Key Challenges for Establishing CIO Position in the Public Sector of LDCs: A Case of Bangladesh

Unprecedented growth of information and communications technology (ICT), calls for new public management, pressure from donors, citizen demand, and, above all, the government’s “Digital Bangladesh” political pledge provide impetus for integrating ICT in the public sector of Bangladesh. Despite efforts, the country cannot make sufficient progress in ICT due to the lack of IT structure led by a chief information officer (CIO) or similar leadership position. Although the literature describes various aspects of CIO including role effectiveness, competencies and structural relationship, it does not offer any prescriptive measure on how the CIO position should be established. Drawing on institutional theory, this research identifies critical challenges to establishing the CIO position in the public sector of Bangladesh. In-depth interviews with various stakeholders at different levels of the public sector reveal two critical challenges: a lack of organizational structure, and a lack of commitment at a policy level

USAF Aircraft Maintenance Officer Knowledge, Skills and Abilities and Commonalities among the Logistics Officer Corps

This study investigated options to improve 21A training and education by first validating the Air Force\u27s logistics mission sets as Deployment, Distribution, Supply Management, Repair Network Integration, Mission Generation, Lifecycle Logistics and Joint Logistics. Then, the Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities (KSAs) considered important to execute each mission set were gathered from a representative sample of Air Force Logistics Officers via field interviews and focus groups. An analysis of results categorizes probable needs (high, medium, low) of KSAs for each mission set and assesses how well they are currently taught, if at all. Additionally, lists of KSAs that overlap multiple mission sets were created along with process options for integrating them into training and education. Based on a discussion of the synergistic effects on acquiring these KSAs, it is also recommended that the Logistics Readiness Squadron be realigned under a common group at the operational wing with the rest of the Logistics Units (presently the Maintenance Group). Finally, a career tracking model is proposed to deliberately build experts in strategic 21A career paths, which this study identifies as Career Maintenance Officers, Air Force Materiel Managers and Joint Logistics Officers

Effect of Business Process Reengineering Factors on Organizational Performance: IT Capability as a Moderator

The main objective of this study is to examine the effects of the business process reengineering (BPR) factors on the Nigerian banks organisational performance. Additionally, this study also investigates the moderating effect of information technology (IT) capability in the relationship of BPR factors and the organisational performance. BPR factors are operationalised by change management, BPR strategy alignment, customer focus, management commitment, IT investment, and adequate financial resource. The IT capability dimensions include IT knowledge, IT operations and IT objects. Data was sent and collected through a hand-delivery method. A proportionate stratified random sampling was used for sample selection. 560 questionnaires were sent to banks’ managers but 417 of them were returned; giving a response rate of 74%. The findings were as follows: first, the findings show that fully supported relationships were found between IT capability and organisation performance. Second, the results showed that BPR factors such as adequate financial resources and management commitment were significantly related to overall organisational performance. Specifically, adequate financial resource's dimension was significantly related to cost reduction, customer service management and operations efficiency. Next, management commitment was found to be significantly related to customer service management and operation efficiency. Meanwhile, IT investment was significantly associated with customer service management. Other dimensions of BPR factors such as change management, customer focus, and BPR strategy alignment were found insignificant to the banks’ performance. Third, upon investigating the moderating effects of IT capability on the relationship between BPR factors and organisational performance, the results revealed mixed supports for the interaction effects of IT capability attributes. The outcome of this study provides important insights to both managers and researchers for further understanding on the effects of BPR factors and IT capability on organisational performance. The necessary suggestions on new area of research were recommended for future researchers

Restoring Confidence: A Qualitative Study of the Experience of Interim Commanding Officers in U.S. Navy Operational Units

Commanding officers in the United States Navy are entrusted by law with absolute authority, responsibility, and accountability. Despite a rigorous selection process, some commanding officers are relieved of command every year. In many cases, these commanding officers are replaced by interim commanding officers, leaders selected to fill the job for short periods of time. There is a gap in leadership literature about the phenomenon of interim command leadership in the Navy. This study investigated interim commanding officers\u27 experiences of taking command following the deliberate removal of the unit\u27s previous commanding officer. A review of current literature on the subjects of command at sea, leadership, organizational culture, and leading planned change in organizations was conducted to develop a basis for understanding existing theories about challenges facing incoming leaders, effective leadership behaviors to generate change within an organization, and recommended strategies for effecting organizational change. A qualitative research methodology was used to provide rich detail about the experiences of interim commanding officers and to develop theories grounded in the data. Eleven former Navy interim commanding officers were interviewed to obtain data to answer the following research questions: (1) What were the experiences and leadership challenges faced by interim commanding officers? (2) Which experiences, if any, differed from their first command tour? (3) What observations were made by interim commanding officers about the organizational culture and morale of the wardroom upon their arrival and departure from the unit? (4) Which leadership behaviors and strategies, if any, did interim commanding officers find useful to change the organizational culture and morale of the wardroom? The findings suggested that: (a) interim commanding officers experienced a higher degree of confidence entering the assignment than on their first command tour, (b) the unknown and not knowing who among the crew they could trust were challenges, (c) effects on the wardroom varied with severity of the incident, the crew\u27s perceived association with the event, and remoteness factors, and (d) that by modeling desired behaviors and focusing on communication, interim commanding officers restored confidence in leadership and mission readiness to the wardroom, the crew and external stakeholders

How to Generate More Value from IT: The Interplay of IT Investment, Decision Making Structure, and Senior Management Involvement in IT Governance

Information technology (IT) represents a large portion of an organization’s investments. Prior research has identified the linkage between IT investment and productivity. Numerous factors affect the value an organization can derive from its IT investment. However, extant literature has insufficiently studied IT governance’s impact on IT’s business value. In this study, we help to fill this gap by investigating the effects of IT decision making structure mechanisms and senior management’s IT governance involvement on the relationship between IT investment and organizational performance. This study builds on a novel framework that integrates two theories on IT in an organizational setting: strategic choice theory and contingency theory. We pool organization-level IT investment and IT governance practice data with other organization characteristics to investigate the moderating effects of IT governance practices. The empirical analyses reveal a positive moderating effect of IT decision marking structure mechanisms on the IT investment–organization performance relationship. Nevertheless, the results indicate that senior management’s IT involvement has no significant effect on this relationship. This study shows the importance of IT governance for organizations to effectively leverage their IT investment

The Chief Information Security Officer: An Exploratory Study

The proliferation and embeddedness of Information Technology (IT) resources into many organizations’ business processes continues unabated. The security of these IT resources is essential to operational and strategic business continuity. However, as the large number of recent security breaches at various organizations illustrate, there is more that needs to be done in securing IT resources. Firms, through organizational structures, usually delegate the management and control of IT security activities and policies to the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO). Nevertheless, there seem to be a number of firms without a CISO and for the ones that do, there is little consensus regarding who the CISO should be reporting to. This exploratory study investigates the organizational security reporting structures using a dataset of all the firms that hired a CISO between 2010 and 2014. The results suggest that the number of firms hiring CISOs is increasing and that the hired CISOs are predominantly coming from outside the firm. Also, CISOs who are hired to fill newly created positions tend to report to the CEO whereas replacement hires for existing positions tend to report to the CIO. These findings have implications for both academics and practitioners

In Brief

Table of Contents School of Law Leads in U.S.-China Legal Education with China Program Lonesome Road : Driving Without the Fourth AmendmentFaculty, Students and Alumni Play Major Role in Historic TrialProfessor Receives First NIH Grant to Study the Use of Genetic science by the Military (Mehlman)Breaking the Cycle of Unequal Treatment with Health Care Reform: Acknowledging and Addressing the Continuation of Racial Bias (Yearby)FUSION Program at the Forefront of Intellectual Asset Management and Technology-Based Economic DevelopmentForging Professional Readiness -- The Role of ExternsThe Value of a Legal Education (Cupar)Wilbur Leatherberry: A CWRU LiferLouise McKinney Leaves a Lasting LegacyCox Center Launches Talking Foreign Policy Radio ProgramFaculty BriefsForward Thinking Campaign Transformative to Law SchoolTransition from Deanship to Private Practice (Pierce)Commencement 2012The Value of My DegreeAcademic Centers & Law Journals Lectures and SymposiaEventsClass NotesIn MemoriamSchool of Law Launches Black Law Student Association Mentoring ProgramMaking Connections Programhttps://scholarlycommons.law.case.edu/in_brief/1092/thumbnail.jp

A new framework for the professional development and performance management of probationary constables

Policing, the enforcement of law and the keeping of order within society, is continually and increasingly under the public microscope. There are many varied and conflicting work doctrines, the control of which is partly directed by the chief officers that lead the police forces of England, Wales and Northern Ireland. For the police service, the assessment of the work that is carried out has to be justified before an increasingly large and critical audience. Within England and Wales, a relatively recent change in Government has itself led to a change of focus on policing issues and political examination from hitherto unknown quarters.Whilst policing in an environment of change and increasing political influence, individual police forces and their members are being increasingly held to account, not only for their performance but their actions leading to that performance. This research examines the problematic nature of measuring and developing performance within a police service that not only expects, but demands personal development and individual growth in an occupation seeking to become revered as a profession.The performance of the individual during the two year probation period is closely examined and has been re-designed within this research. It is suggested that during this period the focus of any police officer should be on the needs of the individual within a relevant policing context, not on the performance requirements of the policing environment that officer serves.The concepts of competency, competence, behaviour, skills and performance related tasks are all closely scrutinised and reviewed with a focal aim of increasing the effectiveness of police assessment. The links between these standard setting processes and performance assessment are examined. This will also assist the service members to become proclaimed as the professional police officers they seek to be.This work has remained iterative and qualitative throughout the research. Members of all police forces have been consulted and data is drawn from them all. Within national policing, each of the recommendations that have stemmed from the research have been tested and found to be agreeable. This agreement was drawn from members of the federated ranks (those lower and perhaps more pragmatic in the organisation), members of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), and the leaders and members of the strategic boards of the organisations concerned. It is recognised that for some, the recommendations are too progressive and could be viewed as 'revolutionary' and a step too far. The findings that emerge from this research involve at a strategic level recommending an additional role for the HMIC (Training) as a clearing house for police training research functions, the analysis of the role of the forthcoming police National Training Organisation. At a tactical level the research outlines a three dimensional model of police assessment to be used within any emerging police assessment/competency framework models as well as outlining how appraisals should embrace the advantages of including European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) processes within the structure of police officer assessment. This research recognises the link between organisational competence and the competence of individual employees and make these explicit within the overall umbrella of 'performance management'

Change management in the construction industry: a client's mechanism for control

This research project constitutes an attempt to improve the construction industry's change management process by introducing the Form 'X' Control Mechanism as the means of establishing an effective method of project control. The traditional practice in the construction industry of appointing the principal designer as team leader has been challenged with the main criticisms on the traditional practice being his, or her, lack of managerial ability and his, or her, failure to control the financial aspects of the project. The traditional approach has remained essentially unchanged for more than a century but it has become increasingly questioned as the primary means of design management. One aim of the research, therefore, was to ascertain whether the traditional practices currently is use in the United Kingdom and Hong Kong could be improved upon. The research began by examining basic systems and project management concepts and noted the development of project management systems and structures for the construction industry. This was illustrated by reference to a number of articles and it was possible to argue that the industry lacked a comprehensive change control methodology. The research also provided evidence that the mechanisms used to exercise control in manufacturing industries could not be used to exercise control over construction projects. This is due, in the main, to the relatively short duration of construction projects and the transient nature of project personnel. Having examined the difficulties, it has been possible to devise a control methodology which couples communication and control and this mechanism has been adapted to fit existing industry practices. Using this criterion it was possible to formulate a control procedure which obviates the difficulties which can arise using the traditional approach to change management. The Form 'X' mechanism requires the design team to quantify, in financial and programme terms, the effect of design or construction changes, and to obtain the client's specific authority prior to revising the works. In doing so the Project Manager is able to determine the magnitude of all changes in terms of time, money and quality. The system is sufficiently flexible to enable it to be used world-wide, on projects of varying contract values and duration, and it requires only minor modifications to meet the provisions of the standard building and civil engineering conditions of contract. A variant of the proposed methodology was introduced by Hong Kong's Mass Transit Railway Corporation and utilised on a number of projects. These contracts were examined in detail, as were a number of Mass Transit Railway Corporation contracts which utilised the traditional approach to project control. The analysis showed that all of the projects on which the Form 'X' system had been used had been completed close to their original contract value whilst a number of the projects which did not use the control methodology suffered from significant cost over-runs. It was concluded that the Form 'X' methodology successfully eradicates many of the control problems which permeate the traditional approach to change management embodied in the standard conditions of contract for building and civil engineering works. The Form 'X' control approach was also shown to be popular with the Hong Kong Mass Transit Railway Corporation's senior management team, as well as with the consultants employed in the construction of the railway. The conclusion of the research project is that the Form 'X' procedure is a highly successful change control methodology which could be used throughout the world on a wide variety of building and civil engineering projects

Exploring information systems development in English local government : a morphogenetic approach

This thesis examines the complex relationships between agency (Le. populations, organised groups,individual actors and collectivities), structure (Le. systems, institutions, roles, positions), and culture(ideas, theories, beliefs and values) in the specific context of cycles of information systems (IS)development and organisational change in English local government. Data for this analysis is drawn from a 15 month longitudinal case study of an English local authority. The morphogenetic approach - anon conflationary approach to the analysis of the agency/structure dynamic devised by Margaret Archer (1988, 1995, 1998b, 1998c, 2002) - was adopted for the research in order to avoid treating either agents or structures as largely epiphenomenal to each other.A detailed analysis of the IS environment of the case study organisation is presented. It shows how.cycles of IS development and organisational change in general were conditioned and/or shaped and transformed and/or reproduced over time by the agency/structure dynamic. The case study material also represents an example of an 'analytical history of emergence' that Archer (1995:294) proposes should result from the use of the morphogenetic approach.Detailed evidence of the causal processes, mechanisms, powers and tendencies that may operate in any IS/organisational development context is also analysed and this then forms the basis for a range of 'tendential predictions' to be made concerning the outcomes. Another outcome (of particular significance since Archer's approach to empirical research remains limited) is a valuable assessment of the utility of the morphogenetic approach when applied to the type of largely micro level case study research reported here. This assessment confirms Archer's claims for the approach's value as an instrument for the production of non conflationary practical social theory, but, in addition, a range of issues are identified which demonstrate that, 'without modification, the complexity and resulting resource intensity of the approach may well work against its more widespread adoption for this kind of social science research