Mapping factors influencing EAI adoption in the local government authorities on different phases of the adoption lifecycle

Several private and public organisations have adopted Enterprise Application Integration (EAI), however, its application in the Local Government Authorities (LGAs) is limited. Although, there exist few EAI adoption models, these models mainly focus on a number of different factors (e.g. benefits, barriers, cost) influencing the decision making process for EAI adoption. Moreover, these models do not illustrate which factor(s) influence the decision making process for EAI adoption on the adoption lifecycle phases. Literature indicates that the adoption process involves a sequence of phases an organisation passes through before taking the decision for adoption. This exemplifies that LGAs may also have to pass through several adoption phases before taking the decision to adopt EAI. However, due to the: (a) multiplicity of diverse EAI adoption factors and (b) not able to recognise which factor(s) influence EAI on adoption lifecycle phases, it may not be easy for LGAs to take decisions to adopt EAI by merely focusing on different factors. This may impede the decision making process for EAI adoption in LGAs. Notwithstanding, the implications of EAI have yet to be assessed, leaving scope for timeliness and novel research. Therefore, it is of high importance to investigate this area within LGAs and result in research that contributes towards successful EAI adoption. This paper makes a step forward as it: (a) investigates and proposes four adoption lifecycle phases, (b) validates the adoption lifecycle phases and (c) mapping the factors influencing EAI adoption on the adoption lifecycle phases, through a case study. Hence, it significantly contributes to the body of knowledge and practice. In doing so, providing sufficient support to the decision makers for speeding up the decision making process for EAI adoption in LGAs

Exploring knowledge management integration through EAI in local government domain

Information Technology (IT) infrastructure integration and knowledge management share communal objectives e.g. to make organisations more effective and efficient, agile and innovative, and more responsive to market changes. Such association when assimilates bona fide knowledge management philosophy, it offers the IT departments a headship opportunity for organisational transformation in affiliation with the rest of the establishment. Notwithstanding, in the context of Local Government Authorities (LGAs), the non-integrated nature of the IT infrastructure is associated with inefficient data and knowledge exchange and reduction in LGA services’ quality. Therefore, numerous data inconsistencies and redundancies occur that impact LGA services to their citizenry. LGAs have deployed Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) technological solutions to integrate their legacy with new developed Information Systems (IS). Literature indicates that EAI achieves integration at five layers namely: (a) connectivity, (b) transportation, (c) transformation, (d) process integration and (e) knowledge integration. This research adapts a Revised Model for Integration Layers (REAL) and tests through a case study in a local authority. The results indicate that cases leading to data inconsistencies and replication can be prevented by integrating knowledge through EAI

A conceptual model for EAI adoption in an e-government environment

The non-integrated nature of Local Government Authority (LGA) Information Systems (IS) is strongly associated with the inconsistency and duplication of data, reduction in data integrity and quality, and high operational and maintenance cost. The reason is that legacy IS within the LGAs are usually tailored to support particular business processes and functions and are as a consequence usually difficult to integrate. This gives rise to a strong need for an integrated architecture that facilitates reuse of existing applications and flexibly implementing business processes across the functional boundaries within the LGAs. This paper examines a potentially important area of IS integration in the United Kingdom (UK) LGAs through Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) technology. A review of the literature indicates that EAI has been a focal technology for several organisations in solving their integration problems. However, is new in the LGAs; thus research literature around it is limited. Yet the effect of IS integration using EAI technology remains under explored, as little research has been conducted to comprehend the LGAs perception of integration that influences their decisions and actions. The author demonstrates that it is of high importance to investigate this area within LGAs and result in research that contributes towards successful EAI adoption. Therefore, resulting in the development of a conceptual model that may be used to assist the government decision-making process for EAI adoption in an electronic Government (e-Government) environment

Attitudinal and behavioural determinants influencing decision makers when adopting integration technologies in local government

Over the last few years, the advent of innovative or revolutionary integration technologies has influenced pivotal decisions within top management to strategically transform Local Government Authorities (LGAs). These technologies may represent a huge cost for adopting LGAs, but may also offer the chance to achieve competitive advantage through superior service delivery. With the emergence of electronic Government (e- Government), LGAs are turning to integration technologies to fully automate and e-enable their business processes and integrate their IT infrastructures. While prior research on the adoption of integration technologies in the private and public domain has considered several determinants (e.g. benefits, barriers, costs), little attention has been given to investigate the attitudinal and behavioural determinants influencing top management’s decision making process for the adoption of integration technologies in LGAs. Notwithstanding, the implications of this research have yet to be assessed, leaving scope for timeliness and novel research. Therefore, it is of high importance to investigate this area within LGAs and contribute to the area of strategic decision making by examining attitudinal and behavioural determinants of top management in relation to integration technologies adoption

A conceptual model of enterprise application integration in higher education institutions

Copyright @ 2013 EMCIS.It is eminent that several applications’ systems are deployed at different levels in Higher Education (HE), ranging from academic and administrative to staff and students record systems. Many of these systems suffer from different problems due to the lack of integration such as data redundancy, inconsistency and maintenance cost. Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) can provide substantial benefits to these systems, such as assisting with business process integration, facilitating e-service based transformation and supporting collaborative decision-making. However, some factors that influence EAI adoption process in HE will be defined. This paper introduces a conceptual model to explain the outcome of using EAI in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). Analyzing the combination of the existing classification of EAI factors with the HE factors will enhance the implementation of EAI in HEI at both organizational and operational levels. A pilot study at King Abdulaziz University (KAU), Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will be presented in this paper to show that the integration of the multiple information systems gives an integrated view to facilitate information access and reuse. Moreover data from different information systems is combined to gain a more comprehensive basis to satisfy the educational needs

Investigating enterprise application integration (EAI) adoption in the local government authorities (LGAs)

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.This thesis focuses on investigating Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) adoption in the Local Government Authorities (LGAs). EAI has emerged to support organisations to integrate their Information Technology (IT) infrastructures and deliver high quality of services. Despite the fact that several private and public organisations have adopted EAI, its application in LGAs is limited. This may illustrate that LGAs develop EAI solutions at a slower pace and they can be characterised as a laggard comparing to other sectors. The small number of EAI applications in LGAs has resulted in limited research in this area with many issues, like its adoption requiring further investigation. Literature indicates various models that analyse various factors influencing EAI adoption in the private and public domain. However, the applicability and validity of these models is arguable and under research in LGAs, as these were proposed to support the decision-making process in other sectors and not in LGAs. To the best of the researcher's knowledge, none of the existing EAI adoption models explored the importance of factors during different phases of the adoption lifecycle. Notwithstanding, the implications of EAI have yet to be assessed, leaving scope for timeliness and novel research. Thus, the researcher demonstrates that it is of high importance to investigate this area within LGAs and result in research that contributes towards successful EAI adoption. This thesis makes a step forward and contributes to the body of knowledge as it: investigates factors influencing the decision making process for EAI adoption in LGAs (Figure 3.2), analyses and proposes the adoption lifecycle phases (Figure 3.3), maps and prioritises the importance of EAI adoption factors on different phases of the adoption lifecycle (Chapter 5 for empirical results) and in doing so, to propose a model for EAI adoption in LGAs (Figure 3.7). The researcher claims that such an EAI adoption process in LGAs is significant and novel as: it extends established norms for EAI adoption, by including Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) technique for prioritising the importance of factors, thus, enabling LGAs to produce more robust proposals for EAI adoption. The researcher discusses on EAI adoption by using a qualitative, interpretive, multiple case study research strategy. Findings from three case organisations exhibit that such an approach contributes towards more robust decisions for EAI adoption and indicates that it is acceptable by the case organisations. Despite these results cannot be generalised, yet they can allow others to relate their views with the ones reported in this thesis. This thesis proposes, tests and presents a novel model for EAI adoption in LGAs and contributes to the body of knowledge by extending the literature

Investigating enterprise application integration (EAI) adoption factors in higher education: an empirical study

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University LondonThe Higher Education (HE) sector of a country is a key area indicating the progress of cultural, political and social growth and development. Public and social demands as well as technological developments add new challenges for this sector. Consequently, higher education institutions have changed and a more flexible IT infrastructure is required to enable them to adapt efficiently to competitive business challenges. Enterprise application integration (EAI) is a technology that effectively integrates intra- and inter-organizational systems. Firstly a systematic review of the EAI literature was conducted. From this review, it was apparent that there are no theoretical models for EAI adoption and evaluation for higher education. Hence, this research contributes a conceptual model that includes influential factors derived from the literature and combines them with the proposed classification of influential factors for HE to produce an EAI conceptual model for the HE domain. To validate this proposed model empirical research was conducted. Then, the model was tested using a qualitative case study approach by means of three case studies that were conducted at different universities. Exploratory, explanatory and interpretive data analysis phases were implemented to find what is the current EAI process of HE and how these institutions currently work. In addition, these phases were employed to identify the EAI adoption factors in HE. As a result of this analysis the conceptual model was modified because of complementary factors that emerged. Therefore, the main contribution of this research is a comprehensive and novel model for EAI adoption in higher education area. The adoption EAI factors were identified by extracting a number of parameters from the empirical data. Several important factors that influence and assist the adoption of EAI in HE were identified. Hence, an additional contribution is the classification of factors in EAI adoption into technical and social factors which provides a better understanding of these factors. A further contribution is the derivation of a new classification of the EAI external and internal pressure factors. The development of a consistent model for the adoption and evaluation of EAI in HE is based on these factors

Towards a Conceptual Framework of Actors and Factors Affecting the EAI Adoption in Healthcare Organizations

The non-integrated nature of Healthcare Information Systems (HIS) is strongly associated with a reduction in the quality of care and the medical errors that occur. In particular, around 80,000 people die per year or paralyse in Australia due to problems related to medical errors and are mainly caused by the non-integrated nature of HIS. There is therefore a real need to integrate the Information Technology (IT) infrastructures, to improve the quality of care provided. During the last years much emphasis has been given on Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) technology to bridge heterogeneous systems. Although EAI is being widely used by public and private organisations, it is underutilised in the area of healthcare. Thus, it is of high importance to investigate this area and result in research that contributes towards successful adoption of EAI. Currently, much of the literature on EAI in healthcare has focused on the identification of the factors that influence its adoption. In this paper, the authors attempt to extend this research area, by identifying the actors involved in the EAI adoption process. In doing so, the paper describes the causal relationships among the healthcare actors and factors that influence its adoption. Thus, the paper results in a novel approach that: (a) identifies the healthcare actors that are involved in the EAI adoption process and (b) combines these actors with the factors influencing the adoption of EAI. The proposed approach is significant, as it (a) extends the existing models on EAI adoption by incorporating an actor-oriented analysis and (b) might enhance the decision-making process for EAI adoption by supporting a more detailed level of analysis

Towards a methodology for the development of integrated IT infrastructures

In this paper, the authors propose and validate a methodology for the development of integrated Information Technology (IT) infrastructures. The motivation for putting forward a new methodology is grounded on the limitations of the various software engineering methodologies (traditional) that exist today. Despite that the traditional methodologies result in the development of Information Systems (IS) from scratch, Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) builds integrated IT infrastructures using existing applications. This significant difference is associated with many issues needed to be realised and addressed like: (a) the changes that such an infrastructure brings to organisations, (b) the resistance to change and (c) the extension of IS lifecycle’s. The proposed methodology consist of eight stages and aims at supporting software engineers, organisations and researchers to build integrated IT infrastructures. As a result the methodology seeks to contribute to the body of knowledge