors of positioning using mobile data whereas. The findings help as a guide for effective decision to any technology company who are interested in MDP in Chinese’s market

I Can, but I Won’t: An Exploratory Study on People and New Information Technologies in the Military

Cloud computing is one of the hottest topics in Information Technology accounting for growth in IT spending with global revenues surging to over $130 billion in 2013. According to the Federal CIO, the U. S. Government is considered the world’s largest purchaser of information technology with spending more than$76 billion per year. Since the commercial industry uses cloud computing to reduce costs, optimize business functions and collaborate on real-time data for decision making, should the Department of Defense implement cloud computing? Research examined the possibility that cloud computing is not seen as a viable technology and if the IT professionals in the DoD who are unwilling to implement cloud computing. Data from a survey of DoD IT professionals was compared to data from a survey from the commercial industry and was used in a model to determine perceived viability and perceived willingness to implement the technology. Perceived viability of cloud computing is determined by the cost, organizational inertia and the fit of the technology with the organization. The perceived willingness is only partially measured by the viability. Perceived willingness is an attitude toward the technology and changing that attitude towards could assist with the willingness to implement the technology

A Model for Implementation and Development of Electronic Banking in Iran (Case Study: Bank Resalat)

To achieve success, banks need to adopt and develop new banking technologies, and success is achieved when the new technologies are accepted and continuously used by customers. Therefore, in addition to the technical development of new banking technologies, factors contributing to acceptance of these technologies by customers shall be taken into account. This paper presented a review of previous research and expert opinions, and simultaneously identified different factors influencing the acceptance and diffusion of electronic-banking (e-banking) in Iran. Afterwards, through an exploratory factor analysis, these factors were classified into the following three categories: perceived factors, technology characteristics, and external factors. Then, using the structural equations modeling (SEM) technique, the model of acceptance and diffusion of e-banking in Iran was developed. Research results indicated that there was a profound relationship between acceptance and diffusion of the technology (e-banking)

The elicitation of key performance indicators of e-government providers: A bottom-up approach

Copyright @ 2013 EMCIS.Delivering an adequate e-Government service (e-service) is becoming more of a necessity in today's digital world. In order to improve e-services and increase the engagement of both users' and providers' side, studies on the performance evaluation of such provided e-services are taking places. However a clear identification of the key performance indicators from the e-Government providers’ side is not well explored. This shortcoming hampers the conduct of a holistic evaluation of an e-service provision from the perspective of its stakeholders in order to improve e-services as well as to increase e-services take-ups. In this paper, a systematic process to identify indicators is implemented based on a bottom-up approach. The process used three focus-group meetings with providers, users, and academics in Qatar, Lebanon and UK to collect, identify and validate key indicators from the perspective of e-services’ providers. The approach resulted in the identification of five factors levels (service, technology, employees, policy and management and social responsibilities) with fifteen sub-categories of SMART variables. Hence, leading to the development of a new model, STEPS, that can fully explain and predict e-government success from the providers’ point of view. It will work as a strategic management tool to align various stakeholders on common goal and values based on evidence based evaluation of e-services using smart measurable indicators for the improvement of an e-service at the engagement level in the field of e-government. In addition, other fields can benefit from the outcome of this work, such as logistics service providers, who make their services available across new and existing relationships between the Internet commerce firms, their customers, and their vendors

Sri Lankan Citizens’ Use Behaviour towards E-Government Services

This research study focused on the main factors influencing Sri Lankan citizens’ adoption of e-Government services. After reviewing existing literatures on technology adoption, the researchers chose the UTAUT model and picked up key determinants from it. The researchers aimed at answering research questions and testing the credibility of hypotheses brought about from the model. Entire Sri Lankan populations’ internet users were selected as the population of this study and sample size was calculated properly for collecting data. Questionnaire was developed and made available in three languages; English, Sinhala and Tamil. Reliability test was carried out to see the internal consistency of the data. The collected data were analysed using SPSS 20 and Minitab 16, and Excel 2010 was also used at times. Correlation and regressions were calculated to see the underlying relationships among the constructs and their impacts. Analysis found that Performance Expectancy, Effort Expectancy, Social Influence had influence on Sri Lankan citizens’ Intention to Use e-Government services and this intention influenced Use Behaviour of the citizens. Keywords: E-Government, Adoption, UTAUT, Use Behaviour, Citizens, Sri Lank